“Is your mom happy?” I ask gently.
He shrugs. “I have no idea. I think she’s happy to know Josh and I are taken care of for life. Her happiness died with my dad.”
“That’s so sad, Ash,” I murmur, pushing food around my plate.
“Yeah.” He sighs. “Fucking is, isn’t it?”
We’re both quiet for a while, not really eating but moving food around our plates. I sip at my milkshake, thinking how much has changed in three and a half years. I’d never really noticed until my life crumbled around me. Seeing Ash awoke a part of me that was buried under social status and the shallow life of being on top, yet I crave to have the status back. I might remember my time with Ash and the simplicity of being a kid, but I can’t go back. I don’t know how, and even if I did, I’m not sure I would.
The Upper East Side is my life now. Albany Nightingale is my school, and I can either spend the next couple of years being an accepted member of the circle or being stepped upon by them. My mother has pushed me for a reason—wealth and status matter in this world. The world my mother was born into anyway. How you get the status doesn’t really matter. As long as I keep it and the secrets I carry never come out, I’ll always be on top, with everything I could ever want at a snap of my privileged fingers.
“Well, I put us off our food with my depressing life. Why don’t you tell me yours?”
“You know most of it, Ash. My dad’s most likely going to prison. He blames it on trying to please my mother. My mother blames it on him and says he’s always been a criminal. Honestly, I don’t know who to believe. My mum doesn’t usually lie to me, but then I didn’t think my dad did either. But why would my mother have stayed with him if she knew what he was like?”
“What does she say?”
I laugh. “She’s blaming it on love.”
“You don’t believe her?”
Running a hand through my hair, I take a moment to really let his question sink in. “I do, but I also believe she loved being rich more than having morals.”
“She was maybe trying to protect you?” he offers.
“Maybe. And maybe she was just protecting herself. She knew what he was doing and lived with him for years while she started her own business so she could get out.”
“You don’t believe her?”
“She’s got my grandparents. And I just don’t buy that it took her time to rebuild her relationship with them.” Groaning, I cover my face. “Or maybe I just want to be angry at her because she’s here for me to be mad at.”
Ash looks at my plate. “You finished?”
“Yeah, kinda lost my appetite.”
He stands, throws some notes on the table, and holds out his hand. “Let’s go to Central Park.”
Chapter 14
Central Park in summer was beautiful, but autumn is breathtaking. Yellow and orange leaves litter the pathways as we walk hand in hand around the lake and then toward quieter areas. Trees tower above me, their golden hues brilliant against the blue sky. The further we walk, the further away my worries seem to be. Sophia is a horrible distant nightmare, which I could have imagined, and my father’s crimes are far from my mind. We don’t mention school, or home, or the fact we are holding hands when he has a girlfriend.
Today we exist out of time. Today we are Ash and Rose, the kids who didn’t change. Winding through one of Central Park’s many wooded areas, Ash pulls me off the track with a charming smile and guides us through the trees.
“Don’t get us lost,” I warn half-heartedly. Getting lost with Ash wouldn’t be all that bad.
It takes me a moment to recognize the secluded grassed area. The trees aren’t as lush and leaves cover the lawn, but as Ash turns and grins, pulling me to the ground with him, I am transported back in time.
I’m laughing as he flips me over onto my back and comes up over me, but as his warm eyes seek mine, it dies in my throat as far deeper, confusing emotions take over. I know what he’s going to do before he does it. Ash gives me plenty of time to pull away. His heated gaze falls to my lips, and a small sigh slips out before they touch mine. It’s innocent and soft at first, much like the first time we kissed in this spot, but within seconds, we cross that line.
His hand cradles the back of my head as he deepens the kiss, dipping his tongue into my mouth. The other roams my body, sending delicious sensations across my skin. I arch into his touch, moaning as his fingers find their way below my shirt and onto bare skin. The rigid hard length of him presses against my thigh, his leg thrown over mine, trapping me beneath him.
It’s more than a kiss. It’s more than an act of lips meeting lips and bodies pressing together. I’m overwhelmed with sensation, hazy with a need that consumes. Our movements are desperate and greedy, the sounds escaping us breathless gasps. I have been kissed many times, but not once when Luke touched me did I respond as I do with Ash. With not just my body but my heart.
He’s dangerous. He’s going to break me, and yet I can’t stop. This feeling, this freedom, this second in time when I am nothing but sensation and lust… it’s worth the risk.
It’s worth the shattering of my heart.
“What are you doing to me?” Ash rasps, resting his forehead on mine as he pants heavily.
I don’t answer. I can’t. I’m fighting the need to drag his lips back to mine. I’m restless beneath him, gripping the grass as I struggle to contain the emotions he’s released.
“We shouldn’t,” Ash whispers, but his body tells another story.
“We shouldn’t,” I agree as his lips find their way back to me.
Pushing Ash onto his back, I straddle him, claiming his mouth as he moans aloud.
“Jesus, Rose,” he whispers between kisses. “Stop. We need to stop.”
His hands graze my leg, trailing up and beneath my skirt. Cupping my ass, Ash makes an incomprehensible noise as his lips devour mine with renewed intensity.
We are lost. We are two bodies fighting to become one. A small voice whispers for me to stop, but it’s drowned out by the insatiable desire coursing through my veins. I’m pushing his jacket from his shoulders, pulling his T-shirt over his head. He looks as gorgeous as I imagined, and my hands roam the dips and planes of his chest, memorizing every inch of skin. My shirt’s unbuttoned, my skirt pushed up around my waist.
Sitting up, I smile down at him as he searches my face. I see the moment it changes, feel his pain echoed within myself. Lust fades from his eyes as he sadly runs his hands up my body and cups my cheek.
“You’ll regret this if we go any further,” he murmurs. “And I don’t want you to regret me.”
Rolling off him, I readjust my skirt and lay on my back beside him, buttoning up my shirt. “I could never regret you, Ash. I’m beginning to think you’ve been the only real thing in my life.”
He takes my hand, squeezes. “Do you remember the cloud you insisted looked like a chicken?”
I smile. “It did.”
“Did not.” He chuckles.
“Well then, neither did your ship.”
Lifting an arm, he points. “There’s a car.”
“That’s a weird-looking car, Ash.”
“Fine. Your turn.” Searching the sky, I take my time before pointing out a wispy cloud. “Fish.”
“What type of fish?” he questions.
“I don’t know. A thin one.”
He bursts out laughing, and I join him, the sadness lingering between us disappearing. There will be plenty of time for sadness when today ends. When Ash returns to his golden throne, and I return to my crumbling castle. This time is ours and while it lasts, I’m determined to hold onto my happiness even as the first fine cracks begin to splinter across my heart.
It’s late when we finally part. Night has fallen over New York City, and our day out of time has come to an end. We drag out the moment, sitting together in the back of a cab as it idles outside my building. Ash doesn’t speak aloud, but I see all he wants to say in the heavy sadness clouding his ey
es.
We’ve become lost, changed by the circumstances of our lives, with no idea how to get back to who we once were. The feelings are there, the first innocent sparks of love from our youth, which could easily become an inferno and burn us both. But it cannot be allowed to grow. Ash and I are on different sides of the line, and crossing it isn’t a risk he’s willing to take.
I understand, even if it hurts. Ash has his mom and brother to think of. He has expectations to live up to. I know better than most how easily it can all be taken away, and unlike me, Ash’s family doesn’t have wealthy grandparents to fall back on.
“There’s always art,” Ash murmurs.
“I know.”
“Are you going to be okay tomorrow going to school?” he asks.
“She’s outed my biggest secret. There’s nothing more she can do to me.”
“Just be careful, okay.”
I laugh. “This isn’t the first time someone has tried to take me down, Ash.”
The cab driver shuffles in his seat, his cough obviously fake. Our time is up.
Ash glances at him and back to me. “Bye, Rose.” The same sense I had when my father said goodbye sits heavy in my gut. This isn’t the same; I’ll see Ash again. Yet my heart knows it will never be the same.
“Bye,” I whisper.
He leans in, kissing me softly one last time, his hand cupping my face with a tenderness that breaks me. A single tear rolls down my face, and he brushes it away with his thumb as he releases my lips.
“I wi—”
I cut Ash off. “Don’t. Don’t say it. I’ll see you around, okay?”
My emotions shut down as a cold numbness seeps over my skin. Hurt and longing fill Ash’s face, but it can’t reach me over the invisible wall I’ve built between us. I’m ice. Frozen down to my very core so my heart will never feel again.
Reaching for the door, I pull the handle and push it open. The chilly autumn air wraps around us. Climbing out, I look back one last time, a smile on my lips that doesn’t quite fit. It’s as if I’ve detached from my body—I move and talk, but none of it really sinks in.
“Rose,” Ash gasps, reaching out for me.
His pain splinters the ice, shattering through the walls I built to survive. I feel it right down to my core, and for a moment, we reach out to each other across time and space. The kids we used to be and the adults we’ve become clashing and becoming one.
“It’s okay,” I lie, because it never will be again. “It’s okay.”
The car pulls away and Ash’s face grows smaller and smaller through the back window of the car. The world carries on around me, but I can’t move, even when the car is gone, and Ash’s pain is too far away to reach me. I stand, and I watch. To move would mean it’s over. To move would mean the line has been drawn and, for all my bravo and sass, the truth is I’m not sure I’m going to be okay tomorrow.
My secrets are out. My closet is wide open. They’ve no ammo left to fire. Except there’s no point firing at an opponent who’s already broken. I’ll hold my head up high. I’ll plaster a smile onto my face. But unless I find and expose their secrets, the war will be over before it has begun.
Chapter 15
“Do you realize what time it is?” my mother snaps as I walk through the apartment door.
Walking into the open kitchen, I glance at the clock on the wall. 11 o’ clock… oops.
“Your phone is switched off,” she continues, striding toward me. “I’ve been trying you all day.”
I shrug. It’s all I have left in me to offer. It’s not enough for my mum; her face heats with anger.
“Do you have any idea how worried I was? School rang me this morning to say you’d not arrived. Where have you been, Rose?”
“I went to school, but then I left,” I answer tonelessly.
“That’s it? That’s all the explanation you have for me? You left?”
Opening the fridge, I pull out a half-full bottle of wine and find myself a glass.
“What do you think you are doing?”
Taking a leaf out of your book. “Drinking away my sorrows, Mother.”
There is nothing left inside me. I can’t even find the energy to explain and try to put into words the emotions I feel.
“What has gotten into you?” Her voice rises, her face taut.
Gulping down half my glass, I relish the burn of my throat and the heat that pools in my stomach. But it only adds to the emptiness inside me. Looking my mother in the eyes, I speak, my voice dull and devoid of emotion. “What has gotten into me? Well first, there’s my lying, scheming parents and the fact my father’s most likely off to prison and I’m not sure when I’m going to see him again, because despite all he’s done, I still love him, which is crazy really because I also hate him more than anything too. Oh yeah, and then there’s the fun fact that when I arrived at school this morning, some lovely person took it upon themselves to photoshop a picture of me into a mug shot, along with my father’s scandalous news articles, and the delightful hate mail people are leaving me on social media.”
She stares at me, the anger draining from her face.
I shrug. “So yeah, I took a day off school. Might do the same tomorrow and the next year too.”
Draining the last of my glass, I drop it back down onto the counter a little too harshly and head for my bedroom. My mother takes so long to respond, I’m already undressed and in bed by the time she walks through my bedroom door.
“I’ll ring school in the morning and make excuses for your absence, but Rose, you are going back tomorrow. I’m sorry this has happened to you. I’m sorry for not being able to protect you from the fall out of our actions, but I cannot let you give in.”
“I’m not giving in. I’m beaten. They’ve beaten me, Mother.”
Approaching my bed, she looks down at me, arms crossed, expression determined. My mother doesn’t give out hugs often; she gives out pep talks, and even those sound more like insults.
“No, Rose. They’ve won round one, and I did not raise you to bow out at the first hurdle.”
“I don’t care, Mum. I don’t care about any of it anymore. Your little queen is ruined, and it wasn’t Sophia who did it.”
Her gaze hardens. “Fine. But if you give up now, all you’ll ever be is the girl whose father destroyed her dreams.”
“And you’ll be the woman who married a con man,” I spit back.
“Now that’s where you’re wrong, Rose. I refuse to let that be my story. Yes, the man I loved was a liar with a tendency to twist the law, but I will be the woman who rose up even as her world fell apart. I’ll be the woman who built her life again from scratch.”
I laugh bitterly, hitting my pillow as I turn away from her. “From Grandpa’s wallet, you mean.”
Her footsteps retreat from my room, but I don’t look up again. I can’t, because as much as I hate her for being the mother with pep talks and harsh realities, she’s right. My father’s betrayal could have destroyed her. She has every right to be hiding from the world and crying under her covers but instead, she walks out the door every morning with her head held high. A survivor, not a victim.
“Get some sleep, Rose, things will be clearer in the morning.” My mother’s voice drifts through the door.
But I honestly don’t think they will be.
***
By morning my head is heavier, not clearer. But even though I can’t see my path forward, I walk ahead anyway. Maybe I’ll find light in the dark, or maybe my road will become murkier, but it is a journey I have no choice but to take.
I can’t change what my father has done, or what I’ve lost, but I can choose how it will affect me.
Dressed and ready for school, I look at my reflection in the mirror. There is no evidence of the emotions swirling below the surface. I am the perfect socialite. My mask hides every imperfection.
“You’re stronger than your emotions,” I whisper to myself.
“Rose?” My mother knocks before opening
my door. “Oh. You’re up.”
The fact she’s so surprised shows just how bad I looked last night. I smile, the action almost robotic by now. “Yes, I’m up.”
“Right… well, I made breakfast.”
Normally when my mother says she’s made food, what it actually means is she’d ordered it from a restaurant or had a staff member cook for us. Since we don’t have staff to cook anymore, I presume she’s been out and brought something back from a café, but as I enter the kitchen, I see bowls piled up in the sink and flour dusted across the kitchen surfaces.
“You made pancakes,” I stammer, shocked.
“There’s no need to sound so surprised. I can cook, you know.”
“Hmm… no, I actually didn’t.” I laugh, sitting at the breakfast bench.
“Here.” She huffs, handing over maple syrup. “Eat.”
“Thanks,” I mumble. I’m not sure what is stranger, the fact my mother cooked or that we’re sitting and eating together. But before the whole scenario can throw me off balance, my mother opens her mouth, and we are instantly back to being the dysfunctional family I grew up with.
“I grew up in this world, Rose, and I assure you they are not as invincible as they appear.”
“I know that, Mother. It’s not much different from London. It’s finding something that can be used against them.”
She puts a piece of pancake in her mouth while she mulls over my words.
“It’s Sophia Kincaid, right?” I nod. “I knew her mother, Isabelle, in school. She wasn’t very bright, Rose. Just a pretty face, and her daughter will be the same.”
“Yeah, but Sophia has Grayson Bishop whispering in her ear. It’s him I need to take down.” Without Ashton being collateral damage.
My mother shakes her head. “The Bishop men are known to be the biggest womanizers on the Upper East Side. There must be dirt there. Then there’s the Brooklyn boy Arthur adopted. I know you knew him once, but he is not that boy anymore.”
The Destruction of Rose: A High School Bully Romance (Albany Nightingale Duet Book 1) Page 10
