by Lexy Timms
Sometimes money could buy the very best things.
Ash didn’t wake up until Clyde pulled up to his apartment complex. He drew in a deep breath and grabbed his stuff, then made his way to his penthouse apartment. He was ready to fall onto his face and sleep the rest of the weekend away. Maybe when he woke again he’d book a trip to Italy. Or Australia. Or Hawaii. The surf was always good in the summertime in Hawaii.
But when he opened the door to his place, his worst nightmare came to life.
“Hello, son.”
Standing there, looking him in his eyes, was his mirror image. What Ash would look like when he was sixty-four years old. The hazel eyes. The faded freckles across his nose. The lean figure cut in an expensive suit that didn’t have a wrinkle in sight. The only thing that had changed—besides the crow’s feet—was his hair. Instead of it being the rich mahogany Ash had inherited, it was silver. Like a fox.
“What are you doing here?” Ash asked.
“We need to talk.”
“Yeah, well. I’m not really in the mood to talk, Martin.”
“I’ve been watching the papers.”
“Join the club,” Ash said.
“I’ve also seen the interview.”
“You and the rest of the nation,” he said.
“You really are dragging the Worthington name for a ride, son.”
“‘Son.’ You know that was the only time you ever called me ‘son’ growing up. When I was in trouble,” Ash said. “Are you here to tell me to stay away from women? To keep away from gold diggers? Because if you don’t mind, that’s what I’ve been trying to do my entire fucking life.”
“Actually, I’m here to tell you that this woman Mr. Rathbone is dragging through the mud is no different than any other woman you will encounter.”
Ash’s eyes panned up to his father as he slammed the door behind him.
“She’s what?” he asked.
“All women want money in exchange for services. If you think about it, the entire world works that way. Money in exchange for services. Goods. Luxury items. Homes. What do you think bills are, Ash?”
“You’re telling me all women are gold diggers and I should embrace that?”
“You have money, son. And your money buys the best of anything you could ever want. Women, included. Understand this now and know that love is nothing but a fairy tale. Take me for instance. I chased it for years and divorced twice before I understood that concept.”
“You cheated on Mom,” Ash said. “That isn’t love.”
“I thought I had found love. Ashly, I was chasing a fairy tale. The reason why it works with your stepmother and I—”
“That woman is not my stepmother. She’s younger than I am. She’s your playtoy,” he said.
“Exactly. And she knows her role. She gets my money, and I get her care. Her compassion. Her body. She gets to upkeep herself, and I get her company. She gets my money, and I get her unwavering support no matter what. That’s how this works with men like us, Ash. Money in exchange for services.”
“Are you serious right now?” Ash asked.
“All I’m saying, son, is that you need to get ahead of this. If you like this girl, then set up the relationship on your own terms. Use her while she uses you. If two people can provide mutual needs, then both of you will rise to the top.”
“Get out.”
“I’m saving you from a world of heartache.”
“Get out, Martin.”
“Ashly—”
“Now, Father.”
Ash eyed his father carefully before the man cleared his throat. He nodded curtly before walking to the door, leaving Ash standing there with his mind at a complete standstill. He was disgusted by his father’s words. But it shouldn't have shocked him at all. It was that same kind of thinking that made Ash’s entire childhood a very special hell. It was why he began avoiding his parents at all costs when his trust fund was released to him. He didn’t want to think like his father. He didn’t want to be anything like his parents. He wanted to believe that love was out there for him. That a real woman could come into his life, turn it upside down, and sweep him off his own feet.
He wanted to believe there was more to life and love and romance than money.
His phone rang and he groaned. He picked up his shit and dragged it to his room before he sat down onto the bed. He pulled out his phone and answered it, not bothering to look at who it was before he put it to his ear.
“What?” Ash asked.
“Mr. Worthington. It’s Chanel.”
He furrowed his brow before he looked at his watch.
“Didn’t I just call you, like, three hours ago?”
“And you told me to put a rush on things. Did you not?” she asked.
“You’ve already got something.”
“I do. Because Mr. Rathbone is nothing, if not sloppy. Here’s the problem. All of what I’ve found can’t be held up in a court of law. So if you’re thinking about taking him to court for some sort of—”
“No one is settling anything in court,” he said curtly. “What is it?”
“I cashed in a couple of favors and pulled phone records. Both Rathbone’s and Miss Semple’s.”
“How do you know her name?” Ash asked. “Sorry. Shit question. The interview. Got it. Continue.”
“Mr. Worth—”
“Ash, please.”
“Ash,” she said, “there’s no evidence of those messages being sent from Kallie’s phone. From the records I received, she didn’t even send text messages during her time on the island. Only a few phone calls. All to the same number. Once I figured that out, I had my friend use some not-exactly-legal methods to hack into Rathbone’s phone.”
“You can do that?” Ash asked.
“Yes, but if anyone asks? No, I never would.”
“Got it. What did you find?”
“I found his phone applications. Specifically, which ones he had and when they were downloaded. And two weeks ago, guess what was downloaded onto his phone?”
“What?” he asked.
“Spoof. It’s an application designed specifically to curate fake text messages and text message conversations.”
“Wait, those exist?”
“There’s an app for everything, Ash. So I dug a little deeper and did some basic comparing. Those pictures. You know, the ones of you and Miss Semple as well as her and Rathbone?”
“Yes?” he asked. “What about them?”
“If that picture of the two of them kissing was taken the night before all of this first hit the tabloids, then it matches.”
“What matches?”
“The night of that kissing picture and him downloading that application onto his phone. It happened all in the same night. And it gets better. The time the application was downloaded was 11:04 that evening.”
“That would’ve been after the restaurant,” Ash said.
“More than likely.”
“Not more than likely. I know it was. I came by to check on her that night around ten thirty. She was already at her apartment.”
“That’s what I have. I’m working on curating Rathbone’s reputational profile now.”
“Thanks, Chanel. And expect your bonus to hit tonight,” he said.
“I’ll call you when I’m done piecing together this profile,” she said.
Ash hung up the phone call in a daze. None of that was definitive proof, but it sure as hell was convincing circumstantial proof. It was more than enough to consider going to talk with Kallie again. But to what end? He’d berated her. Embarrassed her. Said such horrid things to her.
“Fuck!”
Ash threw his phone against the wall and it splintered into a million tiny pieces. He felt his heart racing out of control. His conversation with his father was ricocheting around in his head and the conversation with Eris and Jeremy was ringing in his ears. He placed the heels of his hands to his temple and pressed as hard as he could. Until all of the voices silenced, and h
e was left with nothing but his own voice.
The small, whispering voice that had been so beaten down by betrayal and conspiracy and alcohol.
And his tiny little voice only had one thing to say.
Work it out.
Three words. Three words that held the weight of the world. Was that a thing he could do? Were things salvageable between him and Kallie? What Chanel had told him, it was breathtaking. It fit more with Kallie’s story than it did with James’s interview. Could it be that he really had gotten this all wrong? And if he did, would it matter at that point? The things he’d said to Kallie ... all of the names he had called her. It sickened him. Standing in the light of what could be possible shed a new light onto his interactions with her over the weekend and he cursed himself.
Ash was an idiot.
He didn’t want to be like his father. He didn’t want to always assume women were using him. And the more he turned everything around in his head, the faster he paced. And the faster he paced, the quieter all the voices became. And the quieter they became, the more his headache dissipated. Then, for the first time in almost two weeks, he could think clearly.
Kallie wasn’t that type of girl.
And he wanted another chance.
He had no idea if she would give it to him. He had no idea if he even deserved a third chance. The voice message Eris had played for him was right. Ash hadn’t been the man he’d shown himself to be on the island, and that sent Kallie running. And for a good reason. And now, he stood on the precipice of possibly begging her for yet a third chance.
How many chances had she given James?
Would that someone make him like her ex?
Fuck, he didn’t know. All he knew was he had to try. He didn’t know what he would say or how he would approach her or if she would even agree to talk to him, but he had to try. If there was any possibility that Kallie hadn’t done anything wrong, then he was an ass and she deserved an apology.
But more than that, it meant he hadn’t placed his trust in the wrong person. Hadn’t placed his love in the wrong woman.
And to Ash? That would always be worth chasing down. No matter how many times it took him to get it right.
Chapter 9
Kallie
Tuesday morning and Kallie was back in the office. Back to the grind of organizing the world while hers fell apart. She sent off some invoices and took a couple of videoconference calls with people who had set up one-time appointments for her to go over their schedules. If they wanted to talk about the interview that had been blasted on television, they didn’t mention it. And Kallie was thankful for it. The last thing she needed was people setting up conferences and appointments with her only to corner her about what was going on in her life.
But she figured it was only a matter of time before someone tried that route.
All Kallie did was go through the motions. Sending out quotes, sending out invoices, taking a phone call. Sending out quotes, making more appointments, shuffling things around. Her job felt like a lie. Her apartment felt too empty. Everything in her world was wrong. Slanted. Fake. And she didn’t see a way out of it or a way to fix it. The only good thing was that she didn’t see things getting any worse. Which meant the only way she could go from where she stood was up.
Until a knock came at her door.
“Come in,” Kallie said.
Her eyes panned up to the door as they opened and a familiar figure stepped in. Her heart stopped in her chest. Blood rushed loudly through her ears. She not only wanted him to shut the door behind him, but she also wanted to kick him out. To yell and scream and beat on his chest. Those brooding hazel eyes and that dust of freckles upon the skin of his nose.
What the hell was Ash doing at her place of work?
“Can we talk?” he asked.
“Are you serious right now?” Kallie asked.
“I know it’s a lot to ask—”
“You’re damn right it’s a lot to ask. And at the risk of conserving energy, I’ll only say this. You said all you had to at the Hamptons. I’m a gold digger and you’re not interested. Now get out.”
“I’m sorry, Kallie.”
“Get the fuck out,” she said.
“I know I’m in the wrong,” he said.
“I don’t give a damn what yo—wait. What?” she asked.
Had she heard him right?”
“I know you aren’t that type of person,” Ash said as he approached her desk.
She closed her laptop quickly and wheeled her chair away from her desk. Pushed herself all the way to the wall to put as much distance between him and her as she could. The pained look on his face was like something out of The Twilight Zone.
“You do,” she said.
“I do,” Ash said. “I know you didn’t send those text messages. I know James is lying.”
“Where is all of this coming from?” she asked breathlessly.
Ash sighed before he raked his hand through his thick mahogany hair.
Hair that Kallie missed touching herself.
“I called my family’s private investigator and had her look into things.”
“Your family has a personal PI?” she asked.
“It’s a long story, but yes. She’s on retainer for us. She looked into some things and used some not-so-legal tactics to piece parts of the story together.”
“Uh-huh.”
“The short version? James downloaded an app called Spoof. And your official phone records show you only made phone calls on the island. You didn’t send text messages.”
“You know that doesn’t one hundred percent prove my innocence,” she said.
“I don’t need one hundred percent. All I needed was the truth about those texts.”
“I’m not so sure about that,” she said.
“I am.”
“Ash, this trust thing didn’t go one way. It went both ways. You stand here and you think you’ve got enough information that proves what I was telling you in the first damn place, but you’re working under the assumption that I trust you,” she said.
The look on Ash’s face broke her heart, but she had to stand up for herself. He couldn't keep volleying between being angry with her and being friendly to her. She wasn’t a rag doll to be tossed around.
“You don’t trust me anymore,” Ash said.
“Of course I don’t trust you, Ash!” Kallie exclaimed as she rose from her chair. “Look at all the things you’ve said to me! You can’t jump to conclusions just because someone says something bad about me. That isn’t how this works. You have to be able to trust me because of the person I am. Not the person people tell you I am. Especially people I have history with. An ex who I was supposed to marry. If you always jump to those kinds of conclusions, then we have absolutely no foundation on which to build any sort of a relationship!”
Kallie drew in a deep breath as her heart began to race.
“I’m sorry, Kallie. I don’t know what else to say other than that. Other than I’m working on changing who I am because I know I’m flawed.”
“And that’s great for you,” she said.
“I do want to trust you. And I know you don’t believe that, but I do. I really do. I want to prove myself to you. Will you let me do that?”
“This isn’t just about us, Ash,” she said breathlessly. “It’s all over the media. Still plastered all over the tabloids. We live in a fishbowl, and this kind of thing is going to continue popping up over and over and over again if we get back together.”
“Kallie, please—”
“Stop it, Ash.”
Kallie was finding it hard to keep her resolve. But she had to, because she’d taken all of Monday to think about it. And even if she still cared about him and even if she did want to be with him, fundamentally they couldn’t be together. He didn’t have the capacity to trust and she didn’t have the capacity to defend herself. No matter what steps they took together, the media would always pick them apart. Always scrutinize them. She would for
ever be watched. Judged for the actions she took. And Ash as well. That was how the media worked.
That wouldn’t change simply because Ash wanted to work on himself.
“Working on yourself is a great thing,” Kallie said, “and you should do that. Whether or not a woman is in your life. It’s obvious you’ve been drinking a lot. I can see it in your eyes. You can start working on that.”
“Am I talking to Pretty Kallie or Kallie Semple.”
“Is there a difference?” she asked. “Does there have to be?”
Ash sighed before he leaned his shoulder into the wall.
“The first step is you ditching the alcohol. You’re Ashly Worthington. Act like it,” she said. “Then your second thing is to address this issue you have with trusting others. Because it’s destroyed something you obviously want.”
“So that’s a ‘no’ then?” he asked.
“I have a life already, Ash. A life that is still floating about despite what happened with the interview. That was the constant through all this. Not you. My career was here. My customers were here. The need for my expertise was here. You were the one that left, Ash.”
“I know,” he said with a sigh.
“Maybe we could’ve lived our lives in the media spotlight had we come out to the public in a more subtle or more positive fashion. But we didn’t. James manipulated the media narrative to fit whatever motive that was driving him, so our relationship will always be looked at from that lens. If we get back together, we’ll be hunted, Ash. The press will come for our private life and try to destroy its very foundation before we can get it off the ground. And you’ve already trusted the press over me once.”
“It won’t happen again, Kallie. I swear it.”
“You can swear all you want, but all I have to go on is past behavior. And if we really want to get nasty, you’ve got distrusting me, slandering me in public, and lying. At my very worst, I’ve got ‘hearing my ex out after running away to an island,’” she said.
