Love Disregarded

by Rachel Blaufeld

  Nothing.

  With my tail between my legs, I went to get my kids and took them home with me, playing both mommy and daddy for the evening instead of reunited lover.

  Bexley

  I didn’t know what to do, so I ran.

  In a matter of hours, I’d regressed from a competent, resilient adult to a needy young woman. I needed perspective and information, and there was only one place to get it.

  Bringing my kids home would have only been a Band-Aid to my pain. Instead, I grabbed a box of cheap wine and hightailed it to Tahoe.

  “Mike home?” I asked when Milly answered the door, the box under my arm.

  “He’s out back with the kids, pretending to watch them, but really checking baseball scores on his phone.”

  “Great. I need to ask him some questions.”

  I barged inside and made my way to the patio, dramatically throwing open the French doors. It was one of those perfect backyards surrounded by perfect trees to match their perfect life.

  Their kids were splashing in the pool, floodlights illuminating the idyllic scene.

  “What happened?” Milly chased after me, trying to calm me down. With her hand wrapped around my arm, she tugged me to a stop.

  “Take your hand off me. I’ve been manhandled enough today. Take the kids for ice cream. I need Mike. When you come back, we’ll talk.”

  “Bexley, I don’t think I should leave you here. I don’t think Mike will like that.”

  “Go, Milly. I need this. Just go.” I pushed a strand of hair out of my eye, careful not to drop my wine, and yanked free from her grasp.

  I didn’t wait for an answer before I stomped toward the pool. “Hey, Darcy! Hey, little buddy,” I said, smiling at their son. “Mom’s gonna take you for a treat. Go dry off!”

  A trail of hoorays and dripping water followed them into the house.

  “Bexley?” Mike looked up from his phone at me, one eyebrow raised.

  “Put the phone down. We have to talk.”

  “Huh-uh. Not doing this.” He stared me down and started to stand.

  “Guess who showed up at my house today?” Without pausing, I spat out, “Aston—that’s right. So, sit down. We’re going to talk for once.”

  “I didn’t have anything to do with that,” he said, raising his hands in surrender before he sat back down.

  I set the wine box on the table next to him, then crossed my arms over my chest as I towered over him. “When he showed up at my door, I asked if you gave him my address, and he said you did. Told me about his innocence, his divorce, made a move on me, and then hightailed it out of there to rescue his kids from his wife. His ex, or whatever she is.”

  Mike shook his head. “I didn’t give him your address, but that’s easy enough to google, Bex. I didn’t have anything to do with this, so what do you want from me?”

  “I want you to give me the SparkNotes on the last ten years.”

  Mike let out a frustrated sigh. “No can do.”

  “You can and you will.” I tipped the nozzle of the box into one of the plastic glasses out by the pool and took a healthy swig of wine.

  “Stop standing over me and bossing me around, Bexley. I told you after Milly and I got married, when you woke up hanging over the toilet, barf stuck in your hair, your pregnant belly hitting the floor, that I was never getting in the middle of you and Aston.”

  When he tried to stand again, animosity surged through my veins. Furious, I pushed him back into the lounge chair.

  “Listen to me, Mike. I need to know what the hell is going on. Is the guy a criminal? Is Aston, the only man I’ve ever loved, a criminal? Was he happy with this wife? Is he happy now? Why would he show up at my house like that? Didn’t he think Seth might be there?”

  Mike shook his head at that.

  “So, you told him we split? The rule didn’t work both ways? Milly respected his silence and confidence, but you betrayed mine?”

  He shook his head again, and I felt like tossing his stubborn ass in the pool.

  Slamming the end of his chair with my foot, I jostled him. “Wake up and answer me!”

  “You have to calm down, Bex. Sit down.”

  Closing my eyes, I counted to ten in my head. When that didn’t calm me down, I took another gulp of wine, letting the alcohol coat my soul. Like a wet noodle, I flopped into the chair next to Mike.

  “Breathe,” he told me, and I did.

  In and out, in and out, my lungs gasped for fresh air.

  Finally seeming convinced that I’d calmed down, Mike said, “I never wanted to have this conversation, understand me?”

  I nodded, leaning forward in the chair. With sweat dripping down the back of my neck and my hair a frizzy mess, I waited for him to elaborate.

  “I wanted Aston to make a life for himself, and Milly wanted you to be happy. But neither of you did that. After he ended things with you, he thought you’d wait for him. He’d planned to convince his dad you were the only choice for him. But you married Seth and pushed out two babies, so Aston married Cass. His stepmom picked her, and he agreed to it.”

  Stunned, I dropped into the chair. My lungs hurt from trying to breathe. “I didn’t know. He was so mean, leaving me like he did, just waiting. Nothing but a phone call telling me he’d moved on like his dad wanted him to.”

  “When you showed up at our wedding, pregnant for a second time, he went crazy. He spent a week drinking and destroying everything in his path. The next month, he took Cass to Vegas and married her.”

  “We always wanted to get married in Vegas,” I whispered to myself.

  “In less than two years, you made a life. He had nothing, so he grabbed what was available. Except the fucker was never happy and worked all the time. He couldn’t hire enough people to be with the kids, and Cass drank all the time. It was a clusterfuck.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “We had an arrangement, or did you forget? We didn’t talk about Aston, and he and I didn’t talk about you.”

  “Seems like that didn’t really work out. Did he ever ask about me?”

  Mike shook his head, his brow furrowed, and closed his eyes.

  “What? What are you not telling me? How does he know so much then?”

  Rather than answer, Mike kept shaking his head.

  “Tell me.” I sat forward again, my head cocked to the side as I watched him.

  “He didn’t have to ask. He kept tabs on you.”

  “What? How? That’s nuts. I wasn’t his to keep tabs on.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong.” Mike raised an eyebrow at me and waited for me to clue into what he meant. When I squinted at him in confusion, he explained. “Aston had a private investigator on you, so he pretty much knew everything. When you split from Seth. All the fights. The money issues. Piper’s appendix . . . and the hospital stay afterward.”

  “No, not Piper,” I whispered to myself, shaking my head. “No, no, no.”

  “He’d stayed away from the kids until that incident,” Mike said, trying to calm me.

  “I have to go. Tell Milly the wine’s all hers.”

  “Bexley, don’t do anything stupid. Stay the night. You’re a long way from home.”

  I didn’t answer, just hightailed it out of there, much like Aston had left my house.

  A half hour later, I ended up in some motel outside of Tahoe near the highway, and I didn’t even have my box of wine to keep me company.

  When I arrived home the next morning and saw Aston sitting on my front step, I was so conflicted.

  I wanted to run to him.

  At the same time, I wanted to run far, far away.

  As soon as I got out of my car, he was at my side.

  “You okay?”

  Ignoring his question, I held up a hand. “Don’t get too close. I stink.”

  He surveyed me, his gaze taking me in from head to toe. “Where have you been?”

  “I went to see Mike.”

  “Last night?”
/>
  “Yeah. He had some interesting things to say.”

  “Shit.”

  My eyes felt as dry as the desert air. I didn’t have any more tears left in me. Or feelings—maybe. “Shit, exactly. And now I have to go shower, change, and get my kids.”

  Stepping around him, I made my way up the walkway.

  “I want to talk.” He walked next to me in flat-front khaki shorts, running shoes, and a ragged white Polo shirt.

  It infuriated me that I couldn’t help but notice that he both looked and smelled great. I needed to get inside, far away from him, put some physical walls between us.

  “Make an appointment, Aston. Stop showing up at my house. My kids’ll be back, and I can’t explain you to them right now. Plus, you’ve been on TV every other second. I really don’t need them seeing you here. They’ll be all over school blabbing about it.”

  “Your kids? Don’t you mean yours and Seth’s?” Aston’s eyes narrowed as he glared at me, lit with anger more blinding than the Nevada sun. He wanted me to come clean, and knowing Aston, he’d push until I did.

  Glaring back at him, I said, “You tell me. You’re the one with all the inside scoop.”

  I opened the door, slipped inside, and slammed it in his face.

  Aston

  The son of a bitch broke his own damn rule. Mike was the one who’d said he wasn’t going to discuss me with Bexley. Then he went and told her about the PI I’d hired.

  That was messed up. Fuck bro code . . . this went beyond that.

  It wasn’t until Mike clammed up that I’d hired Bill to watch Bexley. It was right after Mike finally married Milly after a long-ass party-filled engagement and one of those big fancy weddings, close to two years after their original engagement party. Bexley was pregnant again, hanging on to that asshole Seth, her belly huge.

  Seth was drunk, and I was loaded. Poor Mike spent a good part of the evening making sure we didn’t get near each other. Bexley apparently didn’t feel well, and after Seth took off without her, she ended up spending the night hanging over the toilet in Mike and Milly’s honeymoon suite.

  I’d wanted to kill Seth for leaving her there alone. My need to comfort her was at an all-time high.

  That’s when Mike had said, “No more, man. Milly’s got Bexley, and she’s not going to discuss you with her. And vice versa.”

  As soon as I’d gotten to work the following Monday, I’d set up a date with Cass and hired Bill to watch Bexley. He’d been watching her for over a decade.

  Now the jig was totally up.

  After Bexley slammed the door in my face yesterday, I went to my office to collect myself to call Bill and let him off the hook for good. I’d put him on hold after the police detained me, wanting to protect Bexley, but I needed to set him free.

  Then I could explain him to Bexley. And find out if she meant what I thought she meant by inside scoop.

  Back in my office again with my feet propped on my desk, I texted the number I knew to be Bexley’s. It was Sunday afternoon, and I was hoping her kids might still be with her ex, even though she’d planned to pick them up yesterday.

  aston: It’s AP. Can we talk? Grab a coffee? Please?

  I watched the bubbles float over the screen while she typed. Damn, I didn’t think I’d ever done that. I was too old for that shit.

  bexley: Kids are back. It’s going to have to wait.

  aston: How about tomorrow? Monday?

  bexley: Don’t you have work? And more pressing things to worry about?

  aston: Not more pressing than this. How about nine at the Beanery near you?

  It was wiser to meet near her side of town, since the only thing near my office was trouble. Reporters, lawyers, and bullshit.

  I stared at the screen, willing the floating bubbles to appear, but nothing.

  Frustrated, I slipped my phone in my pocket and headed out. Passing the factory floor, I looked around, wondering how someone had infiltrated my business. So I called Bill back and told him to look into this current mess rather than watch Bexley.

  Of course, he was already bitter about just being fired.

  “Isn’t that Doug’s job?” he said snidely.

  Yeah, except he’s watching me for Dad . . . instead of trying to get this all cleared up.

  Someone was fucking with my business. It should have been my priority, but Bexley had been waiting longer.

  Just as I slipped into my car, my phone buzzed with a text.

  bexley: At the Beanery. 30 minutes.

  I started my car, feeling like a winner.

  Bexley

  “Mom, you okay? You look tired,” Piper said as she finished her toast. The kids were home, and as much a salve to my bleeding heart as they were a knife.

  And now I looked like shit to meet Aston. I’d wanted to have the upper hand, or at least feel like I did. A quick glance down at my jeans revealed a hole in the knee. Whatever, they’d have to do with my plain white tank and pale blue cardigan.

  My outfit echoed how I felt.

  Blue. Pale blue. Neither bright nor vibrant. And bland with a gaping hole in the middle of my heart.

  “I’m fine, baby. Just a lot on my mind. Don’t you worry.”

  “Love you,” she said, her blue eyes blazing back at me, taking me in, deciding whether to believe me or not.

  I brushed her dark blond hair behind her ear and kissed her cheek. “Right back at ya, doll. Swear, I’m just tired.”

  She seemed to buy it, because then she hollered from the kitchen down the hallway, “Let’s go, Tyler. I can’t be late.”

  Poor Tyler, he was slower than a turtle in the morning. It took him longer to pee and brush his teeth than it took Piper to go through her whole teenage-girl beauty routine.

  “Coming,” he called, clunking into the kitchen.

  I walked the two of them to the bus, the sound of my flip-flops slapping against the concrete mixing with their sibling banter, distracting me from my yo-yoing thoughts.

  After waving good-bye, I ran to pee again—it was a bad habit of mine when I was nervous, especially after having kids. Laughing at myself as I pulled up my jeans, I wondered what Aston would think of this. Surely, he’d be turned off.

  I wouldn’t be so hot after all . . . ha.

  I dreamed up a thousand excuses why I couldn’t meet him while washing my hands and grabbing my tote. Then I got in my car.

  Wanting to arrive after him, I drove around the block at least ten times, killing time and making excuses not to go at all. Finally, I parked and went into the Beanery.

  “Hey,” Aston said huskily, waiting inside the door wearing a navy suit and a light blue shirt.

  He looked dapper, except when I took another look at his face. Up close, he appeared about as tired as I felt, maybe even more. For a moment, my heart shattered for him.

  “Hi,” I said quietly.

  He took my elbow and guided me to the counter. After I ordered a triple Americano and he got a black coffee, he asked, “Something to eat?”

  I shook my head. It was awkward and stilted between us. How could I eat?

  “Did you take your kids back home?” I asked while we waited for my beverage.

  “You mean, to my ex’s place? That’s what became of my home.”

  “I guess. I’m sorry that happened. I always think about my situation and the kids being with me mostly full time. I don’t think they feel their dad’s place is home, but I suspect your situation is different.”

  “It doesn’t matter right now. They’re staying at my dad’s place with the nanny. Denise will drop them with Cass after school, if she’s sober enough to keep them. Another big secret in a long line of family secrets.”

  “That’s a lot of shuffling back and forth for them.”

  Aston nodded, looking defeated. When my drink was slid across the bar, he picked it up and carried it to a corner table with his.

  “It’s not ideal, but Denise is about the only constant they have. She’s been watching the
m occasionally since they were born, when I traveled or worked late. Cass has made her way through a parade of daytime nannies, who all ended up hating her. When the police showed up at my door, Denise was right behind them to take the kids for me.”

  “That’s odd.” I took a sip of my drink, the liquid burning my throat, a welcome discomfort compared to the pain in my heart.

  “Maybe they alerted my dad to what was about to happen. I don’t know. It was such a blur. But thank God for Denise. The kids were set to spend the weekend in Carson City with me, which meant Cass was off the grid. Literally and figuratively.”

  Silence filled the air around us, along with the whoosh of the espresso machine frothing milk and the scent of freshly ground beans.

  “They’re fine for now. It’s not them I’m worried about. They’re both strong little creatures, and resilient. What I need is to talk with you, explain a few things, although my explanations will never be enough.”

  “What do you want to say?”

  “I assume Mike told you I had someone looking after you?” Aston cut to the chase, his hands settling on the table in front of him. He didn’t flinch or fidget, just asked with no remorse.

  “You betcha. I wouldn’t exactly call it looking after. Maybe spying? Stalking?”

  My body was burning hot, my heart beating through my bra and delicate tank, despite the chilly conversation. Sitting across from Aston brought my body to life, no matter what we discussed, but this was unacceptable. My cheeks blazing, I slid my cardigan off my shoulders and hung it on the back of my chair.

  “You didn’t seem yourself at the wedding, and Mike told me how you slept in his hotel room, on the bathroom floor, sick as a dog. After that, he swore he’d never tell me anything else about you, so my hands were tied. I didn’t have a choice.”

  “Um, you did have a choice. You chose to give me up, remember?” I said, not afraid of the man in front of me, despite his larger-than-life frame and squinting eyes. “It still seems a bit off to me. After all, you ended it. You never called me after Mike’s engagement party. It was all you, and pardon me for saying it for the millionth time, but you’re being accused of something criminal. So, why now? Don’t you have more important things to worry about?”