Stepping inside her office, a light breeze followed her as she watched Charlotte giggle down at her lap. No doubt over of a text from Myles. They had certainly seemed cozy all weekend and she had to admit that it was absolutely adorable to watch. She couldn’t remember a time when Charlotte seemed so smitten with a man, she was a love ‘em and leave ‘em kind of gal and although she changed men like she changed shoes, Alivia had a feeling that this one was going to stick.
Placing a latte down on Charlotte’s desk, she watched her a moment. “What happened to poor little Ethan?”
Nearly dropping her phone on the floor, Charlotte’s face turned red as she quickly grabbed a file on her desk.
“Um…Hi…Good morning,” she stuttered, avoiding eye contact. Scrambling around her desk, she threw folders into a file drawer, actually doing her job for a change and Alivia couldn’t help but laugh. Placing her bag down, she picked up a pile of mail off the desk, skimming through it quietly, watching Charlotte out of the corner of her eye.
“Please don’t say anything to anyone,” Charlotte finally pleaded, plopping back into her chair. Leaning against the side of the huge ivory desk, Alivia crossed her arms taking in the rare behavior of a woman who looked like her office manager, but certainly wasn’t acting like her.
“I don’t have to say anything, darlin’.” She lifted an eyebrow. “It’s written all over your face.”
Clicking a pen violently, Charlotte’s eyes darted around the room.
“It’s nothing, really,” she insisted, laughing it off without humor, but Alivia knew better. She was scared and although she had never met anyone as confident as Charlotte Scott, she could sympathize. After her first date with Jax, it became very clear to her and everyone else around her, that he was it. He was the one. The intensity of those emotions and the rate in which everything had fallen into place, had scared her in the beginning too.
“Char, I’ve been where you are. Remember?” she smiled softly, tossing the mail back down on the desk. Charlotte’s vulnerable brown eyes softened a bit studying her lap.
“I just don’t know what this is yet. I mean he’s great,” she sighed, picking at the pen relentlessly. “More than great, actually,” she trailed off, looking up at Alivia.
“I just-“
“-Char,” she interrupted before she had an opportunity to downplay her feelings, searching for another reason to avoid commitment. “Whatever it is, it’s good. And I know it’s intense and a little intimidating,” she insisted. “But it’s a good thing, so just go with it and don’t overthink, alright?”
Although she knew it would take some time for Charlotte to come around, she also knew Charlotte had met her match with Myles, because quite frankly, he was the only man Alivia knew who had the tenacity to keep Charlotte on her toes.
Ross’s office door opened as she walked down the small hallway, handing him his coffee.
“Good mornin’!” she chirped, smiling so big her face was becoming sore. She had been so wrapped up in her own euphoric mood and convincing Charlotte not to push Myles away, she had completely forgotten that she wanted to throw Ross off from any speculation of her and Jax sleeping together. And plastering on a big ol’ smile and letting her accent thicken from sheer bliss, probably wasn’t the best laid out plan. Ross knew her like the back of his hand and it would take a lot more than a cup of coffee to throw him off.
“You slept with him,” he accused, crossing his arms over his chest refusing to take the coffee.
“Come again?”
“You slept with him,” he repeated.
Staring at each other a moment, she contemplated lying. But she was a terrible liar. She could run? Yep, running would probably be most effective at the moment. Yelling down the short hall, she jumped at the sound of his voice, “Charlotte hold all my calls.”
Turning back toward her, he pinned her with a look taking his coffee out of her hand.
“For how long?” Charlotte asked.
“For as long as this takes.”
Moving out of the way he pointed to his office, his eyes fiery. “You. In. Now.”
Sinking down into the dark leather chair, Alivia crossed her legs pretending to check her phone. Noticing a text from Jax saying that he missed her already, she couldn’t help the corners of her mouth from lifting. Texting him back quickly telling him that she missed him too, she tried unsuccessfully to hide a larger grin behind her coffee cup.
Feeling Ross’s eyes burning a hole through her skull, she looked up, her smile disappearing. He didn’t look furious, but he didn’t look pleased either and she had to handle Ross more delicately. Yes, she confided in Chelsea a lot, but Ross was the one who had been there. The one who had picked her up off the bathroom floor the night that Jax had left. The one who had cooked dinners for her. The one who had played with the girls on weeknights and then stayed and watched bad television with her at night. And he had single handedly been the one to take on the burden of running Save the Date after her breakdown.
“What happened?” he asked not taking his eyes off her. Getting the impression that he was going to listen to her every word carefully, she suddenly felt the urge to wiggle in her seat as if on trial for murder. Trying to escape his direct stare, she picked at the white coffee lid looking at his desk and all the papers stacked with their clients’ information. Business was great and that was a large part because of Ross and the last thing she wanted to do was disappoint the man who had already done so much for her.
“Well, he told me that he had left because he convinced himself that he was the reason that I had my breakdown,” she explained simply. “That the chaos that surrounded him caused me to snap.” She stole a quick glance at him, “And that’s absolutely ridiculous and so I told him that he in fact wasn’t the reason, that it was my own fault, and then one thing lead to another,” she paused almost out of breath,. “And to another… and then another,” she giggled trying to get Ross to at least crack a smile.
He didn’t.
Studying her a moment, he ran his hands over his meticulous face.
“I love him Ross. That has never changed,” she admitted quietly, trying to convince him, and maybe herself, that it was safe to let Jax back into her life again. That it was okay for them just to pick up where they had left off. And that he wouldn’t hurt her again. “You know that.”
“What I know is that he left you when you needed him the most,” Ross snapped, his face quickly turning red. “What I know is that he left those beautiful girls when they needed a stable parent.” His voice rose, freaking her out a bit. She had known this man for eight years and had never seen him lose his temper. He was the definition of composed, but recalling the events of the last twelve months, he looked anything but calm. “And what I know is that I can’t watch you get hurt like that again.”
The last sentence sending a blow to her chest.
“You were the one who kept telling me that I needed to ‘put my big girl panties on’ and deal with this entire situation head on,” she said defending herself.
“Yes. Put your panties on…not take them off,” he said shaking his head.
“Ross, I love you and I appreciate how much you care for me and how much you love the girls and how protective you are of us,” she stressed, trying to ease her agitated best friend. “But, I love my husband and the girls need their daddy and what if this was just one really big miscommunication and it’s over now?” she asked, leaning forward on the edge of her chair. She hoped like hell that things would move forward with Jax, but how was she going to convince Ross of that if she wasn’t entirely sure of it herself? She hadn’t told Jax that she forgave him yet because in a way, it still hurt too badly, so she hadn’t said anything. Things were good, wonderful even, and she wasn’t going to overthink anything. She wanted his arms wrapped around her at night and wanted him home on the living room floor playing with the girls and damn it, she wanted him and the way he made her feel again. She wanted her heart put back together.<
br />
“Look, do what you want, Liv,” he scoffed turning to his computer. “I hope it works out for you.”
Quietly watching him bang on his keyboard he didn’t look at her, which meant the conversation was over. He was like a light switch, completely and utterly shutdown. Now with her partner mad as hell, what was already supposed to be a long day just got a heck of a lot longer.
After nine hours of rigorous planning, reviewing staging locations for the award ceremony, deciding on bright fabrics and confirming a “Havana Nights” theme, along with the daunting task of venue scouting, Alivia was ready to go home. Her feet ached, her stomach was rumbling and all she wanted to do was to go home to her family.
Her family.
The thought of Jax being there when she got home and being able to kiss him and have him hold her instead of running from him like the past few weeks, had her packing up her things faster. Sticking her iPad into her purse, she grabbed some contracts to review later on that night, hopefully in bed while Jax rubbed her feet.
“Have a good night, Liv. I’m heading out,” Whitney popped her head into Alivia’s office smiling sweetly, but looking completely drained. Poor girl still had a little over two more months to go before giving birth and even though she and Ross had insisted on cutting her hours and workload down to take it easy and prepare for the baby, Whitney had declined, claiming that if she sat at home all day she would go insane.
Knowing Whitney for two years, every single one of those years working for Save the Date, the Louisiana native had been nothing short of a ray of sunshine. The epitome of a southern sweetheart, sugary and sweet, with an amazing energy that brightened the room the second she entered; adding in her unique concepts and killer organizational skills, made her the best assistant she could have ever asked for. And an equally terrific friend. A stark difference between the quiet and distant woman that she had seen walking around the office lately. She could almost see Whitney at war with herself inside her head.
“Hey, can I grab you for one more minute?” Alivia asked, pointing to the chair in front of her desk.
Whitney’s face immediately turning from tired to concerned she walked inside, “Sure.”
“Don’t worry, it’s nothing bad,” she chuckled, sitting in the chair next to her, letting her know that she was speaking as a friend and not as a boss. The lines could easily get blended at times and she had always made it a point to ensure her crew knew when she was being a boss and when she was speaking as a friend.
Sitting down, she looked at Whitney unable to miss the sadness in her brown eyes.
“Is everything alright?” she asked carefully, “At home? With the pregnancy? With Adam?”
Whitney’s eyes darted sideways, the only sign Alivia needed that her assumptions were correct and she had struck a nerve. Tensing up, Whitney cleared her throat.
“Of course!” Whitney forced a smile, looking past her at a picture on the wall.
It was too easy to spot a fake smile from Whitney, her genuine smile was too bright, too wide and too contagious. She didn’t want to push her, but she also remembered wishing at times that she would have allowed herself to talk to someone close to her while she was overwhelmed. Instead, she had closed everyone out, convincing herself that she needed to fight the battle alone.
Shaking her head slowly, Alivia narrowed her gaze. “Did you want to try that again?”
She was keeping something from her and although she wasn’t going to push, Alivia wasn’t okay with a phony answer either. Releasing a long sigh, Whitney picked at her nails in her lap.
“It’s Adam.” Whitney finally looked up, tears forming in her eyes. “I think he is having a difficult time coping with the fact that the baby is arriving so soon.”
Only ever seeing Whitney happy and excited, she wasn’t sure she could recall a time when she saw Whitney cry. Taking her friend’s hands that were fidgeting in her lap, she forced Whitney to look at her.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, he’s just become so distant and he’s ornery all the time, and he came home yesterday from work drunk and saying all kinds of crazy things about ‘not signin’ up for all of this’ and that ‘this was never the part of plan.’” She said taking her hands out of Alivia’s, wiping away the tears that were now falling down her face.
Reaching behind her, Alivia handed her the small box of tissues.
“I just don’t know what to do, Liv,” Whitney sniffed, blowing her nose into the tissue. “The way he’s been talkin’, it seems like he was forced into this or something. He’s so withdrawn, I don’t know what to do or what to say anymore.”
Adam Whitman was a good guy as far as Alivia knew. A very private man it seemed, but a decent guy nonetheless. He worshipped the ground Whitney walked on and always seemed willing to make her happy. So it came as no surprise when he had proposed to Whitney, the wedding plans put on hold shortly after finding out that she was pregnant. She remembered the day Whitney had come into work on edge, so unlike her and she knew right away that something was off. After she found her frantic in the bathroom after suggesting a florist for her and Adam’s wedding, Whitney told her that she was pregnant. Everyone was excited, but nobody seemed happier than Adam. When Charlotte had texted him telling him Whitney was emotional and nervous about the pregnancy, he had arrived in the office that afternoon with flowers and chocolates in hand, the smart man that he was. They had all watched as he reassured Whitney that everything would be alright and that she didn’t need to worry about anything other than growing their healthy baby inside her belly.
Surprised now to learn that Adam, of all people, was the one freaking out about the baby, she assumed he just had pre-parenthood nerves.
“Sweetie,” Alivia said, moving forward in her seat. “Look at me. Having a child is a huge adjustment. It’s wonderful and exciting and honestly, the best experience you are ever going to have, but it’s also very scary, especially in the beginning,” she said, placing the box of tissues back on her desk. “Maybe the reality of it all has finally hit him.” She said smoothing Whitney’s hair.
“It’s different for men, you know. They feel the pressure to protect and provide and it’s a lot to process. But whatever this is, it will pass and by the time that beautiful baby is here and you are holding him or her in your arms, all of this panic will be forgotten.”
Sniffling, Whitney wiped her nose again, releasing a small quick smile.
“Thank you.” She shook her head, balling up the used tissues in her hand looking up at her. “I guess I’ll just give him his space and let him know that I’m nervous too, but we’ll get through it.”
“Well, in the meantime, Ross and I want you to take it easy. You’re done with your location hours and I’m going to be taking over your on-site workload,” Alivia ordered, narrowing her eyes. She was going to get Whitney focused on her new little family and her health.
“Feel free to come in and do some office work, but no more overdoing it.”
Holding her hand up at Whitney’s rebuttal, she added quickly, “I don’t need you going into pre-term labor during the Rosenbaum Bar Mitzvah next weekend.”
Nodding in defeat, her very emotional assistant rubbed her lower back, clearly disappointed, but too tired to argue. Standing up, Alivia followed, smiling at Whitney before rubbing her big belly lovingly.
“I can’t wait to meet this little angel,” she smiled, trying to cheer Whitney up and to focus on what mattered most. A healthy baby.
Looking down at her belly, Whitney smiled quickly.
“I can’t wait to find out if it’s a boy or a girl. Adam was very adamant about not finding out the sex until he or she was born.” Her smile faltered a bit. And in that moment, Alivia had a nagging feeling that there could possibly be more to the story about Whitney and Adam’s relationship. More than even she knew.
“Listen, if you need anything, I’m always here,” Alivia said, pulling Whitney in for a hug. “I’m your boss, but I’m y
our friend first. I mean it. Ross and Charlotte are here too. We all are.”
“Thank you, Liv.” Whitney grabbed her purse off the chair. “That really means a lot.”
Whitney said goodbye as Alivia grabbed her purse and turned off her office light. Glancing at her watch, she only had two hours left before the girls had to go to bed. Closing the door behind her, she noticed Ross’s light still on, his door closed. Reaching up to knock, she pulled her hand back. Ross had treated her like a necessary evil all day. There had been no small chit chat, weekend updates or even gossip. He was angry and she had to understand that. She had dragged him through hell right along with her the past year and he had every right to be mad. She knew he needed time to be furious. He needed to ignore her, but it wouldn’t be long before he came around. At least she hoped. Turning away from the door, she walked out of the office, locking up behind her. Ross would stay at least four more hours, burning the midnight oil.
Her heart hurt as she pulled away from the curb in front of her office. She hated knowing that her best friend was disappointed in her, but she wanted to believe that this time was different with Jax. That they had a little snag, but they were going to move forward and nothing would ever come between them again. She would prove that to Ross and he would understand and see that she had been right all along. But most importantly, she would prove that to herself.
14
“Forgive me for boring you, Kelley!”
Jax watched Coach Griffin bark, his scowl settling on the burly rookie. One who hadn’t stopped yawning since he had shown up, looking as if he was going to pass out at any moment. The dude had no doubt stayed up the entire night partying and celebrating his contract agreement, a novice mistake for sure. Snickering along with the other veteran players, Jax settled lower into his seat. He had his work cut out for him with the new recruits. Most rookies walked around with a false sense of security after signing their agreements and it was his job to hit them with the unsettling reality that not only were each of them just trying to make the cut, but that they needed to go against other seasoned players to land a spot on the three time championship team. And as Captain, not only did he have to knock some sense into their heads through brute force, but ensure their focus was solely on the field come August.
False Start (Mavericks #1) Page 20
