The One Where She Walks Away

She moves from me suddenly, her sharp jump a punch in my gut. It’s what you were expecting, I remind myself. I knew this would happen.

“Wife?” Her voice is barely more than whisper, tinged with accusation and disbelief. Her hands are clasped in front of her slightly bent-over body, shaking so discreetly that no one but I would ever notice it.

But I do. I know her so fucking well my next word cuts as much as the last seven did.

“Yes.”

She covers her mouth with her hand, turning away from me with closed eyes. Jesus. I can feel the pain emanating from her and wrapping around me in a suffocating blanket. Fuck. I can’t feel this—the pain I’m causing her. I have to explain, to somehow justify my decision to keep her a secret.

“She’s my ex-wife, actually. We’d be divorced if she didn’t keep stalling on the agreement,” I ramble, my eyes following her.

“You’re still married. She’s still your wife.”

“We’ve been separated for two years.”

She shakes her head, her eyes still closed. “And you never thought to tell me?”

“I didn’t know how to. I kept putting it off until it became impossible. I wanted to, Day.” I move to her and gently rest my hands on her arms. Shit. I wish she’d understand. I need her to fucking understand why I didn’t tell her!

“Don’t you dare touch me.” Her voice is hard when she steps away. A pang hits my chest when she rubs her hands across her arms where mine just were. Rubbing my touch away. “Don’t you fucking dare stand there in front of me and try and justify this. Shit, Aaron. You’re married! Fucking married!”

Her eyes open, and in them, I see pure contempt. Anger. Disbelief. A sliver of hatred that hurts more than the prospect of losing her.

“Didn’t she sit still long enough for you to work your shit out, huh? So much for making sure you’d work it out. Fuck! All that was a lie, wasn’t it? How much more has been a lie? How many more lines have you said that actually mean fucking nothing?”

“Our marriage was a sham, Dayton. Naomi cares for nothing but money and fame. She was an up-and-coming model struggling to break into the industry. I met her one night at college and could see her potential, so I gave her the in. I set her up with one of our agents, and she was…thankful.” I rub my forehead. Lamest fucking excuse in the world.

“I bet she was.”

“We started seeing each other casually, and every time I went to break it off, my father’s assistant convinced me it was good for us to be together because of our profiles. Our ‘relationship’ was no secret, and she was always being hit with the fact that she’d only made it because of me.”

“She did!”

“We both knew that. I was a buffer for that. I claimed we met after she signed with our agency and that was that.”

“And you woke up one morning and decided to marry her, right? Because it was the ‘right’ thing to do?” She raises her eyebrows and storms past me.

I sigh heavily. “It didn’t work out. After eight months, we separated. I’ve been fighting her for two years. She’s not entitled to half of everything I own, but she won’t take what I am offering. There’s a reason I don’t own the company on paper yet.”

“I can’t even look at you right now. I can’t believe you didn’t tell me about her. How couldn’t you tell me, Aaron? Did it not ever cross your mind while you were watching me sleep or pouring me coffee to tell me? How about when you were kissing me or fucking me? Or when you were writing little fucking notes and hiding them?!”

I finally find her eyes again and hope my gaze can show her everything I feel. “I was so scared to lose you, Day. So scared that if I told you, you’d get up and walk and that would be that.”

“So you thought you’d ignore it and she’d go away eventually? That I’d never find out? Even when you were begging me to move in with you—did you really think then that you’d never have to tell me?” She closes her eyes and pushes her fingers into them, and even I can tell she’s fighting tears.

“I hoped I could call my lawyer and give her what she wants from our marriage. My money. Then yes, I hoped she’d go away. I had no idea she was in France right now. If I did, I never would have brought us here.”

“What a nice surprise that was. No wonder you couldn’t tell me this morning.”

I step forward, her sharp words slicing through every part of me. I deserve it. I deserve every fucking word she throws at me. “I’m so sorry, Dayton. If you had to find out, it never should have been like this. I’m so sorry.”

“Believe me, Aaron. You’re not half as sorry as I am.” She turns and disappears into the bathroom.

I stare at the doorway for a moment. I have no words for this situation, for this utter fuck-up I’ve caused. Once again, I berate myself for doing what I assumed would protect her.

I follow her into the bathroom, and upon finding her in front of the mirror with her makeup bag, I pause. “What are you doing?”

I can see it happen. The moment she meets my eyes in the mirror, I know I’m not looking at Dayton. I’m looking at Mia, the woman she was always supposed to be with me.

“I have a contractual obligation to fill. I’ll be there with you tonight, but I’m leaving right after,” she replies simply.

I draw in a sharp breath. Leaving? No. Fuck no.

“You’ll be refunded for the final two weeks that will be unfulfilled. Then you will wipe my agent’s number from your phone and not contact her again. I’ll be changing mine when I’m back in Seattle.”

“Day, please—”

“My other option is leaving right now and letting your wife know she’s got between us. I’ll leave late tonight and use the company plane. This way you can tell everyone I had a family emergency and had to return home immediately.” She coats her lips in red lipstick and rubs them together before continuing. “We both have reputations to protect, and that’s exactly what I’m doing.”

She strolls past me as I take in her words.

A few hours. That’s all I have. All I have to try and right this major fucking wrong. I don’t have a clue where to begin, but I know I can’t take that cold, impersonal stare. I don’t give a shit if I fucking deserve it. I don’t want it.

I follow her into the kitchen. “Don’t look at me with Mia’s eyes.”

I knot my tie and shrug my jacket on while she pours a glass of wine and drains some of it in one long drink. Slowly, she turns to me, her face blank, her eyes expressionless, her hands perfectly still.

“I’m doing my job, Aaron. You’re my client. That’s it.”

***

I don’t know how she can be so composed.

To look at her, you wouldn’t believe she’d been crying not half an hour ago. Her eyes are bright, even if I can see the ache lingering in the depths of them, and her mouth is curved in a false smile as we enter the room.

And this whole thing is fucking stupid. This dinner, this charade. I want to take this woman standing next to me back upstairs, sit her down, and make her listen to me. I have no clue what I can say to attempt to make this better. There’s a high chance I’d just make it worse, but I have to do something.

I can’t let her walk away from me tonight.

I won’t let her.

Not again. Not this time.

“Aaron! How lovely for you to clear your schedule for tonight,” Naomi declares in a shrill voice.

I pull myself from my thoughts and stare at my ex-wife. Her blond hair is as fake as ever, her eyelashes too long to be real, and the glimmer of viciousness in her eyes pushes every one of my buttons.

What the hell possessed me to marry her?

“I believe I had no choice,” I respond dryly. “Dayton, this is Naomi. My ex-wife.” I wave my hand between them. “Naomi, my girlfriend, Dayton.”

“Oh, I’ve heard so much about you!” Naomi fakes a smile and leans forward to air-kiss Dayton.

She returns it in the most controlled display I’ve ever seen in my life. Every woman I know would be clawing her eyes out—but not my Dayton. She puts on a smile and does exactly what she knows will rile Naomi.

“Really?” Dayton replies, stepping back into my side. “I can’t say I’ve heard very much about you at all. A few passing comments, maybe.”

My lips twitch as I fight my smile.

Naomi blinks. “Oh. I suppose Aaron’s been very busy with taking over the company and you haven’t had much time to talk.”

“Oh, we’ve had plenty of time to talk…among other things…but you just never came up.” Dayton leans into me with a demure smile.

Naomi’s jaw visibly tightens, her eyes filling with mirth, and she doesn’t respond. Instead, she turns to me. “And how is the change going?”

“The contracts are locked in the lawyer’s desk, waiting for the day our divorce papers land there.” I feel the twitch of my fingers at Dayton’s side. Our relationship isn’t something I wanted to revisit tonight, no matter how inevitable it was. “We can all hope that will be soon.”

“Oh, darling. You’re being unreasonable in your agreement. Can’t we just discuss it?”

“Naomi, you made a point by organizing this tonight. If you found out I’m here, I’m sure you’re aware I’m not working this week. I don’t wish to discuss anything with you. I’m not paying two lawyers so we can sit and have coffee to iron out your ridiculous terms.”

Dayton turns her body into me and rests her hand against my stomach. “Aaron, honey,” she says in a soft voice. “Shall we get a drink? I don’t think this is the place to be discussing this.”

I stare at Naomi for a long moment before I turn away and kiss Dayton’s temple. “You’re right. Let’s go.”

We leave Naomi standing alone and cross to the bar. I can feel Dayton wanting to pull away from me, feel her fighting to stay close. It only makes me hold her tighter.

“You handled her well.” I hand her a glass of wine and sip my own drink.

“Nothing like letting the woman your boyfriend is married to think you don’t care.” She flicks her tongue out across her bottom lip and raises her glass to her mouth, her eyes finding mine coldly. “She’s a bitch, by the way. You picked a real good one there.”

Didn’t I? A good one who, through my own stupidity, has ruined the only real good relationship I’ve ever had in my life. The only one that’s ever really meant anything.

Dayton’s eyes flick between her glass and Naomi. I wonder if she even realizes she’s doing it. I wonder if she can feel her heart breaking the way I can see it in her eyes.

I wonder if the guilt in my eyes reflects the consuming feel of it inside.

Dayton puts her glass down and reaches inside her purse. “Excuse me. I have a call.”

What?

No. Fucking no.

She turns away from me and walks through the room, her cell against her ear and her purse tucked under her arm so she can put her finger in her other ear. It’s good, I’ll give her that. Convincing. If I didn’t know what this meant.

I discard my drink on the bar and follow her, ignoring Naomi’s eyes on my back. Fuck her. All that matters now is Dayton and stopping her from leaving.

The elevators doors close on me, and I curse under my breath, looking at the second elevator. I press the down button repeatedly, knowing that it’ll get down three floors faster than I can climb twenty sets of stairs.

The doors open and I run in without a care for anyone else. I pace the tiny space as it climbs the floors, rubbing my hand through my hair. Fuck fuck fuck.

The second it dings on my floor, I run out of it and into our suite door. I fumble for the key in my pocket, slide the card through, and shove the door open.

I find her eyes immediately, like my own are drawn to her dark gaze.

“Yes,” she says into the phone. “He’s aware.”

I draw in a sharp breath. “Don’t go.” My voice comes out as a whisper. “Please. Don’t go.”

“I don’t have a choice.” She zips her cases with a calmness that contradicts the shaking of her hands. “If you’d told me before, maybe I could have dealt with it. But to tell me an hour before you expect me to stand face to face to her? No way, Aaron. No way.”

“Dayton. Please.” I’m aware of the plea in my voice. Fuck. I’d get on my knees and beg if it meant she would stay here. With me. I cross the room swiftly and cup her face in my hands. Her cheeks are like silk against my palms as I bring my forehead to hers. “Please. Just one night. Let me explain everything. Just don’t leave me again.”

“You knew I was going tonight. I’m just leaving sooner. I can’t stay down there with her, and it’s ridiculous to expect me to.”

I see the tears before I register the crack of her voice. They hurt more than anything. Fuck a punch to the gut—watching the woman I love so much cry is like being hit with a freight train and crushed by its weight.

“Fuck, Dayton,” I rasp, my own emotion evident in my voice, and I brush my thumb under her eyes to wipe away the wetness. “Don’t go, baby. Don’t go.”

She takes a deep breath and steps back. My hands fall to my sides limply, and she shakes her head. “You lied to me, Aaron. A lie of omission, but a lie all the same. This isn’t a tiny thing that can be swept under the rug and forgotten. This is huge and a central part of your life. All the times you asked me to tell you everything about me, you were never willing to return that. You were never going to tell me. You said so yourself. I can’t stay. I’m sorry.”

She swipes at her cheeks, and all I can do is stare at her. Every part of me is screaming to reach out to her, to grab her, to hold her to me and never let her go.

There’s a knock at the door and she opens it, sniffing quietly. A porter is standing there, a cart at his side, and my chest tightens. She opens the door wider for him to enter, and all I can do is stand in silence as he loads her suitcases onto the cart and pushes it back outside the room.

“Is my car ready?” Dayton asks quietly.

“Oui, mademoiselle.” He disappears into the lift, and she grasps the doorknob tighter.

“I’m begging you, Dayton. I’m fucking begging you not to go.”

“I was ready to give it all up,” she whispers, her voice cracking. “When you gave me my necklace again, I was going to tell you. I was ready to give it all up to be with you. I was going to call Monique, cancel the payment, and leave her. I didn’t think I could walk away from you again. I didn’t know if I’d survive another broken heart.”

Her words ricochet through me so fucking painfully that I can barely breathe. “So don’t. Stay. Please.”

“You were right. True love never dies. It only fades, lingering below the surface until we’re ready for it again. Until fate puts us in the right place and the right time and that simmering love can come alive again.” She clasps her purse to her chest and looks over her shoulder at me. “I love you, Aaron, but I have more integrity than to stay with a man who can lie to me so easily. I respect myself too much. I’m sorry. I can’t stay.”

She runs through the doors, and I move instinctively. Her words fuel my running toward the elevator. Just in time to see the doors close.

“Day! Fuck, Dayton!”

I slam my hands against the doors. My chest is heaving as her words repeat again in my mind.

“I love you, Aaron…”

I push off from the doors and head toward the stairwell. Fuck this. I need to get down there to her. I need to try one last time. I don’t care that I look like a madman in an expensive suit, flying down the stairs of Paris’s most exclusive hotel. All I care about is getting to the woman who has held my heart for seven years.

But I’m too late. I explode into the lobby and my eyes find her car immediately as the door closes. It pulls away from the hotel and leaves me standing in the middle of the lobby, unable to do anything but watch her go.

I’m powerless. This is a situation I’m unable to control, one I was never able to.

I run my fingers through my hair, anger mixing with the dull ache in my chest, and I turn to the concierge. “Do you have anywhere I can make a private call?”

“Oui. Follow me, sir.” He leads me to a small room off the lobby and leaves me.

I pull out my cell and dial my assistant’s number. She answers immediately.

“Aaron Stone’s office. How may I help you?”

“Dottie, it’s me.”

“Oh, Mr. Stone! Is everything all right?”

“No, honestly. I need you to do something for me.”

“Of course.” I hear the shuffle of papers as she grabs her notepad and pen. “What is it?”

“Cancel all my meetings next week and the next. Condense as many of the Paris meetings into the next seven days. If they can’t do it, then tough. I will be leaving Paris at six p.m. on the twenty-third. Got that?”

“Yes. Anything else?”

“Call Mr. Carlisle Sr. in New York and request that he draw up new divorce papers. Seven and a half is my final offer. I’ll be flying back to New York.”

“Absolutely. Mr. Stone…are you okay?”

I exhale loudly and rub my fingers through my hair. “Not particularly, Dottie, but there’s nothing I can do in this moment. Email me a schedule by tomorrow morning. Goodbye.”

I pocket my phone and leave the tiny space, my eyes set on the room we were just in. Naomi approaches me as soon as I walk through the door.

“Oh, Aaron. You almost missed dinner. Oh, where is your girlfriend?” Her smirk is anything but concerned.

I wrap my fingers around her arm and tug her from the room and back to the space I just called Dottie from. Then I slam the door behind us and pin her with my angry stare.

“I have no idea what you’re playing at with this tonight, Naomi, but it’s ridiculous. You’re not in high school anymore. Our relationship is over, and it never should have begun.”

“She didn’t know about us, did she?”

“What Dayton did or didn’t know is irrelevant and, quite frankly, none of your business. What is your business is the fact I will be returning to New York in seven days. My lawyer is drawing up new divorce papers now, and understand this.” I put my hands on the small table between us and lean forward. “You will fucking sign them. It’s my final offer and more than you deserve. If you refuse to sign them, we’ll take it to court and you’ll get less.”

Her face whitens despite her effort to remain composed. And why wouldn’t it? She’s being threatened out of money. Money she has no entitlement to.

“Let’s not be hasty, now—”

“Hasty?” I shout. “You’ve been playing this bullshit game for two years, and I’m finished. I’m done, Naomi. You’ll be flown to New York when I’ve looked over the papers to sign. There will be no further dancing around each other’s lawyers. There will be no more pushing unnecessarily. Do you understand me?”

She clicks her tongue and nods harshly.

“Good. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to retire for the evening.” I stand, adjust my jacket, and move toward the door. “I won’t be attending dinner tonight. I have far more important issues to attend to. Pass on my apologies to the others.”

I leave the room before she can respond and slip into a waiting elevator. I lean back against the mirrored wall, a heaviness settling over me from knowing that I’m returning to an empty room.

I could chase her. I could call the pilot and have him hold the plane until I get there.

But I can’t. I’m not letting her go, but I’m not rushing it either. Before I get her back, I have to figure everything out. I have to end this sham of a marriage properly, take care of a bit of business, then relocate to Seattle.

Then, and only then, can I fight for Dayton.

I hold on to this thought as I enter the suite that still smells so much like her.

Date: 2015-02-28; view: 698