“It’s not as simple as you think,” she said, looking over her shoulder to make sure she wasn’t being listened to. “I don’t think anyone meant to hurt you at all.”
I laughed sarcastically.
“Right. So Ally didn’t cut all contact with me for no apparent reason and then marry my best friend a couple of years after I left?”
She sighed.
“It looks that way, yes, but…”
“Thank you, so if you’ll excuse me,” I interrupted, leaning in close to her ear—so close that I could smell the moisturizer on her skin. “For what it’s worth… It was nice seeing you again, Mia.”
“Ev…”
I walked past her before she had a chance to finish, anger making me unable to stay around any longer, because really, deep down I didn’t know why I’d left my busy life and dropped everything to come back.
I didn’t really understand what had driven me to return when the email had arrived in my inbox that Michael had died. My first thought was karma and then my second was Ally. She was the one that got away, the one that had dropped me without any explanation twelve years ago, and in some way I had her to thank for everything I had now. The money, the houses, the cars… they were all because she’d pushed me out of Seaview and forced me to become something.
I nodded hello at several people I passed on my way to the door, wishing I’d called a cab and had it waiting, but getting out of the house was my main priority. I’d think about the rest later.
“Wait.”
I heard her voice from behind me, and my first instinct was to keep walking and put as much distance between the both of us as fast as I could, but I heard her heels on the wooden floor behind, following me closely.
I stopped once I got into the hall of Michael’s parent’s house and turned to her.
“Ally?”
“Why did you come?” she demanded, her eyebrows furrowed angrily at me. She’d changed a lot since the last time I’d seen her. Of course I’d seen photos over social media over the years, but it was nothing like seeing her in person.
She still had the same light brown eyes and flushed red cheeks that she always did, but her body had smoothed out from her previously athletic figure into womanly curves. In my eyes, she’d never looked better, but I wasn’t going to tell her that. No way in hell did I want to give her that parting satisfaction.
“I’ve got every right to be here, Ally,” I said, turning back around toward the door, but she hurried in front of me, the anger obvious in her eyes and across her face.
“Where were you when he was ill? When he was suffering? He said he told you, and you never once came down!”
“Can you blame me?” I asked. “He wasn’t exactly acting like a best friend to me.”
“But he needed you!” she snapped. “You’re a big shot over in the city, I hear, but when it comes to us pawns, you’re gonna be the guy to hold grudges even when someone is dying?”
I thought of all the things I wanted to say to her and all the anger that I could unleash, but I was better than that. I didn’t get to the status I had by arguing with women.
“I don’t have time for this,” I said backing away from her. “You made your choice all those years ago, so you don’t have any right to tell me what I should have done now.”
The words hit her—I could see it from the look in her eyes—and she stared at me, silenced by her own guilt.
“What about you?” I continued, fired up. “I heard quite a while back that you and Michael were divorced. So where were you, huh? Where were you when he needed you?”
“We had our problems,” she said, keeping her voice low and looking around her. “We had issues, but I’m here aren’t I? I’m here when it matters. I’ve been here for him, and you’re the last person I need to prove that to!”
I took a step toward her, breathing in her perfume as I lowered my lips to her ear.
She remained still, inhaling deeply as I crossed her personal space.
“Well then I’m sure you’ll understand when I say that this conversation is well and truly over.”
I didn’t give her a chance to respond as I stood upright, turned, and walked out the front door without looking back at her.
I didn’t expect her to follow, and as I neared the end of the drive, I took a few breaths to calm down and regain my composure before I hit the sidewalk.
Since she was the one that had let me go, and she was the one who’d discarded our relationship, I’d expected her to have been more upset than anything. I’d assumed that she would have taken me to the side and begged for my forgiveness or apologized profusely for what she’d done. It was the least she could have done for destroying my life back when we were only teenagers. Instead, I’d been made to feel like the bully and the one who’d been in the wrong.
I wanted to know and understand why she’d forced me away from Seaview, and I wanted to understand what exactly the hold was that she had over me.
Why couldn’t I bury myself in the endless stream of women I seemed to attract in the city, and why, no matter who I met or who I tried to forget her with, did it always came back to her?
Chapter Two
Ally
I woke up in bed with the window open blowing a cool yet gentle breeze across my face. I looked over at the time and closed my eyes again as the memory of Evan at the funeral the day before came back to haunt me. Even lying in bed safe and far away from him, I couldn’t stop my heart from pounding at the thought of my surprise when he’d walked into the church.
He’d been the last person I’d expected to see there, and despite years of wishing I could apologize to him and explain everything, I still felt angry on Michael’s behalf. Just before he died, he’d wanted to set everything straight. He wanted to apologize to Evan and make everything right again, but all his communication and efforts had gone unanswered, and now it was too late.
I sat up and scraped back my hair into a high ponytail.
The Evan I used to spend everyday of my life with walking along the shore had gone, I was sure of that much. I was also sure of the fact that I had a large part to play in his transformation, but back then I didn’t have a choice, and as much as I went over in my head ways I could have told him, there were no words to console someone like that. There was no way to tell him exactly what I’d done and why I couldn’t have been with him.
I dressed quickly, throwing on my woolen black dress for the last part of Michael’s send off, to throw his ashes into the sea. I just hoped that Evan wasn’t there because I couldn’t bear to face another day looking at his disappointment or the deep harbored hurt in his eyes—partly because seeing him reminded me of what I’d done, and also because I knew everything he felt was because of me.
Because I’d made him go.
I hurried up the hill in my pumps, cursing the fact that again I was going to be late, but the pit stop I’d made to drop Aaron off at school was unavoidable.
I saw the small group of his friends and family at the top of the hill, and I started to run so I wouldn’t miss it, hoping that even though we’d hadn’t been together romantically in a long while, he knew that I would still be there for his last send off. I still wanted to say my goodbyes.
I got to the top—a panting, slightly sweaty mess—and quickly took my place beside Christine, Michael’s mother, who squeezed my hand affectionately.
“We all know he loved the sea,” his sister continued. “He always did, and this was the last place that he asked us to take him before he died.”
I heard his mother’s soft cries beside me, her eyes hidden behind dark glasses, and I put an arm around her.
“Michael, we know you’re watching us,” she continued, “and we know that wherever you are, you’ll be out on the sea surfing with the waves where you belong…” Her voice broke as she started to cry. “God, I didn’t realize how hard this would be. This is for you big brother!”
She reached into the urn and pulled out a handful of a
shes and threw them over the cliff before turning back to everyone else.
“I don’t know if this is a bit awkward for some of you, but could we all come up and throw some?”
Everyone stood up, and one by one they went over and did the same, throwing his ashes out and watching them float into the wind.
I took a handful and kissed my hand, trying hard to process the fact that the dust in my palm, enclosed by my fingers, was Michael. It didn’t seem real. It was unimaginable that the man who was my son’s hero was now reduced to a pile of something that his loved ones were emptying into the sea. I threw it out of my hand with a jump and watched it disappear around me.
It had been two years since we’d separated, but that didn’t mean that I could easily discard everything that had happened over our short-lived marriage. He’d been the perfect distraction for me after Evan had left, and that was the most important thing in the world to me because I didn’t think I’d be able to get through those first months without him.
“Excuse me.”
I moved out of the way for the next person to scatter some ashes, and as our eyes met, I gasped in shock. It was Evan.
My emotional state made my anger flare up instantly, and I watched him reach in and throw his ashes over the cliff before I grabbed his arm a little harder than intended and pulled him to the side away from everyone else.
He didn’t resist or shake me off. He just allowed me to drag him, and as soon as we were out of earshot, I stopped and looked up. His handsome face was serious and unapologetic, and it made me even angrier.
“How dare you come here?!” I scalded through gritted teeth. “This memorial was by invite only!”
“And how do you know I wasn’t invited?” he asked.
He had a point, but being right made him all the more infuriating to me.
“Because I think everyone knows how both you and Michael fell out. It’s common knowledge around here, so I doubt you’re on anyone’s Christmas card list.”
He nodded, one hand in his pocket.
“Someone in the hotel told me about it and said I should go. I think that’s the least I could do for not answering his mail, don’t you think?”
“Don’t act like you care, Evan,” I snapped, unable to shake the annoyance away. “If you did, you wouldn’t be here. It’s an insult to his legacy.”
He laughed and glared at me.
“An insult? He was my best friend, Ally. I think I’ve got every right to come here and say goodbye.”
“You’ve come here to gloat. You’ve come to show him that you’ve had the last laugh. You’ve got your fancy business in the city, and you’re alive and fun with women and everything, while he’s being thrown around Sea View from an urn.”
I stopped when I saw the anger in his eyes, and he took a step closer toward me, lowering his voice.
“I’m going to pretend you didn’t just say that,” he said through gritted teeth. “Despite what you all want to think about me, I’m the one you all pushed out, remember that? I’m the one that had to hear from old neighbors that my best friend was marrying my girl. I have every right in this world to choose if and when I come back. This was my home, Allysaur. My parents might not live here anymore, but Sea View doesn’t just belong to you.”
I could see the instant regret on his face after he’d said my name, and I felt sick when I heard it. Allysaur. It’d been so long since I’d heard him call me that, and it opened the floodgates and sent a bucket load of memories through my head while I looked at him.
I wanted to hit him, shake him, and scream at him in anger—and ask why he didn’t fight enough for me or why he let me let him go and never came back.
We stood looking at each other for a moment, the sound of the voices further along floating over to us, and I looked past him at the rest of the guests.
“Well, I should get back,” I said quietly.
He nodded.
“I think you should.”
He steered past me to walk away, but I turned and stopped him. I didn’t want the last time we saw each other to end like that. I didn’t want his last memory of me to be as a defensive bitch. Once upon a time, he’d been my world, and I wasn’t a mean person. Emotional, yes, but he was right, what I’d done to him was beyond unfair.
“Evan?”
He turned back to look at me, the distant look of a stranger in his eyes.
“Yes?”
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry it turned out this way,” I said regretfully.
“Me too,” he replied, backing away from me, ready to walk away again. “Me too. Have a nice life, Ally. I mean it.”
I watched his back as he went away down the hill, the urge to call him back just inches from releasing itself, but I kept it at bay. If he was leaving it was for the best, because if he stayed it meant I had to tell him what really happened that day, and I wasn’t sure if I could handle going there again or handle seeing his face and the disappointment it would show once he found out.
Chapter Three
Evan
“So, are you here for business or pleasure?” the woman asked, her breasts spilling from the tight purple dress she was wearing, and I looked at them before lifting my eyes to hers.
She smiled, satisfied that I’d noticed what she wanted me to. How could I not?
“Business,” I said, watching as she sat down on the empty stool to my side, “but it could easily be both.”
“Oh? I’ll have what he’s having,” she said to the bartender before turning back to me. “Can’t have a man like you drinking alone, can we?”
I nodded, keeping my eyes on her. Usually I liked my women much less formal and direct, but the town was small enough as it was, and the bar was practically empty. If I was going to have any female company that night, it was going to be with her.
“It’s a strong drink,” I said as she received hers and brought the glass to her lips.
She took a sip and winced, causing her to laugh.
“I’m Ashley, by the way,” she said, holding her hand out to me. “And you are?”
“…Pleased to meet you,” I answered with a sly smile.
“I see. So what does a girl have to do to find out your name?”
I felt her hand on my thigh, and I watched her as she slid it further up. I was almost certain that she knew who I was. Women didn’t just come up to a stranger and put their hands all over him unless they were in Amsterdam.
I wasn’t a stranger to female attention nor was I adverse to sex, but I liked to be in control. It should have been my hand on her leg and not the other way around.
I turned back to the bar and drank some more of my drink, contemplating whether I should take keen Ashley back upstairs.
She was pretty—decent body, nice eyes… I knew she wouldn’t say no and could almost feel the heat from her panties from where I was sitting, but something just wasn’t right. It just wasn’t there.
“What do you say we go back to your room and talk for a bit?” she asked, leaning in to me. “I’ve always been told I have a way with words, but I’d like to interpret that as meaning I’m good with my mouth. What do you think?”
“I think you’d better show me,” I said, downing the rest of my drink and hers too.
“Looks like you have a big appetite…” She pointed at our empty glasses, and I nodded.
“I guess it depends on what I’m eating…”
She stood up from the bar stool almost instantly, and I followed, taking her hand, and together we walked through the dark bar and into the lobby.
I’d already mentally undressed her before we got to the elevator, and inside, once the doors closed, I pressed her against the wall and kissed her, running my hands over her body in that tight dress. Instantly, I thought of Ally’s new curves. I thought of her body in the black dress earlier and it made me pull back.
“Something wrong?” Ashley asked.
I shook my head and went to kiss her again, pressing my hardening erection again
st her hip.
I reached behind her and pressed at what I thought was the button for my floor, before kissing my way down her neck, and she let out a small moan as my lips brushed her collarbone—and again I thought of Ally. I thought of how long it had been since I’d kissed her, and as I took my lips away from Ashley, I pounded the wall behind her with my fist.
Why, after twelve years, was she still having such a hold over me? Why the hell had I jeopardized everything and turned up at the funeral knowing that she’d be there and knowing that seeing her would resurface any hard feelings and lack of closure that I’d tried so hard to bury for all that time?
The doors opened on my floor, and Ashley practically pushed me off her and got out quickly.
“Coming?” she asked desperately. “Which way? Which one’s your room?”
I got out slowly, still not sure if I wanted to have sex with her or not.
“Look, Ashley…” I began, but she put her hand up.
“I’ll stop you there!” she snapped. “I’m here, okay? I’ve come all the way up here for you, so the least you could do is not lead me on and take me to your damn room.”
I pressed the elevator call button and kept my finger on it, suddenly annoyed that she felt like I owed her anything, and any feelings of lust that had been lingering faded instantly.
“The night’s over now,” I said firmly. “Thank you.”
“Thank you?” She walked past me and through the doors, pressing for the ground floor. “You know, you’re an ass just like everyone says you are, Evan. You’ve got money, but you can’t buy respect for others.”
“So you did know who I was?” I asked, realizing I’d allowed myself to take a complete stranger up to my room without a second thought. I had so much to lose that I couldn’t afford the risk of women like her in my company.
“Of course I know,” she spat as the doors started to close. “Everyone knows you’re the jerk from the city who turned his back on his friends here.”
Keeper (A Billionaire Romance) Page 26