“Looks like you are. And lately, you’ve been off. Like, I’ve never seen you like this. Usually, you’re all work, work, work, Aiden said, Aiden said, Aiden said. Then you went on that trip, seemed all happy for a minute, and by the time you came home—”
Her best friend twirled a braid around her fingertip before narrowing her brown eyes. “This has to do with Aiden. Something happened on that trip. Oh my god, did you bang the Irish Prince and not tell me? You did. And something went wrong. Girl, you did not seriously have all that happen and not tell your best friend, did you?”
Chelsea took another bite of ice cream—a huge one—and was rewarded with an ice cream headache almost instantly. “Ow!”
“You deserved that,” Kimmie decided. “That’s what you get for keeping secrets from me.”
“I didn’t keep secrets from you. I kept secrets from everyone. Aiden is in an important position, so the press—” Chelsea began.
“Is this because I joked about posting stuff to social media? Because we’ve been friends since college. I figured you knew that was a joke.”
Chelsea could’ve kept her mouth shut if it wasn’t for the fact that Kimmie looked genuinely hurt. “Of course I knew it was a joke. I’m an idiot. I don’t know why I thought not saying anything would protect his privacy in some way, but there is more going on than the press would even guess at…and it isn’t just him that would be at risk, so I panicked and didn’t tell you. I’m sorry.”
“Why are you apologizing to me?” Kimmie reached over and got a finger full of ice cream out of the pint. After she popped it into her mouth, she stared at Chelsea. “Thought we talked about your backbone? If you can’t tell me because it might hurt someone else, you can’t tell me.”
Leaning forward, Chelsea spoke slowly. “I could tell you hypotheticals. No names. That would probably be okay.”
“Hypothetically, is his ass as great as it looks in photo shoots? No, don’t tell me. I can’t ogle him anymore if you’re bumping uglies, so it isn’t even fair to help me paint a better mental picture.” Kimmie grinned at her. “Hypothetically, that is.”
“Okay, so what if I said that I met a guy, one that I thought I knew but who was very different than I expected, while I was on that trip?” Chelsea paused for another bite of ice cream. Kimmie didn’t interrupt her, a rarity.
“A handsome guy?”
“The most handsome,” Chelsea agreed. “And dominant. Like, crazy sexy dominant.”
“Were there handcuffs?” Kimmie asked.
“No handcuffs. Just…orders.”
“That’s hot.” Kimmie grinned. “You deserved some hot, for as many hours as you work. Go on.”
Just thinking about it turned her stomach, so she set the ice cream down on the coffee table. “Then things went wrong. The hypothetical guy? He has a daughter.”
“What?! Wait, not going to freak out and ask to who or how I’ve never read about this in a magazine. Just gonna stick with Mr. Hypothetical and say go on.” Kimmie waved her hand. “So go on. It was just getting really good.”
“No, things were just getting bad. He never met the kid before, and she is ten. So they wanted to get to know each other, hence…the trip.”
Kimmie chewed on a fingernail, clearly trying to puzzle it all out. She gave up, looking frustrated, and said, “Someday, you’re going to tell me this whole story, minus hypotheticals, but okay. I’m following you. Doesn’t sound too bad yet.”
“We lost the kid in the Grand Canyon,” Chelsea admitted.
“How do you lose a kid?”
“We were making out. Next to a tree…er, leaned up against it? Whatever, that part doesn’t matter.” Chelsea rubbed a hand over her face in frustration.
“Sounds like it must’ve, if you managed to lose a kid in the meanwhile, but I’m guessing you found the kid. Otherwise, I would’ve read about it, I’m sure.” Kimmie reached for her hand, as if she sensed the story was going to take a bad turn.
“Yeah, we found her. But then he blamed me for distracting him.”
“That jackass.” Kimmie’s judgement was fast and harsh. “How the hell was it your fault? Did you pin him to the tree and force him to play tonsil hockey?”
Chelsea couldn’t help but smile. “I should’ve been paying attention, too, and all I could think about was him. He wasn’t wrong. I did distract him.”
Kimmie rolled her eyes. “Yeah, and I’m guessing he was doing a damn fine job distracting you, too. But that’s neither here nor there. What happened next?”
“Long story short, we came back home and went back to work. He didn’t forgive me for what happened, and now work is kind of hard because of it.” Chelsea shrugged and sniffed, trying not to tear up again but wanting to cry until she’d emptied out all the tears pressing behind her eyelids. “He told me to take a leave of absence until he replaces me.” She practically whispered the last part.
Kimmie tugged her into a hug. “You’re worth more than that, Chels. All the money in the world can’t buy someone as awesome as you, and if he is too dumb to realize it, then he’s the one losing out.”
“I miss them,” she confessed. “I wonder how the little girl is doing. There was a cat—”
“A cat?”
“A cat. Black, scarred-up, old tomcat. He was amazing. And I don’t know what happened to him. Did he keep him? Or did the cat go home with the little girl? I just…I miss the little family, and there is no logical reason why I should, since they’re not mine, but…”
Kimmie pulled back enough to look at her. “Honey, the heart doesn’t care about whether or not you should care. It just loves.”
“I didn’t want to care. I didn’t want to go on that trip with them. I don’t want a family, and I’m not even sure I’ll ever want kids. Really, I lost nothing that I had, so why does it feel like…grieving?” She blinked fast as more tears misted her vision.
“Like I said, the heart doesn’t care about what it should feel. It just loves. No matter what happens with him or the kid, I’m here. We’re family. I love you, Chelsea-girl.” Kimmie hugged her again, tight.
Maybe if she hugged hard enough, all the broken pieces would fit back together.
Kimmie was right, and she tried to comfort herself with the possibilities. She might still see him after she quit. He could visit, since he always insisted they were friends and not just coworkers. They could make it work—others had.
Not could, they would. She’d find a way.
…
The one thing that kept her going was the upcoming weekend. Although she planned to work Saturday, she only needed to be in the office for the half day. All the work she needed to do on Sunday, she could do remotely.
If she could just make it through—a glance at her watch proved time was crawling by, but it’d been a solid two minutes since she’d last checked the time—two more hours and seventeen minutes, she could go home. Curl up in her bed. Order some takeout. Snuggle under the covers and binge watch something she streamed until maybe, just maybe, she managed to distance herself from her heartbreak.
Because she’d accepted that was what this was. Heartbreak. She knew and owned up to her crush on Aiden before the trip—not surprising since he was hot, eligible, and universally acknowledged for his charisma. The trip had made this not only worse, but it had exponentially developed those feelings past crush and into the danger zone.
Part of her even thought she might have been falling in love with him.
Which was stupid, something else she could own up to, but it was how she felt. Acknowledging those feelings would allow her to deal with them and get past the weakness. Or, well, so an internet search said. Lucy popped her head into Chelsea’s office without announcing herself, and Chelsea leveled a glare in her direction.
“Can I help you, Lucy?”
“Maybe? Look, I don’t know if this is going to be a regular thing, but Ms. Welles is here again, and she wants to see Mr. Kelley. So do I just let her go on back when she shows u
p like this? Because he has a four o’clock with that company in the UK scheduled…” Lucy lifted her hands in a helpless gesture.
“One moment,” Chelsea said. She tapped her ear and connected to Aiden’s device. “Mr. Kelley, Ms. Welles is here to see you. Would you like me to reschedule your four p.m. or ask Ms. Welles to wait?”
“Send her back,” Aiden said.
He’d been like that all week. Short, to-the-point answers. None of their usual work banter in place, nothing personal…and he was killing her with it.
“Yes, sir,” she answered.
She tapped to disconnect and glanced up at Lucy. “Send Ms. Welles back. He’ll be ready for her.”
“Um, the kid is here, too? So do I send them both back?” Lucy looked vastly uncomfortable, but Chelsea doubted she could feel nearly as ill at ease as she herself did.
“Ask Ms. Welles if she’d like to take her back or leave her in my office to wait, please, Lucy.”
“Thanks, Chelsea.”
Lucy vanished, and moments later, the knob turned again. Waverley entered the office, head down, and flopped into the chair nearest the door.
“Hey, kiddo. How you holding up?” Chelsea tried to keep her voice casual and upbeat, but it was the first time she’d seen Waverley since their ill-fated trip. She’d really missed the little girl.
“Fine, I guess.” The child dropped the messenger bag she’d been carrying onto the floor and slouched even farther into the chair.
“You look bummed. Want to talk?” Chelsea asked, telling herself she was a glutton for punishment.
“Kinda? I don’t know. Mom says it will be okay, but I’m just… I don’t know how I feel about the whole thing. And I can’t talk to my friends about it. Something about the press? I don’t know. All of it is really confusing to me.” The kid looked positively miserable, and Chelsea wanted to give her a hug.
“Well, whatever it is, you can talk to me about it. I won’t tell anyone, swear.”
How bad could it be, really?
Waverley admitted, “Mom had him on speaker, and before you even tell me, she’s told me a hundred times that people who eavesdrop don’t hear stuff they want to hear.”
“You overheard something? That is what has you upset?”
Chelsea stood and went around her desk to kneel in front of the child. Stroking her soft hair, she gave the kid a comforting smile. “Whatever it was, they might have said it out of anger or fear or any number of other emotions. Kids aren’t the only ones who sometimes say things they don’t mean. Grownups do, too. I promise, whatever you heard, it isn’t that bad. She’s still your mom, he’s your dad, and you’ll work out how to be a family. It is just going to take some time.”
Waverley leaned forward and hugged Chelsea tight. She returned the embrace, worried when the kid sniffled a little. She didn’t want to make her cry. “Thanks, Chelsea. I was worried, though, because Mom seemed annoyed, and Dad said they needed to talk about it … But, well, I don’t know. Mom didn’t seem happy.”
“What is it, Waverley?” Chelsea asked.
“He said maybe they should get married now, and that’s why we’re here. He asked my mom to marry him, and she refused to answer… I just don’t know what that means for me, you know?”
…
Chelsea
She’d kept her smile on, asked Lucy to come sit with Waverley, and managed to get away from the child before she crumbled, but with her hands on the gleaming marble of the women’s room, she realized she was breathing way too fast. She couldn’t cry—couldn’t—because if she started, she didn’t know if she could make herself stop. And if she didn’t manage to stop breathing so fast, she’d pass out and knock her head on the sink and die in a bathroom. But she just couldn’t seem to get enough air…
What, had she thought that, just because she hadn’t found panties in his office this week, he’d changed? A sob broke free, seeming to crack her heart in two as it got clogged in her throat. That things were different? That he’d actually felt something for her? She was a fool.
Any feelings she had for him were manufactured by her, not given by him. It was all in her head, a giant fantasy woven by a lonely and overworked mind. Aiden Kelley was exactly who he’d always been—an alphahole bastard who used women and made money and otherwise wasn’t what she should want in the first place.
But she did want him. A second sob hit the barricade of her throat, and she realized the horrible gasping sound in the room was coming from her. Tears splashed her flattened palms, and she shook her head as if she could shake away the pain in her chest. She’d known him for years and knew he didn’t care about anyone’s feelings other than his own.
He didn’t give a shit about her and wanted her to quit early so he could be rid of her, not because her presence pained him in any way. He wanted the uncomfortable reminder that he’d banged his assistant removed. She was nothing more than that to him—an inconvenience.
Men like him married the Margo Welles kind of women of this world, not the Chelsea Houstans.
She splashed cold water on her face, and then she dried off and walked out of the bathroom. She didn’t hesitate at her own office door, instead heading right toward the bank of elevators. As she pressed the button to call the elevator, she tapped her earpiece and waited as it beeped in her ear twice before he picked up.
“About your offer to quit immediately? I’ve reconsidered. Good-bye, Aiden,” she said before yanking the stupid thing from her ear. It made her feel special, really, like so many other little things he’d done over the years. She’d been the voice in his head, the person he allowed that constant contact. It made her feel like he needed her, like she mattered to him.
At the end of the day, it was just another lie she told herself to make it seem like he cared.
She dropped it to the floor, pleased when her steps into the elevator brought her foot firmly down on the discarded plastic and electronics with a satisfying crunch.
No more. She’d no more let herself believe the web of lies she’d built around a man who, as of right that second, proved that he didn’t deserve her idiotic devotion. She was done—with him, with his life, with his company. It was time she found something that made her happy, far away from anything and everything that had to do with Aiden Kelley and his company.
She didn’t expect to see him. But his hand caught the doors before they whooshed closed. He shoved inside the elevator, and the doors closed behind him. Before she could speak, he’d hit the elevator stop button and trapped them both inside the metal box.
“Why are you leaving? We can find a way to work out whatever is upsetting you.”
“I can’t work with you anymore,” she said. She wasn’t able to summon even a little heat to give force to the words. She felt hollowed out, as if there was nothing left for her to feel.
“I need you,” he said. He paused, and the weak portion of her—her heart, she guessed—hoped he’d finish his thought with an emotional plea. That he cared. Anything. Instead, he added, “We have a great working relationship, and this company needs you. You know how important you are to us.”
Part of her wanted to believe him, to read between the lines and invent a love he clearly wasn’t capable of offering. But her brain was functional, so she decided to squash her traitorous heart and said, “That’s too bad because, for once, I’m going to do what I need. And I finally realized that what I need is to be as far away from you as possible.”
An alarm began to sound, so she reached past him to release the stop and allow the elevator to move. He blocked her move, stepping in front of the panel. “You’ll be in breach of the contract.”
She felt her lips curl into a smile, but it wasn’t a happy expression. “I can always make more money. Please, just let me go.”
There was nothing else to say, really. He was going to marry Margo. Was staying out her two weeks worth this giant pit of pain in her chest? She raised a fist to rub at the spot, as if she could relieve the ache in her
soul with her own touch.
She couldn’t look at him. He apparently noticed this, capturing her face in one hand and tilting it up toward him. She still refused to focus on his face, choosing to keep her sightless gaze focused on his ear. Everything in her felt like it had shut down, slammed out of operation by his actions as easily as he’d stopped the elevator.
“Chelsea…” His voice seemed to throb out her name, sounding more like a plea than anything else. The way he said her name, it sounded like he cared. Even in this dark moment, her heart tried to find excuses for him. Tried to believe that he was capable of emotions like love and caring.
He wasn’t. Her logic knew it, even if her heart was too stupid to realize it yet.
His hand slid around her neck, capturing her hair before he dipped his face to cover her lips with his own. She didn’t respond to his kiss, if she could call it that. She simply stood there until he backed up with a frustrated huff. “Chelsea,” he repeated.
Finally meeting his eyes, she whispered, “Shouldn’t you be getting back to your fiancée?”
His expression went as empty as the hole carved in her heart. She reached past him, then hit the button to release the elevator into motion. In the quiet seconds of the elevator dropping to the ground floor, he said nothing. She could hear him breathing, a harsh sound that echoed in the small space. When the doors slid open, she stepped out into the atrium without a glance back.
If she looked back, she might crumble. As she came to the automatic doors leading to the street, she paused for only a second to whisper, “Good-bye, Aiden.”
But she knew he couldn’t hear her.
Chapter Sixteen
Aiden
He leaned back in his chair, trying to stay calm when he felt anything but relaxed. He guessed he should be happy that Margo hadn’t left when he’d fled the office to chase after Chelsea, but he had a hard time summoning anything that could be labeled joy.
Margo faced him, looking flawless, as seemed to be her norm. Her skirt was short, creamy white, and her shoes were a crimson much brighter than her hair. Everything about her appearance spoke of money, power, and elegance.
The Irish Prince (The Billionaire Dynasties) Page 11