by Tia Siren
“Helen, I am a professional. This is my business. If I were to shy away from property connected to anyone from my past, I would go bankrupt. This is a small town. I have had both good and bad dealings with everyone at some point in my life.”
She nodded her head, but I knew she didn’t believe me. “Okay then. I’ll be at my desk if you need me.”
“Helen?”
“Yes?”
“Will you shut my door? I need to make a phone call.”
She did as I asked, and once she had gone, I let out a long breath of air. I didn’t need to call anyone. I just needed a minute to get my shit together. That woman had a way of making me crazy—still!
I would not let her win. I would definitely not allow her to get under my skin. There was no way she could hurt me if I managed to stay indifferent toward her. I just hoped I had the strength to ignore the stirring of passion she always managed to incite within me.
Chapter 5
Ashley
I hated him, absolutely fucking hated him. He was an arrogant, conceited asshole who was drop dead gorgeous. I hated that I found him so damn attractive. Years of fantasizing about him in my bed came rushing back. He was the one man who popped into my head every time I went to bed with someone. There had only been a couple of men with whom I’d gotten close enough to have sex, but they had never measured up. None of them had been Brock.
I walked out of his office, looked up and down the street, and decided a piece of pie was what I needed. Chocolate cream pie. It would help settle my nerves, I hoped. Brock had looked so, so, manly, like a real man. The last time I had seen him, he had been a young man, barely old enough to drink. Now he was all hard lines and his chest was much broader than I remembered. I didn’t think people could grow after the age of twenty-two, but he had. I’d felt so small standing in front of him, poking my finger into his chest. I knew it had been ridiculous, but in the moment, I’d felt it was better than wrapping my hands around his neck. As if they would even be able to close around his neck. I had seen the muscles on either side and then the vein popping out that had always been the giveaway when he was angry. At least that was still the same.
I walked into the diner, plopped down in a booth close to the door, and looked around the place. It had been a favorite hangout for the teens back in my day, but that didn’t seem to be the case today. I looked to my left and groaned.
Shit!
My sister held up a finger and told the customer she was waiting on to sit tight for a minute.
“What are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be off saving the day or ruining someone’s life?”
“Knock it off, Anna. Get someone else to wait on me. I don’t trust you not to spit in my food.”
“Ha! As if I would ever wait on you. Everyone else bows down the great Ashley, but I do not,” she spat at me before turning to call the other waitress over. “Donna, can you please deal with this customer?”
Donna, who was filling salt shakers, looked up, looked at me, then Anna, and rolled her eyes. “Yeah. I’ll be right there.”
The woman had clearly been a two-pack-a-day smoker for some time judging by her gravelly voice.
Donna made her way over in no big hurry and took my order for coffee and pie. I didn’t get the impression there was any love lost between Donna and my sister, so I wasn’t too worried she would take up the crusade against me and sully my order in some spiteful way.
I stared out the window, looking at the various businesses and watching people walk by. A lot had changed, but the feel of the town was the same. The Starbucks on the corner had been a surprise, but there were still plenty of mom-and-pop joints up and down the road.
A clatter on the table caused me to jerk and turn my gaze back to the restaurant.
“Here’s your damn pie,” Anna sneered, dropping the plate on the table and slamming down a cup before filling it with coffee from the pot she was carrying.
I guess I should have felt lucky she didn’t pour the hot coffee over my head. Small miracles I supposed.
“Where’s your kid?”
I glared up at her. “My son, Jasper, is at home with Dad.”
Her eyes bulged out. “What! You left your kid at home with our sick dad? You get that he has cancer, right? Like, he isn’t well?”
I rolled my eyes. “Uh, duh, yeah. I get it. Jasper isn’t difficult to watch. Dad wanted him to stay. He was feeling good today.”
“Whatever. You are such a spoiled little bitch, always expecting everyone to jump when you say.”
I couldn’t take her anymore. She was toxic.
I reached into my purse, pulled out a ten, and left it on the table. “Keep the fucking change, Anna.”
I walked out of the diner and headed for my rental car. I needed to get out of this town. It was not good for my health. I was going to have high blood pressure by the time this was all settled.
The drive out to the farm was nice. I was glad I was alone. I cranked up the radio and listened to the latest song from Carrie Underwood. The woman was small town but powerful. I admired her. When I pulled up in front of the house, I saw my dad sitting on the porch in his favorite rocking chair. Jasper was in the yard close to the steps, digging in the dirt. The boy loved dirt.
“Hey, guys!” I said, feeling much happier than I had a short thirty minutes ago.
“Hi, Mom! I’ve been taking care of Grandpa and now he is going to take care of me,” Jasper said, standing and rubbing his dirty hands down his shirt.
I groaned. The kid had a way of staining clothes beyond what any laundry detergent could possibly remove.
“Thank you,” I said, hugging him before making my way up to the porch. “How was he?” I asked.
My dad smiled and shook his head. “You’ve done a real good job with that boy, Ash. Really. I am amazed at how smart he is. And caring. He is far wiser than his cousins, but don’t tell Leslie or Hank I said that.”
I laughed. “Your secret is safe with me, Dad.”
Jasper went back to digging in the dirt. His little box of special rocks sat off to the side. I smiled while watching him dig with an old garden tool. He was really in his element.
“So, how’s the farm business been going?”
He shrugged. “Last year was great. This year I just don’t know. I haven’t been out there to check the fields. I had a hired hand help get the seeds in the ground, but it’s been sorely neglected since.”
“I’m sorry, Dad. I’ll take a look out there today. How’ve you been feeling?”
“It comes and goes. The first round was worse, I think because I didn’t know what to expect. I didn’t feel sick so I kept up with my chores. Toward the end of the round, I wasn’t doing well at all. I just overdid it. I’ve been a little smarter this time around,” he said with a grin. “I’ve got all my kids around to do the heavy lifting, and I’m letting them do it.”
“We are all here for you. I’m here to help, too.”
“Oh, Ash, I wish you didn’t have to pick up and come running back here. Losing the farm wasn’t my plan, but if it happens, it won’t be the end of the world,” he said in a soft voice.
“Dad,” I said, not willing to accept his defeat, “we can fight this. We’ll figure out a way to keep the farm. You’ll recover from the cancer and life will go back to normal.”
He laughed. “Normal for you. We don’t need this big ol’ farm anymore. I’m getting old, Ashley. I don’t need to spend my days planting and harvesting, worrying about how much rain we get. It’s time to retire and enjoy my remaining years. I want to have free time to visit you and spend time with all my grandkids.”
“But, Dad, this is our home,” I argued.
He shook his head. “It hasn’t been a home in a long time. Hank and Leslie have their own homes and families. You live in New York, and I expect with your rising-star status, you’ll buy your own home real soon.”
“Dad, this is your home,” I stressed.
“I don’t need a house this
big. It’s just more work for me.”
“Anna still lives here, doesn’t she? Make her help out.”
“Anna,” he shook his head. “Well, Anna’s new boyfriend will want her to move in with him now that she’s pregnant.”
“What!?” I blurted out. I’d had no idea she was pregnant. That explained the increase in hostility. She had been extra bitchy since I’d been home. Maybe she was pissed she was pregnant. She was twenty-seven though. If she didn’t want to be pregnant, she should know how to prevent it by now.
“Yep. She’s only a couple months along, but I suspect she’ll be moving in with that boy real soon.”
He didn’t look pleased about Anna’s new boyfriend, but with three daughters, my dad had been through a lot of boyfriends. He always told us he didn’t bother getting to know them all that well because we would end up dumping them anyway. He was usually right. Despite his automatic disapproval of the boys my sisters and I brought home, he was always polite. He was gruff and tough, but never overly rude.
“I can’t believe she’s pregnant,” I said in disbelief.
He laughed. “I would think you’d understand how that all works.”
I rolled my eyes. “I meant I’m surprised she is. She has never struck me as the maternal kind.”
“No one is until it happens.”
I smiled. He was right—again. I had certainly not been the maternal kind, but the moment Jasper was in my arms, I’d known I was meant to be his mom. That maternal instinct had kicked in and, despite being all alone, far away from my family, I had figured it out.
“Well, I’m not ready to give up on this farm yet, and I think we can save it. I think deep down you want to save it too. I want to be able to come back and visit, and, Dad, I want Jasper to know this place,” I said, meaning every word.
It had taken me a long time to realize how much I wanted to be here—at least to visit. It was a home base, and now that I had pulled the scab off the wound by returning home and seeing Brock, I was ready to heal the right way. I needed my family, and I needed Jasper to know them.
I stood up, brushed off my butt, then looked at my dad and said, “I won’t let him win, Dad. I promise you that.”
He smirked. “Lord have mercy on that man. He has no idea what’s coming his way. I admire you for trying, Ashley, but I don’t think it’s worth all this effort.”
I laughed. “He sure as hell doesn’t, but I will make him very sorry for messing with my family, and that will definitely be worth the effort.”
I headed inside to the table where the files were still sitting. I was going to go over them with a fine-tooth comb and find a way to stop Brock. I wasn’t rich by any means, but I had some money put away. I hoped it would be enough to pay the back taxes and the amount due on the mortgage. Brock needed to back off.
Leslie had said she hadn’t really had time to look over the paperwork. That irritated me to no end. She was right in the same town and couldn’t make the time to check on Dad? To make sure the mortgage got paid on time or check on his health in general? I guessed I would just have to do it.
Chapter 6
Brock
Dammit. She had done it again. Here I was caught under her spell. One look at her and I was lost. I had been sure that after all this time I would be immune to her. I wasn’t. Despite the hurt she had caused me, I still wanted her. My body remembered all the little details about her. I remembered the way her face looked when she was in the midst of an orgasm, how her body felt under my own, and the way she tasted and smelled. Everything was burned into my very soul.
I had been in the middle of bringing a girl to an orgasm when my alarm had gone off, and I realized Ashley had been the star of my dream. Not the Ashley I’d met yesterday, but the Ashley Parks from years past. The two were one and the same in some ways but not all. My body longed to know the woman she was today, but my mind was holding on to the girl who had captured my heart when I was eighteen.
In my dream, she’d been naked beneath me. Her blond hair with that sexy little streak of pink had fanned out around her head, creating a halo effect. Only I knew she was no angel. The woman was a firecracker in bed. I remembered her yelling my name as her nails cut little half-moons into my back and shoulders when I fucked her good and hard. Her body had been built for mine; at least that was what I had always felt. We fit together perfectly, and our sexual needs were a match as well.
Back then, I could do no wrong. We had been happy. Too happy, apparently. She had always been far too eager to please me. Anything I had said or wanted, she’d agreed with. I laughed thinking about my only hang-up with her back in the day. Secretly, I’d hoped she would be a little more aggressive. I’d wanted her to argue with me, tell me to go to hell when I said or did something stupid. She’d gone out of her way to do nice things for me. I had fallen head over heels in love with her kindness.
I remembered her bringing me lunch on a whim or using her key to my apartment to let herself in so she could make me dinner. Sometimes she would be waiting for me naked in my bed. Those days had been so good. I wished I would have paid more attention and appreciated every minute I had with her back then. I missed her like crazy, and still, to this day, I longed to see her naked in my bed.
When I had asked her to marry me, she’d cried, and I had thought we would be together forever. Everyone had. I would never forget the day she shattered my heart into a million pieces. There wasn’t a day that went by that I didn’t think about her and what she had done to me that day. I closed my eyes, blocking the image of her family staring at me with pity. She had fled. We had all stood out there in her dad’s field, thinking she was getting some last-minute fixes done to her dress. The minutes had stretched on, and soon enough, Leslie had gone to check on her. Ashley had fled out a back window so no one would see her.
“No,” I said aloud in the room. I couldn’t go down that road again.
I needed to go for a run, anything to get rid of the tension. The dream had stirred up some vivid memories that I wished to forget. I had taken up running about three years ago. It had been a last-ditch effort to exorcise the demon that haunted me: Ashley. I had been desperate. I’d even been prepared to hire a priest to bless me or something to make her go away. Running had been my saving grace.
I checked my phone app and saw it was already close to eighty before eight in the morning. It was probably too hot for a run, but I didn’t care. I needed the release, and a wet dream wasn’t going to do it for me. I laced up my shoes, rubbed on some sunscreen, and headed outside.
Damn. It was hot.
I set off, going at a slow pace, relishing the feel of the pavement under my feet. Every time a foot slammed against the pavement, it vibrated through my body, shaking the image of a naked and writhing Ashley out of my head. A good trail run was what I needed, but I didn’t have time for that. Maybe tomorrow. I cut my run short, not wanting to give myself a heatstroke, and headed home to shower and dress for the day.
As I drove through town, I checked my various signs, making sure they were all still up and free from graffiti. I wouldn’t put it past Ashley to take a can of spray paint and deface my signs.
“Good morning, Brock,” Helen said when I walked through the door.
“Good morning, Helen,” I said with a genuine smile.
She usually beat me to the office. Being my own boss, I could set my own hours. It was a perk that I took full advantage of. I wasn’t the kind of guy that liked to show up at six in the morning.
“I have a message for you—from your lawyer.” She added the last bit with a look on her face that told me it wasn’t good.
“What about?”
Helen cleared her throat. “The Parks farm.”
I nodded. It was expected. “What? Did Ashley call him directly, or does she have a lawyer?”
Helen shrugged. “I don’t know. You’ll have to call him. He said he would be in until ten and then he had court. Did you want coffee this morning? It’s a bit warm.”
“No, thank you.” I shook my head.
I headed into my office and called my lawyer. As I suspected, Ashley had called, demanding answers and peppering him with questions. Thankfully, he was a good lawyer and fended her off. He assured me I was not breaking any laws. All I had to do was bide my time. The minute the loan went into default, the farm was mine. I had a month. I could wait a month. I knew there was no way Tanner Parks was going to scrape together the money he needed to save the farm. I would own the property next month.
After hanging up with my lawyer, I felt giddy. Ashley wasn’t going to win this one. I was. I spun around in my chair, laced my fingers behind my head, and stared up at the ceiling. Life was good. I didn’t have to worry about Ashley ruining my plans. I would buy the farm and she would go running back to New York, never to be seen again.
Ping!
Spinning my chair around, I looked at my email. There was a new message. The message line read, “Important information about Ashley Parks.”
I hesitated about half a second before I clicked the mouse to open the message. My stomach dropped when I read the single line of the email.
“Ask Ashley about her kid.”
I blinked and reread the email several times.
Ashley had a kid?
The twinge of jealousy and hurt I felt surprised me. Of course she had been with other men. I had been with other women. She had moved on. I hadn’t. I was the one who clearly had this weird hope that we would get back together one day. It was a fantasy, one I really didn’t even want to come to life. I couldn’t trust her. I certainly didn’t want to give her my heart so she could crush it again.
A kid. Why would the anonymous emailer tell me to ask her about the kid?
Oh shit.
The email gave me no information. I had no idea how old the kid was or even if the kid was a boy or girl. She wouldn’t do that to me, would she? No one in town had ever mentioned she had a kid. All I had ever heard was gossip about how well she was doing in the city and how she was some up-and-coming big shot in the photography world. I assumed all that information came through her family, but I couldn’t say for sure.