by KB Winters
“No, I don’t know,” I retorted and then sank down into one of the chairs opposite his desk. I didn’t feel welcome, but I had to sit down. My legs were threatening to buckle. “Remy did…that?”
He gingerly placed the ice back on his bruised face. “Yes, he did.”
“I’m so sorry, Christopher. I don’t know what got into him.” I twisted my hands in my lap.
“Why are you here?”
I glanced down at my purse that was lying on the floor next to my feet. I could see the papers poking out from the top, but after seeing Christopher’s condition, I didn’t feel right about bringing it up. But, then again, that was the entire reason I was even there. It had to be done.
“Listen, I didn’t send Remy here, if that’s what you’re thinking. I know you two aren’t the best of friends for whatever reason and I’m sorry about what happened. But, I’m not here to talk about Remy, I’m here to talk about business, specifically the record deal with Downside.”
He scoffed. “Olivia, really? You think I give a flying fuck about your business?”
His voice was jagged and cruel and made my stomach clench. “I thought that’s what this was all about.”
“God, you really are that stupid. I’m done with this, Olivia. The deal’s off. And after the stunt your boyfriend pulled, I’m going to make sure that you’re blackballed from every club in this city. And I’ll make it my life’s mission to target any band that you’ve ever thought or will think about approaching. You’re business is over. Remy can’t save you.”
“Why?” It sounded so shallow and insufficient, but it was all I could eek out.
Christopher let out a harsh laugh. “Olivia, Olivia! Are you really that stupid? I was only—he put his fingers up in air quotes—’helping’ you to get to Downside so I could sign them to my new management branch.” He held up some papers. “And guess what, I’ve already signed two of them, so you might want to call them and say goodbye.”
“How dare you! You selfish piece of—”
“You know what—I don’t have time for this. Get out.”
I stood on shaking legs. “I’ll leave, but you should know that you’re wrong. I’m not helpless, and I guarantee that within six months—you’ll come begging to sign my bands to your pathetic excuse of a label, and guess what? Then, it will be my turn to blackball you, and you’ll remember this day and wonder why you had to be such a fucking asshole.”
I didn’t wait for his reply, I spun on my heel and stalked out, giving his nasty receptionist one final glare as I swept past her desk and out the front door.
I made it all the way back to the parking garage before I lost control of the hot tears that had built up since the moment I’d left Christopher’s office.
Chapter Three — Remy
The tires on my Audi screeched as I hit the gas and ripped out onto the street, driving as fast as I could away from Livvie’s apartment building. The knuckles on my right hand ached as I gripped the steering wheel. The skin wasn’t broken, and they hadn’t started bleeding after making contact with the side of Christopher’s face, but wrapped around the wheel, I could feel the pressure of a new bruise forming.
It had been worth it, though…hadn’t it?
I didn’t have an answer. I wanted to think it had been worth it, in some puffed-up, protective, way. Who was I kidding? The white knight in shining armor had never been my role. I was used to being the man driving women into the arms of guys like him—after I’d had my fun and never called them back.
But Livvie wasn’t like the women I’d had. She was different. Since meeting her, nothing in my life had been the same. I’d done things, thought things, and felt things that went so much deeper than anything else before I met her.
And yet, here I was, alone, pissed off, and on an aimless mission to get myself back in control. I was free-falling and I hated the way it felt.
A month or so ago, I had it all—or so I’d thought I did. I had access to unlimited money, was on the verge of signing lease papers to open my first restaurant, and more women than I could possibly fuck in a lifetime.
And now? I was living off my savings, my restaurant had been shelved, and the woman I was falling for didn’t trust me and thought I was some kind of petty, jealous, asshole.
“God, Remy, what did you expect?” I railed at myself as I found a highway that would lead me to the beach. I needed some fresh air, and the one place I could count on for that was the ocean. As a child, I’d always loved beach trips, which, considering I’d grown up within miles of it, were actually pretty infrequent. Madge wasn’t a fan of the beach—something to do with the sand not playing nicely with her designer clothes—and she usually disapproved of other families that offered to take me on their outings. It wasn’t until I’d hit my teenage years that I’d really experienced the unbridled freedom that the coast had to offer. I had countless memories that revolved around late night bonfires, beach house parties, and surf lessons.
I ripped down the highway with the windows rolled down, waiting for the first gulp of fresh and salty sea air to fill my lungs. Something had to clear my head before I went insane. All I could see when I closed my eyes was Livvie’s face. The way she’d looked, underneath me, in my bed with her sapphire eyes glowing up at me just before they rolled back as she moaned and writhed beneath my sweat coated body.
“Fuck!” I punched the steering wheel with my good hand.
Why didn’t she believe me? After everything I’d done—given up—to make her see that I was ready to be serious. What was the fucking point of any of it? Obviously, shaking my flaky, bad boy rep was going to take a helluva lot more effort than I’d anticipated.
I needed another voice, the one nagging and throwing doubts inside my mind was too much. I hit a few buttons on the center console and within seconds, JJ’s voice was filtering through the Bluetooth.
“Hey, man, what’s up?” “You free to get a drink?” I asked.
JJ hesitated. “Dude, it’s barely ten o’clock. You know that, right?”
“Don’t care. You free or not?”
“Yeah, of course. Where are you?”
Great, now he was worried. “I’m headed to the beach. I’ll meet you at Coast Guys Burger Shack. They have beer, right?”
“Pretty sure. I’ll be there soon.” He paused and my finger nearly slid over the end call button, before he continued. “Hang in there, man.Don’t do anything…impulsive.”
“JJ, I’m fine. Don’t go calling some suicide prevention line. I just need a drink and some fresh air, all right?”
“All right.”
I ended the call before he could dig deeper. I didn’t want to hear his warnings or advice. Actually, I really didn’t want to think at all.
That lasted about half an hour. As soon as JJ and I sat down at a table on the patio of the burger joint, I ordered a beer—ignoring the raised brow of the waitress—and before I knew it, I’d spilled the entire story. As I was speaking, JJ’s face melted with compiled horror.
“Wait—Remy, stop,” he sputtered after I told him the part about punching Christopher. “You gotta back up, dude. You gave up your trust, traded your restaurant money for Livvie’s music business, and then hooked up with her? Then, you had the audacity to assault one of the richest bastards in LA?”
He scrubbed his face with the palms of his hands. When he looked back over at me, his face was red and his skin looked irritated from the pressure. “Have you lost your fucking mind completely? Christopher Diaz is not the kind of guy you need to be fucking with. You know that, right? I mean, the cops could be out looking for you right now.”
I took a long pull from my beer. I didn’t care. I knew Christopher wouldn’t call the cops, and even if he did, there were no witnesses. The case wouldn’t stick.
“Keep it together,” I told him. I set my empty bottle down and waited for the waitress to swoop by and get me another. It was ironic that JJ’s anxiety was somehow calming my own. While he was losing his mi
nd and reeling from the bombshell I’d just dropped on him, my own thoughts reorganized and settled down.
“Hey, man, I’m cool,” he said, although his tight expression gave him away. “What’s your plan?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. I gave Livvie the contracts that prove Christopher is using her. If she still wants to associate with him after that, I guess I’ll have to pull my support. I can’t work with her if she won’t trust me on stuff like that.”
“Can you do that, though? Were there contracts signed to guarantee a certain amount of financial assistance?” JJ asked.
“Yes and no. We had an unofficial agreement, but my lawyer is drawing up formal contracts.”
“So, what, you just wouldn’t sign them?”
“No.” My answer came out firmer than I’d intended, but it helped me see my feelings more clearly. Like that game where one person throws out a word and the other has to say the first thing that pops into their mind.
The admission hurt, but I knew that if pushed, it would be the only choice I could make. I was willing to give up, or at least put my restaurant on hold, to help Livvie and make her dreams come true. She deserved it and I wanted to help her, maybe even more so now that her success would also wreck Madge and Christopher’s plotting.
But she had to trust me. That was all I required.
“What do you think the secrets are?” JJ asked, pulling me back to the present.
I must have looked confused because he rephrased. “You said that Christopher gave Madge some kind of dirt. What do you think it is?”
I honestly didn’t know. I hadn’t formed any theories. Livvie and I had talked a lot over the three days that we had spent together at my penthouse. Her life sounded pretty straightforward to me, it didn’t seem like there would be much room for some big, dark secret to hide.
“Do you want me to do some digging?” JJ asked. I knew he could use his PI skills and probably figure it out in a few days.
“No.” I stared past his shoulder, out at the ocean, watching the waves rolling in as the tide changed from low to high. “I can’t expect her to trust me if I won’t do the same for her. If she’s hiding things, she will have to bring them out at her pace.”
I cut my gaze back to JJ and he looked surprised. “Wow. This one’s really got you, huh?”
I cocked an eyebrow.
“I’ve never seen you—or heard you—like this before. Where do you think this whole thing’s going?”
I took another chug of beer, stalling my reply.
“That good, huh?” JJ smiled.
I couldn’t help but laugh. “It sounds completely insane, but…” I trailed off, looking back out at the ocean. It was a perfect southern California day. My heart twisted, and I suddenly found myself wishing I was here with Livvie. Wishing that she was sitting across from me and that we were splitting a bottle of wine before going out to dip our feet in the ocean.“I think she’s it for me.”
JJ smiled and nodded at me. “I’m happy for you.”
I wished I could say the same. I wanted Livvie, and I knew she wanted me, too, but at the moment, there was so much bullshit in the way of us being together the way that I’d imagined.
Our food arrived and we changed to lighter topics as we both dug into our burgers. I hadn’t eaten since having dinner with Livvie the night before, and ended up wolfing down the buffalo burger with smoked Gouda cheese in record time.
When we were done eating, JJ announced that he had to get back to his office to meet with a new client, so I picked up the check and waved him off as I went up to the counter to pay. Once things were settled, I went back to the table and dropped a nice tip down for the waitress. I stood, staring out at the ocean and then used the patio gate to exit and started a long walk down the coast.
Eventually, I ran out of places to go, and headed back into the city to my penthouse—which I already knew was going to feel a lot bigger than it was, simply because Livvie and her infectious energy wouldn’t be there to fill it.
Chapter Four — Remy
I’d barely been back home an hour when the anticipated silence was broken by my phone buzzing on the granite counter top in the kitchen. I threw down my oven mitts after checking the frittata I had in the oven, and glanced over at the caller ID. It was the front desk. I snatched up the phone and clicked onto the call, silently praying that Livvie was downstairs waiting for me to give the word to send her up.
“Good evening, Mr. Maddox. Ms. Devereux is here to see you. Shall I send her up?”
Shit. What the hell is she doing here?
The residual anger and frustration from the morning welled back up and my fists clenched at my sides as memories of her conversation with Christopher still rattled around my mind. “No, don’t send her up. She’s not welcome here. Please tell her to go away.”
“Uhm—okay, sir. Yes, sir,” the front desk clerk—it sounded like James—stammered out.
“Remington, you will not embarrass me like this,” Madge hissed into the phone.
I grimaced, imagining the scene going on in the lobby. I just hoped she hadn’t clobbered James with her designer handbag to get the phone away from him. “Mother, I said I was done with you. Good bye.”
“This is about Christopher,” she retorted, as though that was the magic ticket.
I laughed harshly. “Well, in that case, there’s even less to say.”
I hung up the phone. It rang again two seconds later
“Mother, stop embarrassing yourself. You’re never stepping foot inside my apartment again. Clear?”
“Remington, the only one who should be embarrassed is you. What were you thinking? Assaulting Christopher in his own office. You’re just lucky he isn’t pressing charges. Obviously, you’re going through a lot right now, with the trust ending and all this tension. Let me come up so we can work something out.”
I rolled my eyes. So this was her new tactic? Her backstabbing, plotting, ice queen routine wasn’t panning out, so it was apparently time to switch gears and act like she gave a damn about me instead. How novel.
“Goodbye, Madge.” I clicked off the line again and raked my hand through my hair. This time, the line stayed silent for more than a minute. I dialed down and told James to not send up any more calls for the rest of the day. Madge was resilient, if nothing else, and it was only a matter of time before she’d come back to try for another round.
My veins were still flooded with molten lava, and I only knew two ways to get the pent-up rage out of my system—and a good fuck wasn’t available, so I set the baked frittata on the counter, put on my Nike shorts and went directly to the complex gym and didn’t go back up to my penthouse until every muscle in my body was shredded to the point that I could barely move. I rode the elevator back up to the top of the building, back home, and took a long steam in the sauna attached to my master bathroom.
By the time I’d showered, I barely had enough energy to collapse into bed. A sleepless night combined with all the stress of the day pushed me over the edge into a deep, dark, dreamless sleep within seconds of hitting the feather pillows.
Sometime later, a ringing sound ripped me out bed and had me running to silence the phone. I nearly clicked the silence button before seeing through groggy eyes that Livvie’s name was the one flashing on my screen this time.
“Liv?” I mumbled, pressing the phone to the side of my face.
“Remy! I—I’m sorry, to—” she paused and I could have sworn I heard her sniffling. “They said you’re not taking calls, but—”
“Liv, where are you?”
“Downstairs,” she said, sniffling again.
“Stay there.”
I hung up, and ran back to my room to throw on a t-shirt and a pair of shorts. I went downstairs and as soon as the elevator doors opened when I hit the lobby, Livvie was the first thing I saw.
God, she’s a mess.
She was crying and looked like she had been for quite a while. There were black smudges under her
eyes, her hair was tousled like she’d just gotten out of bed, and she sniffled every two seconds.
Without a word, I stepped off the elevator and went to her, wrapping my arms around her. I pulled her close to my chest and she snuggled against me. I had no idea why she was crying or why she was here.All I knew was that holding her like that felt like heaven.
“I’m so—sorry, Remy. I was such a biiiitch,” she wailed again. Hot tears were splashing from her cheeks and soaking through my thin t-shirt as she sobbed against me.
“Shhh, Liv, it’s okay.” I smoothed her hair under my hands.
“No—it’s—not!” she insisted—each word punctuated with a body wracking sob.
“Hey, what’re you talking about? Of course it’s okay.” I tilted her chin back and forced her to look up at me. It killed me to see her gorgeous blue eyes clouded over with tears. “Livvie, it’s okay. I swear. Come on, let’s get you upstairs.” It was pitch black outside and the lobby was all but deserted, but the late-night front desk clerk looked a little too eager to overhear our conversation.
“I was so awful to you,” she said as I gently pulled on her arm and started leading her towards the elevator bank.
We stepped inside, and I hit the buttons before gathering her back in my arms and pulling her against me. “Livvie, please, it’s okay.”
She was still crying, but was slowing down. I didn’t say anything else and continued stroking her hair, hoping that somehow it was helping. I’d never really been the comforting boyfriend type—hell, before her, I’d never been the boyfriend type, period. I could only do what felt right and hope she calmed down.
By the time we got inside my penthouse, she had wound down. I led her inside, shutting and re-locking the door before taking her into the kitchen. “Water or something stronger?” I asked, opening the fridge wide enough for her to see inside from her seat at the kitchen island.
“Water’s good,” she answered, her voice still a little shaky.
I deposited a bottle in front of her and waited for her to finish her sip before asking, “All right, let’s start at the beginning. What’s wrong?”