Page 95 of Forever Fighting
He tosses his hands up but comes over and takes the seat on the other side of me. “We were having a really good night at the soft opening, and I didn’t want to bring any of that down bymentioning Adam. Plus, I knew I wasn’t going to do the show, so I didn’t think it was all that important.”
“Why would Adam send?—”
“He didn’t,” he cuts me off. “She told me she wanted to lock me in for the show so she could pitch it to the higher-ups.”
My brows furrow. “Does she know about your friendship with Adam?”
He shakes his head bewilderedly. “No clue, and I didn’t say anything. All I told her was that I wasn’t interested. She emailed my people, and my people told her again that I wasn’t interested and that was that. Until this.”
I frown and look sightlessly across the room as I think this through. “She was in Vegas when we got married. So either she was following us or digging into you and came across our marriage license. Are you saying she followed us to Mexico?”
“It looks that way,” Forest states.
My hands cover my face, and I think and think and then… My hands drop to my lap and I look at Roman. “The woman Adam cheated on me with was blonde. I mean, I realize there are millions of blondes in this world, but…”
Forest comes over, working something on his phone before he hands it to me.
It’s a picture of her from the Boston Nine corporate site. Anne Sharpe. Again, there is something familiar about her that I can’t quite place.
“This is Adam’s Corporate Barbie.” I sigh bitterly. “Nothing like trying to fuck your way to get what you want. She likely seduced Adam to get a show out of him, and that show was going to star his best friend. She must have thought it was a no-brainer and would make her career and when you said no, this was her retaliation.”
“Something like that,” Roman agrees.
“Fabulous. Can I out her publicly?”
“I wouldn’t do that with a vengeful woman especially whenyou don’t know all of her motives.” Skylar throws her hands up. “But that’s just me.”
“I agree,” Aston says, tucking Skylar in by his side. “You don’t want to provoke her into more action. What she did is already done. Focus on your story.”
“Let’s write the statement,” Hayes comes in, ever the CEO. “Then once you’re good with it, we’ll put it out there and see what happens.”
30
ROMAN
Braelyn’s statement went out two hours ago, and it’s completely taken over everything. We won’t fully know how it’s going to be taken likely until tomorrow. But for now, it’s done.Boston Nineisn’t posting it and I’m not surprised. It makes Adam look like a cheating asshole. It makes Braelyn and me look like two friends who got a little careless one night in Vegas, but from it something real and unexpected has spawned.
Except Braelyn didn’t write it.
Hayes wrote most of it and we signed off on it.
Since we got back here, even on the plane before that, she’s been a little distant. I can’t get a full read on her. I need to tell her about Europe, but I still can’t find the right words. I’m trying to figure this out. Like what if I don’t go for the entire time? What if I do a week or two, then I’m home for a bit and repeat? Or maybe sometimes I take Braelyn with me for a few days here and there or something.
I can make it work. I know I can. I just have to figure out a way that makes sense and until I do, I’m not sure what to say.
Now that everyone has left and it’s just us and I don’t know how to proceed. The statement was the right thing to do, but for some reason, it still doesn’t feel finished. Like this was just round one of the fight and not the knockout.
It was easier in Mexico. Just us in the small villa with one bed, but now we’re back at my place, and she has her own room here. As if proving my point, that’s exactly where she heads after she reaches the landing at the top of the stairs.
For a moment, all I can do is watch her go. She enters her room, the door shutting behind her, and she did all of that without a word to me. I’m left standing here in the hall with my stupid fucking heart in my hand, and she shut the door on me.
So there’s that.
I had been wondering how she’d be when we got back here, and I guess I have my answer.Fuck!
I want to go after her and demand answers. I want to call her out on her bullshit and tell her to get the fuck over it already. But how can I do that? I’ve already put myself on the line with this, and her going in there and shutting the door tells me everything I never wanted to hear.
I head for my bedroom, anxious to change out of these clothes and punch the fuck out of a bag. I have a fight in two weeks and I’m not ready for it. Usually, I train daily. Running, weights, drills, bag work. Considering I don’t do this professionally or even legally, I work very hard to stay at the top of my game.
