CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Jaxon
As soon as I step off the plane in Los Angeles, I want to turn around and fly back to Catalpa Creek. Not just because I’m immediately ushered into a car by my security or because my assistant, Heidi, is already talking a mile a minute, but because I feel like I left an organ behind.
It’s my heart. I left my heart in Catalpa Creek.
It sounds so cheesy, but that’s exactly how it feels. Like I have a huge gaping hole in my chest that no one can see, but I can feel it so severely that I want to curl my body around it to stem the blood flow.
I know Honey sent me away to protect me. I saw the hurt in her eyes when she pushed me away, because it exactly matched what I was feeling. But staying and fighting for her would have been the selfish thing to do.
I don’t care about my reputation in the least, but I’ve seen how publicity, especially the wrong kind of publicity, can hurt people and I’m not letting that happen to Honey. If I bring her into my life, even if Dell doesn’t sell her story to the highest bidder, people will dig up the dirt on her, and her sisters finding out the truth about her will only be the beginning.
The world will see her as a criminal and say horrible things about her.
And Dell, seeing me as a ticket to wealth, will never leave her alone.
I hated to leave her with him, but I’ve hired even more security to look out for her and her sisters. She’s going to be okay.
She’ll be even better without me there to tempt Dell to ask for even more than she can give.
I left to protect Honey, so why do I feel like the villain in our story? A far worse villain than Dell?
“Jaxon, are you even listening to me?”
I blink at Heidi. She’s the calmest person I know and barely ever expresses any emotion, but at the moment, she’s grinning like the cat that’s just gobbled down all the canaries. She’s in her forties, but could pass for someone younger than me, with blond curls and glasses she wears only to offset the curls. Her exterior doesn’t match her serious, take-no-prisoners interior.
“Sorry,” I say. “My ears are blocked by my broken heart.”
Her smile doesn’t falter. “Thankfully, broken hearts aren’t my department. Have you checked your messages?”
“I turned my phone off this morning.” Shortly after I left Honey. If she or her sisters or their partners called me, nothing would have stopped me from running back to her.
It takes a lot of work to not be selfish, and I’m a weak man.
Heidi shakes her head. “Well, you are in for a wonderful—”
Her phone rings, and somehow, her grin widens when she looks at the readout. She practically shivers with delight. “Put on your don’t-fuck-with-me pants, Jaxon. It’s time for payback.
Heidi hits the speaker on the phone and holds it up between us. “Hello?”
“Heidi, put Jaxon on. I need to talk to him.”
I glance at Heidi, confused. Why is she so happy about Lucia calling?
“I’m sorry, who?” Heidi pretends a confusion that doesn’t suit her at all. She is never confused. She’s always three steps ahead of everyone else.
“Don’t fuck with me, Heidi,” Lucia screams in a voice I’ve never heard from her. What the actual hell is going on? “Put Jaxon on the phone.”
“Oh,” Heidi says slowly. “You mean Jaxon Hayes. I have so many clients and—”
“Just put him on the fucking phone.”
“One moment, please.” Heidi mutes her phone and cackles with maniacal glee.
“Best day ever.” Heidi squeezes my arm and looks me dead in the eye, her smile twisting as her expression turns bloodthirsty. “Remember that she pushed you in front of the train when she told the world you were the cheater. Don’t go soft on her.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Your heart has been ripped out. Use that.”
“Heidi, what the —”
She unmutes the phone and shoves it in my face.
“Hello,” I say automatically.
“Jaxon,” Lucia says, then breaks into sobs. Gone is the angry, shrieky voice she used on Heidi.
I stare at Heidi, but her smile only grows the more Lucia cries. Heidi is sharp and cutthroat, but she’s never been malicious or deceitful. I assume some real tragedy hasn’t befallen my ex-girlfriend.
“Lucia,” I say, gently. “What’s wrong?”
“Jaxon,” Lucia wails. “You have to help me.”
Finally, Heidi pulls another phone from some secret pocket and holds up an article from a celebrity gossip site with the headline ‘America’s sweetheart caught cuddling with Theo Landry six months before she split from Jaxon Hayes.’
“Six months?” If my heart wasn’t still in Catalpa Creek, I might be furious and hurt right now. Instead, I just can’t believe I was such a blind idiot. “You were fucking Theo for six months before I caught you?”
“I didn’t mean for it to happen. Haven’t you ever fallen in love with someone at first sight?”
Honey, standing in a field, her dark hair caught by the wind. Even from a hundred yards away, I was a goner. I believe in love at first sight. I fell ass over head into it. “You shouldn’t have lied to me for six months and let me think the problem in our relationship was me. Do you know how hard I worked to fix things for you?”
Heidi makes a pained sound and I look over to see she’s pressed her hand to her mouth and is blinking hard. Guess she has a heart after all.
“If I’d told you, you would have dumped me. You know how it would have looked if we only dated for a few months before I ran off with Theo.”
“Bottom line.” I’m so sick of her bullshit. So sick of feeling like any of this was ever my fault. “You cared more about your image than you ever cared about me. It’s a shitty thing to do, Lucia.”
“I know.” She sounds contrite, but she’s not. It took me thirty seconds to recognize Honey attempting to manipulate me, but I let Lucia do it for six months while we dated and then I let her keep doing it, because it was easier than admitting the truth. The truth that I’d been so busy with my career, I didn’t even know the woman I was dating. The truth that I was so desperate for a real, stable relationship in my life I was willing to ignore the numerous red flags.
All it took for me to get my head on straight was a few months of solitude and a woman who reminded me what true friendship and love really are.
Lucia’s still talking, but I’ve stopped listening.
“No,” I say.
Heidi air claps next to me.
“What?” Lucia’s voice goes watery.
“I’m not covering for you anymore, Lucia. If you try to spread some story that you and I were on a break when those pictures were taken or that we had an open relationship or that you knew about my cheating and ran to Theo for help mending your broken heart, my team will rebut your story with everything we have.”
“This will ruin my career. Everyone will say I’m a horrible person.”
“If you can’t handle it, I fully recommend hiding out in a small town and taking some time to yourself to really think about who you are and what you want out of life.”
“What?” she screeches. “What the actual fuck, Jaxon? I stayed with you, even when you were being an asshole and trying to talk about our feelings all the time. I listened to you whine about fixing our relationship for freaking months and you can’t even do this one simple thing for me?”
At another time, her words might have hurt my feelings, but I have perspective now. Enough to see she’s got far bigger problems than I have and none of this has ever been about me. “I’ve done more than enough for you, Lucia. We’re done.”
“I will destroy you, Jaxon. I will—”
Heidi hits the end call button with a decisive flick of her finger. “That was the highlight of my year.”
I study my assistant. “Did she always talk to you like that?”
She nods. “Every single time.”
I could get mad at Heidi for not letting me know about Lucia’s dark side, but Heidi’s not my friend. She’s my assistant. She was doing her job and saying anything to me back then would have probably gotten her fired. I wouldn’t have believed her, because I was so determined to believe Lucia was right for me. “I’m sorry you had to deal with that.”
“You pay me enough that nasty people like that can’t hurt my feelings. Now, what can we do about your broken heart? Want to stop by the gym to hit the punching bag before your first meeting?”
“It’s going to take a lot more than a punching bag to make me feel better.”
Heidi gives me a sympathetic look before her phone rings and she gets back to work organizing my life. I can’t think of a single person in this city who I can talk to about my broken heart or the way getting back to my career doesn’t feel nearly as good as I’d hoped it would.
The first thing I do after I dig my phone out of my carry-on and power it up, is check the text thread I have going with Honey’s security team. Dell is still several miles away from Honey, who’s safe at home. Apparently, she and her sisters are having some sort of huge party with tons of people camping out on their property.
I advise security to watch her even more closely and make sure Dell doesn’t party crash.
I’m sure they’re annoyed with my micro-managing, but I don’t care.
Next, I call my publicist and warn him about Honey’s past and the stories that could come out about her. I want him to be ready to do whatever he can to prevent the story from getting out and to change the narrative if it does.
After I hang up with him, my phone vibrates in my hand with a text from Aunt Lorraine. It’s a picture of her holding up a t-shirt with an image of Bigfoot wearing sunglasses and playing a guitar. It makes me smile.
I stopped in to see her on my way out of Catalpa Creek and she yelled at me for not letting her know I was in town sooner, then she thanked me for increasing her sales and fed me chocolate chip cookies she’d bought from the grocery store.
She’s promised not to tell anyone I was Bigfoot, but she’d ordered the t-shirts as soon as she saw the diner video of my fight with Dell. Aunt Lorraine is smart, and she knows me well.
I text her back a smiley face and tell her I love her. I’ve promised to visit her again soon for longer. She didn’t ask me to stay this time, probably sensing my sadness. If I’d stayed, I would have told her about Honey and Lorraine would have convinced me to go back to her, because she’s always thought I should have whatever I want.
Maybe the career of my childhood dreams and the opportunity to spend a few weeks in Honey’s life is the limit of good things I can have. Maybe it should be enough.