Chapter 16
SIXTEEN
STORM
Every muscle in my body froze, the oxygen in my throat almost seizing up at Jasper’s softly spoken words.
“What did you say?” I managed to force out.
Jasper looked up from his half-empty plate with an unnerving calmness, like he was barely aware of how his words had just affected me.
“You’re many things, Stormy, but hard of hearing isn’t one of them,” Jasper replied, his lip curled at one corner. That self-satisfied grin on his face forced me to push my hands under my thighs: anything to stop myself from reaching over the table and gouging his eyes out with my thumbs.
My spine was tense. I shifted uneasily in my seat, the entire restaurant blurring into the background, and all I saw was the monster sitting in front of me.
My chicken terrine sat before me, going cold, but I couldn’t eat for fear of choking.
He’s lying, he must be!
After Phoenix and Reed’s veiled instructions, I rushed to my room to play his voicemail.
The signal must have been poor, as I only caught part of what he said: something about Jasper’s green file and the possibility of blackmail.
I had played the message a couple of times, purely to hear Reed’s voice.
He didn’t sound like himself, and his voice was slightly slurred. He told me to trust him again.
I had managed to manipulate Jasper into taking me to lunch to keep him away from the office. It was the weekend, but he still usually spent a couple of hours there.
When I first sat down, having achieved my goal, I’d felt a sense of achievement.
I had fully intended to call the wedding off during that lunch.
It was the perfect setting to do so; we were in public, and so there was no way Jasper could make one of his scenes.
I had made up my mind. I would end things and be with the man I was supposed to be with.
I would then confess everything to Reed, explaining how Jasper had blackmailed me by threatening his NFL career, both in the past and the future.
I had intended to tell Reed everything that morning, but then he didn’t show up at the gym.
And that original sense of achievement had plummeted into helplessness at what Jasper had just revealed.
You underhanded bastard. I found it difficult to even look at him.
As I had told him straight that I would no longer marry him, Jasper had cut me off with a wave of his hand.
“If I can just stop you there, my sweet,” he’d interrupted, using his napkin to pat the corner of his mouth.
The wedding rehearsal was due to take place in a few days.
If I wanted to call off the wedding with as little embarrassment to my family and Jasper’s as possible, I had to do it before then.
Hence, my initial decision was to do it right then.
And now I knew that there was no way I could do that. Not without hurting Reed.
When Jasper had explained that he had arranged for Reed’s drink to be spiked the previous night, any hope of saving our future together was smashed away.
At first, I didn’t get his point. I had seen Reed, and he was fine that morning.
Well, apart from standing me up. Then it clicked, and Jasper noticed the shift in my expression.
Reed’s slurred voicemail also proved that what he was saying could have been true.
“Yes. His drink was spiked with a traceable drug, an illegal traceable drug.”
“You’re lying. Why should I believe you?” I’d shot out, even though I was unsure.
He lifted one eyebrow. “You don’t have to, but that would be quite foolish.
I assure you, all it would take is an anonymous tip-off that Loverboy was seen taking something after his win last night, and voila, they would piss-test the entire team in a heartbeat.
And when they drug tested Reed, what do you think they would find? ”
My muscles stiffened as I tried not to scream the restaurant down. “I have no idea, a trace of the shit you put in his drink, I imagine,” I snapped angrily.
“Flunitrazepam, to be precise. It also usually takes around a week to leave the system.”
The sonofabitch, the wedding was less than a week away.
I was screwed. If Jasper did what he threatened to do, and they found drugs in Reed’s system.
He’d be suspended, maybe kicked out of the NFL.
I knew the punishments were extreme after having several therapy sessions with a player who had been suspended for drugs.
The sporting organization took taking drugs as cheating, and anyone crossing that line was made an example of.
And then I thought about Reed’s bruises.
“Are you also responsible for what happened to Reed’s face?”
Jasper threw his napkin on the table and raised his hands. “I can’t personally accept full responsibility, but yes, I had a hand in it.”
“I fucking hate you!” I snarled, pushing to my feet. My legs were trembling, and I had to grab onto the table to stop myself from collapsing.
Jasper released a slow, exaggerated breath. “It’s always amazed me how far a woman will go for hot abs and a killer throwing arm.”
I glared down at him as he continued to eat his meal like we were having a normal conversation. The man I hated the most on the entire planet raised an eyebrow. “Why don’t you sit down so we can carry on this discussion. If you make a scene, I may carry out my threat anyway.”
I lowered my body into the chair. I had no choices left. My heart sank.
“Why Jasper? At least tell me why you are doing this? Why me?”
There was a long moment of silence before he enlightened me. “Money, my darling. Isn’t it always about money?”
“But you’re already loaded. Your father is a wealthy man.”
“Not anymore,” he replied whimsically.
Shock bled through me. “What? Why? I don’t understand.”
“It appears my daddy dearest has a gambling problem and decided to involve some not very nice men. I won’t bore you with the mundane details, but it has fallen to me to dig us out of the shit, and that’s exactly what I intend to do.”
“When did this happen?”
“A couple of months ago,” he informed me.
That was when Jasper had started to put pressure on me about the wedding I’d put off for four years. Shit.
“But surely, if Theo went to my father, he would help. They’ve been friends for years.”
A strange smile twisted his expression. “That just goes to show how much you don’t know about our parents.
My father resents yours, ever since that day Dominic stole the mayorship of Newport from him.
” The venom in his tone suggested he felt the same way as his father.
“I have it on good authority that Dominic Summers secured that position by underhanded means. Ask his undertaker-like assistant, David Burns, about that one.”
“What do you mean?” I had met David many times and had always thought he was shady.
He let out a long sigh and placed his fork down, waving off the waitress when she asked if we’d like more drinks. “Let’s just say, money exchanged hands. My father never got over it.”
I felt like I was being torn in two by an information overload. I had been so obsessed with carving out a career for myself that I had missed so much.
My mouth hung open as Jasper then blurted out everything that had happened over the last four years and why he returned from Connecticut.
The bad blood must have been something Daddy was still unaware of.
He’d never said anything to me. But then why would he?
I had my own life and my own problems. I had been so immersed in my own shit that I hadn’t stopped to worry about my father’s.
The strain of my parents' marriage had also made me turn my back on family issues.
At that painful moment, I felt like a failure as a daughter as well as a woman.
“Aren’t you eating?” Jasper muttered with his mouth half-full, pointing towards my meal with his knife.
“I’ve lost my appetite.” My shoulders slumped as I placed my hands on my lap.
And I didn’t just mean for my meal. I had lost the appetite to fight. There was now no way out. I was locked in and couldn’t do anything but marry the man in front of me.
The threat to Reed was now real and raw. I studied the expression on my fiancé’s face, hating him with everything I had. I had no alternative now but to let the man derail my entire life.
In less than a week, I would become Mrs. Jasper Dean Remmington the Third.
REED
After our mission, I drove Harper and Phoenix back to Ma’s house. She’d invited us to dinner that afternoon. As we pulled up the driveway next to Hudson’s Ford Ranger, he and Molly were climbing out of the car.
“Where the fuck have you three been?” he barked, striding around the bonnet as I slid out from behind the wheel. His face looked even worse than it had the previous night.
“We could ask you the same thing?” Nix deflected, grimacing at Hudson’s black eye.
Molly and Harper did that girl-hug shit and then greeted Nix and me before saying. “We’ve been to the emergency room. I wanted Hudson to get checked out.”
Both Phoenix and I grinned as we shot Hud a feigned sympathetic look. “You OK, sunshine?”
“Blow me,” he grunted, walking up the drive towards the front porch.
It was great to be at the house again and to have both Harper and Molly with us, but it did make me pine for Storm even more. I’d messaged to ask if she was OK, but got nothing back. No doubt she was still with that shit head.
Once we had helped to clear the dishes away, we left Ma and the girls in the kitchen to finish the pots and congregated in the den.
It was the room we all used to chill out when we lived together.
It felt strange being back in there, but nothing had changed.
Well, apart from the addition of white fluffy pillows, which Harper had added after saying that the sofa was as uncomfortable as fuck. The girl had a point.