Chapter 25 Asher
ASHER
For the past twenty minutes I'd been pacing my office, wringing my hands. Nervous didn’t begin to describe how I felt, knowing what I had planned for this evening. I had picked the most beautiful ring and Veda was going to love it. I just had to convince her to have dinner with me tonight.
It wouldn't be a big fancy event or a grand gesture, more like a quiet escape from the stress I'd been under here at work and battling to stay sober in my personal life.
But I hoped and prayed the simplicity of it showed her just how serious I was.
I wanted her in my life, right by my side every day for the rest of my life and I wanted to help her dreams come true.
Every few minutes I checked the time on my phone but I couldn't sit down.
When I did, my legs felt restless and I ended up getting up to walk to the door and see through the window of my office if she was at her desk yet.
I left a note there for her to come see me when she got in, which wasn't unusual.
Sometimes I left it with a piece of candy, and once I left a flower there too.
This morning I got here a bit earlier so the wait was longer, making it feel excruciating.
Before Veda's smiling face ever appeared at her desk I was interrupted by a rude knock on my door.
I knew right away it wasn't her or Penny.
Both of them had more feminine cadence to their knocks.
This was hard and heavy, the hand of a man for sure, which wasn't a surprise when the door swung open without me beckoning and Clayton barged in.
My body went rigid before he said a word but I swallowed down my anger toward him because we were still family.
His insults and pressuring hadn't diminished that in my eyes.
It threatened to yesterday, but when Veda stopped me from insulting him, I had a heart check.
Clayton had his personal reasons for what he was doing.
I didn't have to agree with him to care about him.
"Good morning," I grumbled, halting my footsteps in front of my desk as he stomped to the center of my room and crossed his arms over his chest.
His chest was puffed out, eyes wide with some sort of negative motion. He most certainly was not here to apologize to me, but what was new? He had never approved of me being in the position of CEO here at LG, and that would never change, sadly.
"You went to the board and told them I was lying?" Clayton's eyes narrowed on me and went black as sin. I had no clue what he was talking about.
"What?" I asked, furrowing my brow in confusion. "I never spoke to the board about anything after that blow up."
"Cut the crap, Asher." He scoffed and ran a hand through his hair as he stepped closer, still maintaining personal space between us. "I got a corrected memo that places you as the lead for the branding acquisition now, when you know I took charge of that."
My mind raced with possibilities. I'd been so eager to see Veda and invite her to dinner tonight that I hadn’t even looked at my notes or emails this morning.
There were a half a dozen notes from Penny on my desk and more than fifty emails in my inbox to go over.
I hadn't seen said memo, but I believed him based on his anger.
"I didn't say a thing to anyone. You better check your facts before you come in my office with both barrels blazing.
" My hips were already aligned with the desk behind me, so I stepped back, leaning on it to seem more casual.
But really it was the way my legs shook from adrenaline that required a little more support.
After such a huge outburst yesterday my body still hadn't calmed down. I'd taken the medications my doctor offered me for tense moments but they barely took the edge off. The thing that truly helped was to go to a meeting or to sit with Veda for a while. Right now I had neither option available.
"You expect me to believe you said nothing to them after the way you exploded on me yesterday?" He took another step closer and I watched his fingers curl into fists. It put me in a defensive posture, but I stayed seated because if I moved toward him I knew I might lose control.
This man standing in front of me had done everything in his power to try to remove me from this position.
He never cared that my entire world fell apart or that I had to bury my own child.
And now that I was finally putting my life back together he was the one trying to stand in my way instead of supporting me.
"Clayton, I need you to calm down now, please." That was when I stood and straightened my tie, though my eyes flicked toward the open door where I had a plain view of Veda’s empty desk from where I stood.
Clayton's eyes followed where I was looking and he scoffed, then chuckled.
When he locked eyes on me again, it was with such malice in his expression I could physically feel it in my gut.
His head cocked to the side for a second.
He pursed his lips and then he sighed heavily and took another step closer.
This time, he walked right into my bubble where I could feel his hot breath over my face and cringed.
"You don't belong in this office and you don't belong behind that desk." He bared his teeth like a rabid dog when I didn't back away from him. Then he snarled, "Just like you never belonged in my family or in my life."
Before I could blink, his arm reared back and he let his fist fly.
It crashed into my jaw so hard, it made me see stars and I fell backward into my desk, which thankfully caught me so I didn't end up on the floor.
But Clayton was on me, swinging and pounding away at my chest and face, so that I had no choice but to defend myself.
I launched up off my desk at him faster than he could react. Years of pent-up fury over the way he'd treated me came out in one forceful lunge, and I pinned him against the wall with my arm pressed from shoulder to shoulder and one hand holding his wrist.
Only then did he stop throwing punches, but he didn’t stop throwing his hatred. He spat in my face and tried to pushed me off while I shouted, "Penny, call security, please!" Then he grabbed my lapel with his free hand and shook his head at me.
"You don't get it, do you, Asher? You're not the golden boy of Locke Global anymore. You haven't been since your wife died and you decided to wallow in self-pity."
"Shut up, Clayton."
"Oh, you think you're better than me because you have the title on the door and you can call security to drag me out.
Well, guess what? You're in for a huge shock.
" He paused only long enough to take a breath before he continued.
"You know nothing. You're so blind to everything going on around you, aren’t you? "
"I said, shut up!"
Clayton chuckled loudly and pushed me hard, but I didn’t back away. I kept him pinned on the glass wall near the door as he continued berating me.
"If you had just paid attention a little closer, you'd have seen how everything fell right into place, and now you're gonna pay for the way things went. I deserved that chair and that title. And now it'll be mine."
"What are you talking about?" I asked him, eyes flicking toward the hallway, hoping security got there before he overpowered me.
"I'm talking about how bad you're gonna spiral out. Do you know Veda Porter is just a plant?" he scoffed and then chuckled again, so loudly, I let my arm slide up to his neck where it pressed on his throat but didn’t cut off oxygen.
"What are you talking about?" Every bone in my body told me to ignore him and get rid of him, but I'd lost control of myself. Right now I just wanted to punch him in the face and it was taking every ounce of my self-control not to do that.
"I paid her, Asher…. A half-million dollars to seduce you and make you look like a pervert boss." My blood ran cold as I froze there, staring at him in disbelief, but he didn't shut up. "Would've been a million too if she'd gotten me the proof… But she gave me something much better."
He smirked at me a nasty, sardonic look as I backed away in shock, giving him space to straighten his jacket and tie. "What?"
"Yeah, you heard me," he continued. "She's pregnant, Asher… With your baby. She’s a gold digger of the worst sort. She’s been lying to you this whole time."
The words felt like he had physically punched me. My chest got tight instantly, my mouth dry. My head swam with accusation and emotion, spinning around everything he'd said over the past few weeks and landing on the words he told me—that she was hiding things.
I expected something this cruel and heartless from Clayton, but from Veda? It couldn’t be possible, but then… She'd been acting strange, telling me she was fine, but was she? And I'd have sworn she was hiding something on multiple occasions.
"All I wanted was for her to make you look like a predator or something…
." He laughed again and it was more sinister this time.
"You went and got all sober for her—so sweet really.
" The sarcasm in his tone had my hands curling to fists.
"And she took it the extra step and pretty boy fell in love.
" Now Clayton was backing me up toward my desk again.
Where the hell was security?
"And she's going to have your little baby.
That just takes the cake, don't you think?
" He reached into his pocket and opened his phone, flashing the screen at me. My eyes couldn’t make sense of what he was showing me, but he said, "Proof, brother…
I paid her to do a job." The way he said the word "brother" felt like a knife.
"You!" I growled, and my chest was heaving.
"Yeah…. me." Clayton smiled like he was proud of himself while I stood there with my world shattering around me yet again.
"Do you want to hear the recording I made of her verbally agreeing to seduce you and record it?
Because if you don't believe me I can make sure your little weak mind gets the proof you need.
"Veda is nothing but a gold digging tramp and she fooled you." He stepped closer to me and I almost grabbed him. "I bet you slept with her on her first day, didn't you?" That grin, my god I was going to kill him. "Do I know how to pick your type or what?"
I lost it.
My fist flew back and geared up and drove straight into his nose so hard his head snapped back and his body crumpled to the floor like a cheap suit. My brother's head lolled to the side, eyes shut and mouth agape and I heard a gasp from the door and looked up.
"Sir," Penny said, staring at me like she'd seen a ghost.
"Tell security to get this piece of crap off my office floor whenever they finally show up, and cancel everything the rest of the week." I stepped over him, feeling the pulse of my heart beat in my temples. Then I grabbed my jacket and stormed out past her.
I had to be out of this office when Veda walked in. I didn't want to see her when I was this angry, and maybe never again.
If what Clayton said was true and everything Veda had done was a lie aimed at snaring me in some scandal, then I didn't know who I was anymore.
"Sir," Penny called after me but I was gone, already inside the elevator waiting for the doors to close.
My entire body throbbed with unspent adrenaline. I knew I should stop and call Robert or Mike, or any number of men from AA who could help me. But not a single one of them could take the last nine weeks of my life and undo them or make them right.
The woman I fell madly in love with had lied to me about everything.
My own brother had conspired against me to not just get me fired but to break me mentally until I was nothing but a shell of a man.
And my life felt like a cruel joke fate had played to ensure I felt the weight of every mistake I'd ever made, every sin I'd ever committed.
I stormed out into the chilly air with my jacket draped over my arm and no destination in mind. I just had to get away from wherever Clayton was and wherever Veda would be.
And after no more than ten steps I saw Murphy's, the bar I would drink at in the evenings for months after Emma died.
So I turned that way.
No one could change the facts of what was happening, and no matter how hard I tried to be okay with life, it kept kicking me. I might as well indulge and drown my aching heart.
It was as good as dead anyway