Chapter 15
Ash
I send the call from Gray to voicemail as I sit across the desk from Max Kaladin. I wanted to talk to her before I saw him, but now it will have to wait until after this meeting. One doesn’t keep the billionaire who pays your salary waiting while you take a call.
“So,” Kaladin says, tenting his fingers, “care to explain why you and Dr. Mackey are splashed across every tabloid in the country?”
Cedric sits in the chair next to me. I’m not sure what time the video of me and Gray hit the media, but Cedric looks like he’s running on coffee, sugar, and sheer willpower right now.
I don’t envy the man his job, and I’m only mildly sorry I’m adding to his stress.
Secretly, I’m thrilled the world thinks I’m dating Gray.
“Code Ex,” I tell Kaladin.
He raises a confused brow. “Excuse me?”
“I invited Gray to come out and hang with me and some of the guys Saturday night at the club, but we had a Code Ex,” I explain.
Kaladin cocks his head at something, but whether it’s the Code Ex thing or the fact I called Gray by her first name, I’m not sure.
Thinking of her as Gray rather than Doc Mackey is easier now than it was before. I suppose having my hand between her legs and my tongue down her throat helped.
“Gray’s ex was there,” I elaborate, ignoring the look, “and the code says we had to make the guy jealous so he’d realize what he’d lost.”
“Ah, Code Ex,” Kaladin says, humoring me like he knows exactly what I’m talking about. “And feeling the good doctor up on the dance floor was part of the code?”
I shrug. “I was improvising.”
Kaladin sighs and turns to Cedric. “What’s the situation? Do we need damage control?”
Cedric looks up from his phone where he’s been furiously typing.
“They identified Dr. Mackey about fifteen minutes ago,” Cedric says, “and the news of her work with trash talk just hit the wires. There’s already conjecture about her working with Ash, so we need to make a statement sooner rather than later to control the narrative as much as possible.”
“What is our narrative?” Kaladin asks.
“We confirm what they already assume,” I say. “I’m dating Gray.”
Kaladin narrows his eyes. “Are you dating her?”
“No, but they don’t know that,” I say, “and it’s better for us if they think I am, right? It confirms what the photo suggests, and it deflects attention away from her working with me while still giving us a reason to be seen together.”
Kaladin’s brows shoot up. “You want to…fake date Dr. Mackey.”
It’s not quite a question, and I tamp down the voice that says I want to date her for real. Instead, I just nod.
“How do we say you met?” Cedric asks.
“She reached out to me because she wanted to question me for some research she’s been doing, and we hit it off.”
Cedric and Kaladin look at each other, and Cedric gives a quick tilt of his head to indicate it’s not a bad plan.
“We’d have to get the university to back the story,” Cedric says, “but more importantly, we need Dr. Mackey on board.”
I open my mouth to answer, then close it.
I was about to assure him it wouldn’t be a problem, but suddenly I’m not so sure Gray will go for it.
It’s her professional reputation on the line, and I don’t know what kind of blowback she might get from being tied to me.
As it is, that picture alone may have done irreparable damage to her image, and I can’t even conceive of what she’s telling her students.
The need to return her call now is overwhelming.
“Gray tried to call a little while ago,” I say. “Let me call her back and see if she’ll agree to the fake dating plan, at least for a little while.”
Kaladin nods. “Call her.”
I stand and head to the end of the huge office that’s farthest from the desk. It puts me well out of earshot of Kaladin and Cedric.
Gray picks up on the third ring. “Ash? What the hell is going on? What are we going to do?” she asks, and I feel a twinge of guilt at the obvious panic in her voice. The dance at the club was my doing, and it backfired spectacularly.
“It’s going to be alright,” I assure her. “Are you okay? Have the reporters started calling?”
“I had one follow me to my car,” Gray says. “I’m currently hiding out in one of the parking garages on campus. I don’t even want to know what I’ll find when I get home.”
I close my eyes. I need to fix this.
I open them again. “I’m in with Mr. Kaladin and our PR director now. We have a possible plan, but you’d need to agree to it.”
A pause. “What’s the plan?”
I explain the fake dating scenario, then wait for Gray to respond. There’s a long silence on the other end of the line.
“Gray?” I ask when she still hasn’t answered. I look at my cell to be sure we’re still connected.
“Look, I know this isn’t ideal,” I go on when I see we are, “and if you’re not down with it, we’ll think of something else, but pretending to date, at least for a little while is the easiest way to handle this.
There will be some interest from the media for the next few days, but they’ll get bored soon enough.
We can finish our work and…fake break up. ”
The words taste sour in my mouth already, and there’s more silence on the other end.
“Gray?” I ask again. “Are you still there?”
I hear her huff a small laugh. “I just convinced my department head we weren’t dating. Now I have to go back and tell her we’re fake dating.”
She laughs again, but there’s little humor in it.
“We don’t have to do it if you don’t want to,” I repeat.
Another pause. “No, you’re right. It’s the easiest way to explain the picture, and it’s the only story that doesn’t out me as a fraud to Drew or make me look like a puck bunny.”
I breathe a sigh of relief, and excitement tingles in my chest at the idea that Gray and I will get to play the happy couple for a few weeks.
“Thank you,” I say. “I appreciate this. We’ll have to get the university on board with the story, but I assume they’ll back us given the money Kaladin is promising.”
I hear Gray’s own sigh on the other end of the line. “What do I do until then?” she asks. “There are probably reporters at my house by now.”
“Hold on,” I say. I put the phone on speaker and head back to Kaladin’s desk. “Gray is on board with the plan,” I tell Kaladin and Cedric, “but the reporters have found her already. They’re probably at her house. What should she do?”
“Dr. Mackey,” Cedric says into the phone, “my name is Cedric Winston, and I’m the Hydra’s PR director. If anyone approaches you, just tell them you’re not answering any questions and refer them to me.”
He gives her his phone number, and she confirms it with him.
“I can get a handle on the story today, but you should probably be seen in public together tonight,” Cedric suggests. “It will sell the story and get the reporters off your back quicker. If you try to hide, they’ll only think you have a reason to, and they’ll hound you more. Throw them a bone.”
The other end of the line is silent.
“Are you free tonight, Gray?” I ask. “I can take you to dinner.”
More silence before she finally says, “Just tell me where and when.”
“It would be better if you pick her up,” Cedric says.
“I’ll pick you up at your place at six thirty,” I tell Gray. “Until then, just lay low. Cedric will get the reporters off your back.”
Cedric gives me a look that says I shouldn’t have promised her that, but I ignore him.
“I’ll see you tonight,” I tell Gray. She confirms, and we both hang up.
“See. No problem,” I say.
Cedric rolls his eyes and looks at Kaladin. “I should get going on this.”
“Go,” Kaladin says, waving him off, and Cedric hurries out of the office to work his PR magic.
“Sorry,” I say to Kaladin. “I was just trying to help the doc out.”
I turn to go, but Kaladin calls me back. He stands with his arms crossed, the biceps straining against his Armani suit jacket confirming he must work out.
“Yes, sir?” I ask.
He picks up the picture of me and Gray from his desk, looks at it, then turns it to show me. “Are you sure this will be ‘fake’ dating?” he asks.
Something flips in my stomach, and I look at the picture.
I was definitely buzzed at the time it was taken, but I remember exactly how Gray smelled when I had my face buried in her hair.
I remember the feel of her body pressed against mine and how hard my cock was as she rubbed against it on the dancefloor.
I ached to slip my fingers between her thighs to see if she was as wet for me as I hoped.
If the entranced expression on Gray’s face in that picture is any indication, she wanted me as much as I wanted her.
“We both had a little too much to drink,” I tell Kaladin. “I’m sure you know what alcohol does to inhibitions.”
He nods slowly, then turns to run the picture through the shredder behind his desk. “Fair enough,” he says before turning back to me. “Just be sure to make it look real tonight.”
“Yes, sir,” I say and head for the door.
Make no mistake, for the next few weeks, I intend to convince everyone – including Gray herself – that we’re a happily dating couple.