Chapter 8
Chapter Eight
JAXON/JAX
Now
The Man On The Cutting Room Floor
Some people don’t stitch you up. They slice you open and say thank you after.
My legs shake as I deplane the jet and slide into my waiting car with the image of Livianna smiling for the tabloid. The headline was more than a blow.
LIVIANNA HEMINGS SAYS YES!
The high I was on from my morning meditation wore off fast. But I vow to give her a chance to explain. She’s always said the media has never treated her right. Maybe this headline is another lie.
The black SUV rolls off the tarmac, windows dark enough to pretend the world can’t see me bleeding. David keeps his eyes on the service road and says nothing, which is why he’s my driver. He lets me think.
I huff when I realize something profound. Silence has always felt like control until it turns into a mirror. I’m alone. It’s just me.
Before that lands and settles into my bones, my phone connects to the network like a storm wakes a coastline.
Notifications flood the screen with board updates, European numbers stacked like dominoes, and a calendar anchoring me to meetings that don’t care about my personal issues.
I scroll without reading, smooth out my jacket, and pretend the aircraft didn’t drop me off in a life I don’t recognize. How could Livianna go back to a man who nearly destroyed her?
A headline cuts through the noise on my phone’s screen.
MAYHEM FRONTMAN + DESIGNER: BACK TOGETHER!
I don’t open it. Not at first. I stare at the words until they blur and I can pretend the plus sign is a dividing line, not an addition I can’t balance.
“Sir?” David’s voice is careful. He’s seen this face before, the one that holds in earthquakes.
“Take me straight to the office.”
“Of course.”
The phone is a bomb in my hand. I never read the gossip sites, but I click the article anyway.
Photo after photo of her in Cash’s presence with a smile I’ve held in my head on nights I couldn’t sleep. Only these look easy, public, and earned. On stage, in the press, and in his orbit.
Nobu’s sign is in the background where she’s handing a dessert and a coffee to a cameraman like she’s untangling a snare with grace. I knew she would learn to negotiate with monsters, but I didn’t expect to be watching her from afar when she did.
You handed her your house, not your heart, Jaxon. Probably the worst decision you’ve ever made.
The thought hits without mercy. I close the article before it kills me. I gaze out the window and ignore this gut-wrenching pain.
The SUV glides through downtown. Glass towers rise like mountains that are too high and dangerous to climb. I imagine her telling me these stories are all fabricated and laughing at the insanity of it all.
David pulls into the parking lot under my building. We park in the private bay, and I don’t move.
“I’m done hiding.” The cabin is quiet, testing the shape of resolve after too many days of acting like my travels didn’t come with a cost.
He opens my door. I step out, the city heat skims my face, and then I let hope, small and reckless, breathe once. I need to find out if there’s still a chance for us.
My stomach twists and knots as I prepare for the most important conversation I’ll ever have with Livianna. I steady myself and stride toward her office.
The lobby is all marble and heavy décor, the kind of place designed to promise stability. My West Coast headquarters live here. So does hers. Elevator doors slide open, exhaling cool air.
You’ve waited long enough.
I’ve been silent too long. My plan to give her agency over her life while I was away was taken as abandonment. And now, I may have lost her for good. But the pain carves clarity. I still love her, and she needs to know it.
The lift climbs. I adjust my sleeves, let the sterile light wash over the fatigue of crossing time zones, and ignore the way my hands shake. Each floor number lighting up like a countdown to something I’m not prepared for.
My reflection in the polished steel doors shows a man who’s spent too many hours on a plane thinking about one conversation, one woman, and one chance to undo the biggest mistake of my life.
The elevator dings as it reaches our floor, where I’ve spent countless evenings admiring her while she created magic. I’ve kissed her against these same walls, and I convinced myself that giving her space was the same thing as giving her love.
I exit, take a deep breath, and round the corner. And there they are.
Livianna is pressed against the wall near her office door, Cash’s hands framing her face as their lips meet in a kiss that looks like a homecoming.
The collision is immediate. Explosive. Every carefully prepared confession dies in my throat as Cash’s thumb traces her cheekbone with the respect I should’ve shown her before I left.
His whisper against her lips cuts through the air. “I love you.”
I suck in a gasp. He turns his head, and his eyes find mine at the end of the hallway before Livianna can respond.
Time stops with my heart. My feet cement to the floor, my chest tight with something that feels dangerously close to drowning.
He’s back. The thought crashes through me like a sledgehammer. Cash Mazye is back with Livianna.
I know exactly who her ex is now. Although it doesn’t appear he’s an ex anymore.
This is what happens when you wait too long to fight for what’s yours.
It’s now I realize the error of my ways.
He was the man who was supposed to be dead to her. The one whose label I helped fund through CrowneTheory Records without ever knowing I was financing the soundtrack to her heartbreak.
Cash smiles, his voice carrying down the hall. “Livianna, there’s the man who made our reunion possible.”
His tone is reverent, and I hate that I understand it. My jaw clenches and my fingers crush the rolled-up tabloid I’m clutching. The irony stabs deep and twists until I can’t breathe.
I didn’t just help create this moment. I backed his freedom from Leon Baker’s label and gave him the tools to become the man who could win her back. And I did it all without knowing I was destroying my own future.
Livianna turns to see me. Her eyes widen, and she lurches my way.
“Jax—” But she stops short, her gaze skittering away from mine like she can’t bear to look at me.
It’s like she knows exactly what I came here to tell her and she’s already made her choice. I’m frozen as I stare at the woman I was ready to burn the world for.
Cash pauses, studying her odd reaction, but she flashes him a bright grin and keeps her eyes trained on his face.
She’s chosen him. The truth spirals through my mind like poison.
“Jaxon made it possible.” Cash takes a few steps toward me, holding her hand, oblivious to the devastation radiating from me. “I met up with him and got him to back my business.”
I’m blindsided not just by the misery of witnessing them together, but by the worshipping tone in Cash’s voice when he adds, “This is the man who changed my life.”
I changed his life so he could reclaim mine.
Livianna glances between us, stunned. “When did that happen?”
“The same night I found you in my hotel suite in Paris.” His voice softens with the memory. “I met up with him before we shared that kiss.”
My eyes lock with Livianna’s. It’s a heavy, loaded gaze that’s like stepping on a landmine.
That same night, the night she barged into my penthouse demanding exclusivity and that our arrangement mean something more. The night she came to me after kissing him, and I was too blind to understand she was choosing me over the love of her life.
I always thought it was her brother who was causing her unease, but no, it was Cash.
How didn’t I see it? How did I not work that out?
Right after she shared that moment with him, I whisked her away to my vineyard and fell in love with her to the depths of my soul. The loss hits me like a freight train.
Before I can stop myself, the words spit out.
“Livianna was the woman you were talking about that night, and later you two shared a kiss.” I half-laugh, the sound bitter as black coffee. “It all makes sense now.”
Livianna physically shrinks.
Callum’s brows narrow. “What does?”
I cover my slip like the practiced businessman I am, even as my world tilts off its axis. “Why you’ve been so determined to get your life in order. You have a woman you’re building a life for, and you wanted it running smoothly before that could happen.”
“Exactly.” Cash nods, relief evident. “She’s the woman I told you about.”
The one he said he was destined to be with. The one whose name I didn’t know was written in every chord progression I put my name behind, and whose face I didn’t know was behind every lyric that made CrowneTheory Records millions.
Livianna backs up the conversation as if she’s trying to rewind time, popping her hands to her waist. “I was at the hotel visiting my brother. You weren’t supposed to be there.”
“I know, but after Jaxon agreed to help me and I ran into you, I knew I was on my way to getting you back. That kiss we shared, when your lips met mine, something in me took hold.” He reaches for her.
She jerks away. “I didn’t ask for that to happen. You sprung it on me.”
“Lily, I know that night didn’t go as I had hoped, but for a second, you melted into me and allowed that kiss. Even though you were mad, I knew deep down you still cared. Between Jaxon’s help and your reaction, that was the motivation for me to get my life back together.”
She was upset.
The words bounce around in my mind. She was distressed because she was in a relationship with me. Because what we had was growing and kissing her ex-lover felt like a betrayal of what we were building.
With his declaration, Livianna sways as if she might faint. My instincts have me lunging for her, the same protectiveness that made me create rules to keep her safe.
But Cash is faster, pulling her into his arms and steadying her. “You okay?”
She’s pale as winter moonlight, but brushes it off. “Yeah, I just got a little lightheaded.”