39. Chapter 39
Chapter 39
Since Valerie had a decent arsenal of toys and clothes for Jacob at her house, it simplified things for David. So, rather than having to pack a bag and take it to his mom’s house, he was able to stop by the studio, instead, and take care of a little business.
The building was dark and empty as he let himself in, and after logging onto the main computer at Ashley’s desk, he searched through the trash folder first, figuring that’s where the emails from Paige would likely be. When he didn’t find them there, he clicked on the garbage can icon at the bottom of the screen and opened it, finding that it hadn’t been emptied in forever.
The emails were there. After printing hard copies of them, he texted Evan.
DAVID: Are you busy tomorrow?
DICK: I work at two.
DAVID: Can you switch with Evelyn or Everett?
DICK: Why?
DAVID: I need your help. It’s really important.
DICK: Evelyn will tell me to piss off. Let me check with Everett and then I’ll get back to you.
DAVID: Thanks.
DICK: Don’t thank me yet. Everett might tell me to piss off, too.
After locking up the studio again, David drove home and had just poured himself a glass of bourbon when Ashley came into the kitchen. She’d changed from her work clothes into yoga pants and his vintage Led Zeppelin T-shirt, making him frown. He wasn’t a fan of her wearing his shirts—they were his goddamn shirts, after all. He didn’t go around wearing hers, did he?
Without a word, he took his drink and sat down at the table, laying the printed emails face down in front of him. Her expression wary, she watched him for a few moments before taking the chair across from him.
“I ordered a pizza for dinner,” she told him. “It should be here soon.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“Not even if I got sausage and pepperoni on it?”
That made him frown, not because the thought of pizza with meat didn’t appeal to him, but rather because the inclusion of meat screamed pandering.
Meat fixed a lot of things, but it wasn’t going to fix this fucking mess.
“We’ll see,” he replied, taking a drink of his Knob Creek.
For the first time, she seemed to notice that Jacob wasn’t there. “Where’s Jacob?”
“He’s staying at my mom’s for the weekend.”
If she thought that was strange or ominous in any way, she didn’t show it as she rested her hands in front of her on the table, picking at her black painted fingernails. “How was your meeting with Paige?” she asked, her features carefully schooled without any sign of anxiety, as if she had nothing to hide.
David was a little surprised that she’d brought it up first and thought about everything she’d been doing behind the scenes, almost from the beginning. And then he thought about all the secrets she had to keep and wondered if that was exhausting; it seemed like it would be.
He leaned back in his chair. “Remember how pissed I was when I found out you’d dicked with my phone?” he asked quietly, waiting until she nodded. “Well, I found out something today that makes how pissed I was over that look like a good mood.”
Ashley blinked at him, her expression now guarded as he turned over the printed emails and slid them over to her. She looked at the top page, her face freezing when she saw what they were.
“These are emails I never saw, because you kept them from me, right? And these replies to Paige were written by you, weren’t they? Because they weren’t written by me.”
“Yes, I wrote them,” she admitted.
“Why? What were you thinking?”
She pursed her lips. “I was thinking a lot of things, David. I was thinking that because I’d gotten into your phone, I had to keep going. When I saw the first email, I knew that if you had any contact with her, you might find out I’d blocked her and I couldn’t let that happen. So, I responded to her email, hoping that would be the last of her.”
“But it wasn’t.”
“Fuck, no. She wouldn’t go away. She kept emailing, so I had to keep responding. I started worrying she’d just show up at the studio one day to see you and ruin everything, so after she emailed, literally asking to see you—”
“To talk about her Uncle Carter.”
“It didn’t matter what she wanted to talk to you about. It only mattered that she wanted to see you, so I decided to send her a very clear message, one that would keep her away.”
“The message being that I basically didn’t want anything to do with her ever again, and that I’d ‘moved on’?”
“Yes.”
“You didn’t think that was … overkill?”
“No, I didn’t think it was overkill. I wanted her to know there was no room for reconciliation, okay?”
“Did it sound like she was trying to reconcile?”
“No, but meeting to talk about her uncle could’ve led to future meetings to talk about other things, and I still wasn’t taking any chances on her becoming a part of your life again, in any capacity. Especially since I had a baby to think about.”
David almost rolled his eyes at that. The amount of thought she’d given to her baby was minimal.
“I thought that would really keep her away,” she continued, almost as if to herself. “It would’ve kept a normal person away, but apparently she isn’t normal.”
He was already tired of hearing Ashley bitching about Paige, as if she was the problem here. “You didn’t have any reason to doubt me. You knew I was committed to Jacob—”
“I know. But you weren’t committed to me.”
“That’s bullshit. I changed my entire life for you. And I’ve been financially supporting and taking care of you—”
“I wanted more than that. Nothing was permanent between us, David. We were living together—yeah, thanks for that—but we weren’t engaged and we weren’t getting married. It was abundantly clear there was no ring in my future.”
“Correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t you tell Paige you didn’t need a ring on your finger?”
She glared at him, breathing hard. “I lied. Of course I want a fucking ring on my finger! I’ve wanted one for four-and-a-half years! But what else was I going to say when your bitch ex-wife rubbed it in my face that I didn’t have one, and she got one after ten minutes? Obviously I wasn’t going to let her see how insecure I was in this relationship.”
He decided to shift the conversation a little. “Let’s talk about Paige’s book.”
Her face twisted and for a second, she looked genuinely ugly. “That goddamn book,” she practically snarled.
“It must have really irritated the shit out of you when she went ahead and mailed me a copy of it after you told her I wasn’t interested in reading the advance copy she offered me.”
“Yeah, it did.”
“So, what did you do with the book after you intercepted it?”
“I read it, then threw it in the trash.”
Neither her answer, nor her lack of remorse was surprising. He was digesting the fact Ashley knew all the details of Paige’s story before he did, when he felt his blood run cold as he remembered what his mom had said about Paige’s book: that David was in it, along with ‘personal stuff’ about their marriage.
Sex stuff.
David didn’t know what ‘sex stuff’ entailed, but Ashley did, because she’d read it.
“Why did you read it?” he asked flatly.
“She wanted you to read it, so I wanted to see why.”
“And did you see why?”
Ashley looked at him for a long moment before nodding.
Jesus, he really hated her. He hated her for what she’d been doing and he hated her for having knowledge that he didn’t even have yet. And that she’d had this knowledge for seven months.
“So, after finding out why she wanted me to read it, you decided to keep that to yourself and not give it to me to read.”
“I couldn’t. You’d have wondered why she didn’t tell you about it in the first place, you would’ve tried to get in touch with her, and then you would’ve found out I blocked her—”
“Yeah, I can connect the dots. All roads lead back to you blocking her and you needing to continually cover your ass.” He was almost vibrating with rage and his skin felt like it was on fire. “Paige said she wrote a note to me in the book. Did you read that, too?”
She blinked. “Yes.”
He took a deep breath. “Well, since I didn’t get a chance to read it, why don’t you tell me what it said? So I can know, too.”
“David, I read it months ago. I can’t remember all of it—”
“Then tell me what you do remember.”
She appeared to be thinking. “It said that she knew you didn’t want to read the book—” at that, Ashley looked away from David’s aggravated expression, “—but that she hoped someday you’d change your mind. And then she wished you all the best,” she finished.
“That’s it?”
“That’s all I can remember.”
David knew there was more and figured she’d deliberately left it out, which further pissed him off; even if it was by omission, she was still lying to him.
Ashley reached over to touch him. “Look, baby, I know you’re pissed—”
“Don’t fucking touch me,” he snapped almost slapping her hand away. “And I’m not pissed. I passed pissed a while ago.”
There was a knock at the door, a normal, mundane sound in the midst of their ugly argument that was sort of the equivalent of a bucket of cold water being thrown on them. Without a word, David got up and went to the front door and opened it to find the Domino’s delivery guy standing there with a large cardboard box. After paying for what was, indeed, a sausage and pepperoni pizza, then giving the guy a tip, David returned to the kitchen. As he was setting the pizza on the counter he heard an incoming text and quickly checked his phone to see he’d gotten two from Evan.
DICK: Everett can cover for me, but now I owe him one. Which means you owe me one. Saturdays are big tip days, not to mention, that’s when the most attractive people come in.
DICK: So, what am I going to be helping you with?
Not caring that Ashley was watching him, he typed out a reply.
DAVID: Packing all my shit and then moving it into the loft.
DICK: Are you kidding? Fuck, if I’d known I was going to be helping you move, I wouldn’t have asked Everett to cover for me.
DAVID: I know. That’s why I didn’t tell you.
DICK: You’re such an asshole.
DICK: Wait. You said ‘your’ shit. What’s going on?
DAVID: I’ll explain everything after we’re done tomorrow. I promise.
DICK: All right, fine. But you’re going to owe me BIG for this.
DICK: I’ll see you in the morning at 8 a.m.
DAVID: Can you make it 7 a.m.? I have a lot of shit.
DAVID: Which reminds me … I need you to bring as many boxes with you as you can.
DICK: Seriously, you’re an asshole.
DICK: Fine. I’ll see you at 7 a.m.
DAVID: Thank you!
DICK: You’re not welcome.
Putting his phone in his pocket, he sat back down at the table.
Ashley immediately started in. “David, I’m sorry—”
“You’re sorry you got caught, maybe, but not sorry for what you did. Jesus, you crossed lines without even blinking,” he ground out. “You were so busy thinking about yourself and what you might lose, that you never stopped to think about how your actions might affect me and what I might lose. And you certainly weren’t thinking about Paige and what she might lose—and yes, she matters, too.” David shook his head. “You had no right to do the shit you did. Who the hell does that? And then lives with it for years, like they haven’t done anything wrong?”
“At the time, it didn’t really feel wrong,” she said softly. “I know that sounds terrible, but it’s true. It just felt like … survival. But I really am sorry. I am.”
“Honestly, it doesn’t matter if you really are sorry. It doesn’t change anything for me. It doesn’t get me back any of those decisions and allow me to make them for myself. I really loved that house. If I’d known she was selling it, I might’ve tried to figure out a way to buy it from her. Or maybe not. Who knows? But that wasn’t a decision I got to make, because you took it away from me. Nor did you have the right to make the decision about the money she offered me. It’s a moot point now and I can’t say for sure that I’d have taken it, but I would’ve at least considered it, if for no other reason than it could’ve made a substantial dent in Jacob’s college fund.
“And I would have taken some of the furniture, when she offered it, especially the sectional, that’s for damn sure. Another decision I didn’t get to make. I would’ve talked to her about Carter, but again, not a decision I got to make. And you know what else? I would’ve read the advance copy of Paige’s book. Absolutely. But that was another decision I didn’t get to make, thanks to you.”
He gave her a disgusted look. “Are you seeing a pattern here? Yeah, me too. So, fuck you, Ash. Fuck you and your ‘sorrys’. They’re worthless.”
She must have heard something in his voice, because for the first time since they started talking, Ashley looked truly wary, as if she was just now understanding the severity of the situation she was in.
“We have nowhere to go from here,” he told her, deliberately and unemotionally, before he lowered the boom. “Which means we’re done.”