Chapter Eighteen - Scarlett
The post-seminar celebration is being held in the Ridgebacks’ VIP lounge, which sounds a lot fancier than it is.
Really, it’s just a very well-lit room with way too much football memorabilia, uncomfortable modern art, and waiters passing around canapés—with fancy names like duck compote parfait petit—that taste like disappointment and pure ginger.
I’m on my third flute of something bubbly that claims to be champagne but might be Prosecco with a superiority complex—apparently complexes of the sort are contagious around here because Caleb is showboating me around the room like I’ve accepted a marriage proposal, or we are the Ridge Highs formal “couple of the night”.
Shell’s talking to a local journalist near the bar, Collins and Jace are deep in a debate about who could bench more in a suit, and I’m just trying to escape Caleb, so I can chat to my potential new signing.
He’s been glued to my side all evening. Charming. Laughing. Brushing fingers along my elbow. Telling every media outlet in the room that “Scarlett and I go way back—she used to steal my crayons and now she steals contracts.”
It’s not, not true. But he’s laying it on thick. Too thick. Caleb’s writing his own narrative, and it’s not one that I’d like a part in let alone the damsel in distress role.
I fake a laugh at something he says—God, what was it?
A pun about half backs?—and excuse myself toward the hallway that leads to the back staircase.
I just need a second. A moment to breathe without his cologne making me dizzy, and his little charade making me want to throw up the fancy ginger duck thingy.
I round the corner and lean back against the wall, the coolness of the exposed concrete cuts through the sheer fabric on my back and I’m immediately more at ease.
My cheeks must be so red from the pure second hand embarrassment radiating off me at the thought of Caleb’s ‘more than friends’ cosplay.
I’m more comfortable here against a cold concrete wall over Caleb’s showboating, slimy fingers.
Quiet.
Finally.
A moment to breathe, downing what’s left in flute number…3,4? Look I know I have my professional big girl pants on but tonight has been torture it’s just making the whole charade slightly more bearable.
I hang my head in my hands ready to give myself a pep talk to head back in and deal with this shit storm male bravado.
That’s when a shadow emerges from the darkened hallway. Great now I’m about to be murdered.
My pulse spikes. I swear to God if Caleb’s followed me out here, I’m giving him a round house kick to the head and calling it a night.
“Asher,” I breathe, catching sight of his jaw first, then his eyes—stormy and locked on me like I’m the next mistake he’s about to make—on purpose.
“You’ve been avoiding me,” he says, voice low and dangerous. Oh, I think he’s pissed off. It’s kind of hot; I won’t lie.
“Technically, I’ve been avoiding everyone. Equal opportunity dodging.” Just a little fuel to the fire, no biggie.
His jaw flexes. “I watched him kiss you.”
I fold my arms. “It was a press stunt. Caleb likes theatrics, you should know that by now.”
“Yeah?” he steps closer. “So do I.”
And then his hands are on my waist, pulling me against him like he’s been holding back for an hour or two—three days to be exact—and is finally losing the fight. Anyone could walk past right now.
“You know I wanted to rip him off the stage for touching you like that; break every finger he brushed across your ass.” he grits into my ear. “My ass.”
“I know,” I whisper, unable to think straight in these conditions. “That’s why I walked away, that’s why I’m out here hiding from him. He’s insufferable right now.”
He chuckles darkly. “You walked right into me instead. Dangerous move.”
I press a hand against his chest, feeling the thunder of his heartbeat and the heat of his skin through his navy polo. “I’m always making dangerous moves, nothing I can’t handle though, you know that.”
He leans in, lips hovering just over mine, and for a split second, the whole world and the drama inside the Ridgebacks function room disappears again—just like it did that night on the Sydney balcony, and the other night in the sheds—that was reckless, but it would’ve been worth the scandal—the night in my Bondi apartment, that was just plain stupid.
No names. No future. Just us. If I could go back in time, I’d force him to write down his number the moment he stepped onto that balcony.
Before I can plan out my next move, someone clears their throat just down the hallway.
We break apart like guilty teenagers—again.
“Scarlett?” Caleb’s voice calls out, casual but sharp. “Everything alright?” Don’t play dumb pretty boy.
I fix my hair, reapply my professional face, and step out of the shadows.
Asher stays behind me, close enough that I feel his breath on my neck.
“I’ve been looking for you everywhere, there’s some press that want to get a shot of you and Ted” he tilts his head and motions around me.
“Kingston. Surely, you’re lost.” He presses his lips together, he knows exactly what he just interrupted. There’s thick venom coating his words.
“Not at all we were just discussing our coffee date, movie night and planning the next one.” Asher shoots back at Caleb without missing a beat, adding in a wink “All professional Maroon meetings of course,” he adds with a grin that says I’m one step ahead of you mate.
I clock Caleb’s hand which is now curled into a tight fist, and with Asher’s body rigid behind me, he is waiting for Caleb to make the first move—the tension is so thick between the two that it’s almost hard to breathe.
I should really just let them at it, get this whole “she’s mine bullshit” over and done with but I don’t, not here.
I know better than to let this stupid schoolboy alpha male crap land in a press meltdown.
I run my palms down the sides of my dress,
“Alright boys let’s remember where we are. Ash, let’s go back in.” I clutch his hand to reassure him he is the one I want.
We return to the main room, and Caleb’s already making his way toward us, two fresh drinks in hand.
Yep, like I said he is being completely insufferable.
It reminds me of when we were in year three at primary school and I picked Alexander to be my partner for a class project on rainforest animals and not Caleb, so he followed me around for 2 whole days begging me to change partners and when I didn’t he got his mum to call the school and ask the teacher to swap him over.
The boy’s been jealous since he could walk, but you’d think now after years have passed and he’s all grown up it would be different. Nope, it just might be worse.
“Didn’t mean to lose you,” he says smoothly, offering me a glass like nothing happened.
I furrow my brows in confusion and I’m just about to remind him of Alex in year three when—
He reaches to guide me back toward the centre of the lounge, his fingers brushing low on my back again.
But this time—Asher’s hand snaps forward and catches Caleb’s wrist mid-graze.
“You keep doing that,” Asher growls, voice just loud enough for the three of us to hear, “and I’ll chop it off.”
Tension. Static. I realise I’m holding my breath.
Caleb yanks his arm back, jaw twitching. “Touchy,” he mutters. “You always were good at that. Touching things, you shouldn’t.”
His face is scrunched up like his drink is sour, but it’s just his imaginary entitlement to me mixed with a dash of his male ego being bruised.
He looks me over, gaze now sharp, realising his act is slipping up.
“I’d watch myself if I were you,” he adds. “People like Asher—people with secrets—they bury them for a reason.”
He says it so casually, like it’s a joke. Like a stab from a rusty pointed knife that’s been designed just for me.
But it lands like a warning. Opening a tiny little hole and planting a seed of equal size that has me questioning once again what I even know about Asher. I know Caleb, I know how he acts and why, well I knew Caleb. I can’t say the same for Asher, so why shouldn’t I take Caleb’s warnings on board.
He looks at me for a long minute and then without a care in the world he walks off, like he didn’t just drop a live grenade between us. But he knows the wheels in my mind are now turning and I’m doing the math on the situation. Caleb knows me well.
I turn to Asher, but he’s already watching Caleb’s retreating form like a hawk.
His voice is low.
“He doesn’t know the truth.”
I raise a brow. “What truth?”
Asher looks at me.
And for the first time since I’ve known him, he doesn’t have a comeback.
Just silence.
And guilt.
Dripping in guilt.
And something very close to fear.