Chapter 2
ASPEN
“Listen, Jade. I understand that it’s super serious between you and…”
“Jace,” she supplied through the phone.
I balked at the similarity, but quickly refocused.
“Yes. Jace. But you agreed to your donation for the auction months ago. You can’t back out now.
” I strived for firm but knew my panic tinged the words with pleading.
We were three days out from the event, and I didn’t have a chance in hell of finding a replacement for Jade’s offer to take the winner to the Oscars with her.
“I know,” she whined, before her tone turned whimsical.
“But I didn’t see myself finding Jace last week.
Our romance is such a whirlwind, and he’s…
everything. The least I can do is respect his request to escort me.
I mean, he brought up a good point about how it would basically be cheating if I went with someone else. ”
I clutched the phone, slack-jawed, slowly blinking, and speechless. I didn’t know where to start combating her unhinged reasoning. Not that she gave me the chance.
“Hey, I have to go. Jace is here to take me to lunch.” She squealed, then quickly sobered. “I’m so sorry, Aspen, but when it’s love, you gotta hold on to it. You get it.”
“Actua—”
The line went dead. I pulled the phone away from my ear and stared at it, swallowing the speech about how love could suck a dick because responsibilities were more important. With a groan, I dropped my head to my desk with a thud.
“Having a bad day?”
For the third time in a week, I screamed around my heart lurching into my throat. Slapping a hand to my chest, I glared at my father. He winced with a sheepish smile as he let himself into my office, closing the door behind him.
“Sorry about that.”
“Seems to be the trend for the week,” I grumbled.
He huffed a laugh and dropped back in the seat across from my desk, unbuttoning his jacket. Meaning I needed to brace myself because he was getting comfortable. With a herculean effort, I bit back a pleading whine for no deep conversations today and willed passive features.
“Want to talk about it?” he offered.
No, I wanted to shout like a petulant child.
Instead, I dug deep for the cool businesswoman I needed to be.
After our first conversation this week, I didn’t want to leave any doubt in my father’s mind that I could—and would—handle anything thrown my way.
I needed him to know that Quinn Music Group was in good, capable hands with me.
“This kind of response…it’s like a child lashing out because they didn’t get their way. It makes me wonder if you’re anywhere near being the CEO this company needs. It makes me wonder if you ever will be.”
He’d assumed I’d moved out of my apartment without telling him to spite him for selling off part of our family business without consulting me.
In reality, I hadn’t told him because I was a coward unwilling to face the truth of my agreement with Lucian.
But I didn’t have to admit my cowardice—I only ended up having to admit my engagement to Lucian.
Even that bombshell was better than leaving him to wonder if I could handle the company.
I internally cringed, remembering it.
“Of course I will be. I am ready,” I corrected quickly with fervor. “This…this whole thing is a misunderstanding. It’s not what you think.”
“Then what is it, Aspen?” my father asked. “Please explain it to me so I can understand what the hell is going on.”
With a deep breath, I held up my hand and smiled. Or tried to. “I’m engaged, and I moved in with him this weekend, which is why I wasn’t at my apartment when you stopped by.”
“Who?” he asked, despite his mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water.
With that single word, he burst the bubble holding together the illusion that admitting I was engaged would be the hard part.
That admitting I’d moved out of the apartment I’d lived in since my sophomore year of college without telling him would be the most challenging part of this conversation.
Neither came close to what I had to say next.
Clinging to the smile that felt more manic than jovial, I laughed, attempting to hide my increasingly panicked breaths. “Umm, you actually know him already.”
“What? I didn’t even realize you were seeing anyone. The fact that it’s someone I know is preposterous,” he spluttered, shaking his head. “Who? Wh-who the hell is it?”
With clenched fists, I sucked in a deep breath and exhaled the lie. “Lucian.”
My announcement had left him slack-jawed with a lot of questions.
Questions he hadn’t gotten to ask because my phone rang with an important call.
At least, I’d claimed it was important. It could have been a serial killer asking me to sign up for a special pickup in a candy van, and I still would’ve answered like my life depended on it.
After making promises to talk to him all about it later, I knew it was only a matter of time until I found him in my office, looking like a concerned father unwilling to be deterred.
Despite the worry lines pulling at his eyes, I remained calm and collected with my answer, infusing myself with a confidence that would carry me through admitting the dilemma with the auction, as well as all the other questions I was sure to come.
“Jade Hart just called to inform me she would no longer be able to fulfill her donation.”
“You’d think I’d be more used to the flighty whims of celebrities—especially the younger ones—yet they still manage to surprise me.” He sighed and shook his head. “Did she offer a replacement donation?”
“She did, as a matter of fact. A signed photo of her at the Oscars on the red carpet,” I deadpanned.
He whistled. “What’s the plan?”
“As of right now? I have no idea. But considering her donation sparked an increase in ticket sales for the event, I know I’ll need to come up with something equally as extravagant to replace it.”
“Let me know if you need help. We can always ask other employees to reach out to their contacts.”
“Thanks. I’ll be sure to keep you updated.”
With that assurance, the business side of our conversation faded, leaving nothing but the real reason he came to see me.
And here we go…
“We didn’t get a chance to finish our conversation on Monday.” He huffed a laugh. “Or, really, not even have a conversation about it.”
“Yeah,” I said, dragging the word out.
“So…Lucian?”
I nodded, unable to speak around the ball of nerves crawling up my throat.
“I assumed you two had too much animosity for each other ever to guess you’d become a couple—let alone engaged.”
A high-pitched laugh bubbled over before I could stop it. I dropped my gaze and brushed my hair behind my ear, hoping he took the laugh as one of excitement rather than panic—time to put on the act of my life as a woman in love. If anyone would see past my lie, it would be my dad.
Swallowing past the knot, I held my smile and met his gaze head-on. “It started that way, but we realized our bickering came from having similar, passionate personalities. Over time of working closely together, we discovered how much we had in common. It didn’t take long for us to grow close.”
His brow furrowed. “But you’ve only known each other for a few months. How can you be ready to get married?”
“You only knew Mom for a few months before you married her,” I accused.
“That was different,” he said with a wave of his hand. “Your mother’s family wanted her to move back to Puerto Rico.”
“And she already planned to stay because of a job after college.”
“We didn’t want to take the risk. Marriage was easier.”
I raised a brow over my sardonic stare. We both knew they married for love, and nothing would’ve made them wait. They’d shared how quickly and deeply they fell in love all my life. Their love was one for the ages—one I could only dream of.
One I would never get.
At least not for the next five years.
“Fine. You’re right,” he conceded, throwing his hands up.
“Nothing would have made me wait a second longer to marry your mother. Trust me, Aspen, I understand passion and falling in love quickly. I also understand how rare it is. I understand how passion fools people into thinking it’s love when in reality it’s a fleeting illusion that can lead to fast decisions and long consequences. ”
“Dad, it’s not like that. I’m not like that.”
Lies filled our conversation, but that statement was true. I had no illusions of believing my arrangement with Lucian had anything to do with love. Passion ignited between us, but never love.
“I know I haven’t been around for the interviews much, but I watch you two bicker at meetings.
I know a lot of that comes from your anger at how I allowed Lucian to invest in the company.
I also know you.” He took a deep breath and leveled his deep green eyes at me across the desk.
The depths swirled with a combination of my dad and the businessman who built this company.
The mixture dug deep and prodded for a crack in my lies.
“You’re my daughter—with the same stubbornness as me.
Add in your mother’s determination and fiery, fighting spirit, and it makes me wonder if maybe this is some wild plan you’ve concocted that you think will allow you to work around the stipulations in the contract. ”
Tingling numbness crept along my limbs with each passing second of his accusation until the air froze in my lungs.
Desperate to mask my shock over how close he’d guessed to the truth, I scoffed and tilted my head back with a laugh.
Anything to excuse looking away from his penetrating stare.
“That’s insane, Dad. There’s no way I could find a way to defy a contract that you had lawyers create with every attention to detail.
You were very thorough in ensuring I had no option beyond what was laid out for me.
” I finished with hints of irritation to make my lie more believable.