Chapter 2 Lexie
The high-pitch ringing in my ears spreads to my head and nausea travels to my stomach. This can’t be happening. Justin’s smile fades as his gaze sweeps mine. Sydney says something to me, her smile pained and unmoving, but the ringing is too loud and disorientating and I can’t make out the words.
I’m not here, in the office. I’m back there. In Boston. Seven years ago.
I’m going to be sick.
“Lexie.” The snap in Sydney’s tone pulls me into reality and I blink through the red spots invading my vision.
“Ah.” I clear my throat, and take a tentative step forward. “Yes.”
Sydney flashes me a concerned look but doesn’t drop her smile. “This is Lexie,” she says, waving her hand towards me like I’m a prize at the fair, “an assistant coordinator who’ll be helping us plan your very special day.”
My breath locks as I wait for the reaction of the man who destroyed everything. Will he drop to his knees and beg for forgiveness? Hide in shame? Storm out, cheeks flaming, without looking me in the eye like a cowardly piece of shit?
“Welcome to Shades of White.” My voice is unnaturally high. I flinch against the sound and wait for his smile to change when he realizes who I am.
One moment passes, then two. And… nothing. Literally nothing but a politely generic smile.
“Lexie?” Theodore asks, and I brace myself for the flicker of recognition to cross his perfectly groomed, five-o’clock-shadowed face as he places me and the different name I go by. “Is that short for Alexandra?”
Is he actually serious right now? How can he not know who I am?
There’s not even a flash of acknowledgement in those deep bourbon-brown eyes.
Not a nervous hand through his inky black hair.
Not a twitch in the twenty pounds of sheer muscle he’s put on that towering frame since the last time I saw him. Nothing.
As a na?ve young student, I spent a year daydreaming that somehow in a sea of other girls, Theodore Astor would notice me.
How his gaze would linger, sharpen, settle.
How I’d pretend not to feel it at first, resisting his charm while he bided his time.
In those fantasies, he was intoxicatingly relentless.
He’d corner me in his father’s office—my mentor—lowering his voice as if the walls themselves were listening.
He’d murmur all the things he wouldn’t do if I kept ignoring him, his words brushing my ear—both a threat and promise.
His breath would warm my skin as he traced the line of my neck, a hand would slide slowly up my leg, always stopping just short of where I wanted it most.
That was before he ruined my life.
And he doesn’t even remember me.
“Nope, short for Lexie.” I shake his hand, hard, fighting the urge to dig my nails into his skin. “Nice to meet you, Mr.…” Two can play this game, asshole.
“This is Doctor Astor,” Sydney chimes in as his grip firms against mine before he drops it.
Doctor? Don’t people have to take an oath to be a doctor? They’re meant to be compassionate and caring—not so cold and calculating that demons themselves run in fear.
“But please, just call me Theo,” he says, holding the type of confidence that comes from wealth, looks, and a mother who never told him no.
His grin drips with sex and honey, carrying the power to dissolve the thong from any straight woman within a ten-mile radius.
For a while, that smile held my dreams before it haunted my nightmares.
And yet, there’s a sensation that this smile is the pocket of sunshine hiding the ominous, shadowy clouds of an approaching storm.
He adds, “Unless you’re needing me to look at some festering wound, or read your chart, then Dr. Astor it is. Otherwise, Theo is perfectly fine.”
He actually thinks he’s funny, does he?
Theo wraps a protective arm around the woman next to him. “And this is my fiancée, Annabelle Barlowe.”
Before my mouth drops to the floor, I suck in my cheeks. Barlowe? As in one of the renowned billionaire families, as close to royalty as you can get in America—that Barlowe? Jesus Christ. No wonder we had to sign an NDA.
“Very nice to meet you all,” Annabelle says with a dazzling, warm smile, and moves to shake my hand first, then Justin’s, then Sydney’s. I wonder if she has any idea of the devil she’s about to marry.
“We’re so honored to have you as a client. Oh, wow, what a beautiful ring,” Sydney interjects as Annabelle finishes shaking her hand.
“Thank you! It took us a while to find the perfect one,” Annabelle says.
I slide only the quickest glance to Theo.
“Oh, a proposal without the ring?” The question is innocent enough on the surface, but I know it’s probing and silently beg Sydney and Justin not to read anything into it.
I clear my throat. “I love that, actually. Imagine spending the rest of your life with something you hated.”
“Right?” Annabelle tucks a strand of dark hair behind her ear. “Theo’s a bit of a control freak.”
“I’m right here,” he interrupts.
“You know what I mean.” She playfully rolls her eyes. “He likes everything to be perfect and didn’t want to ruin the moment with something I wouldn’t like.”
“Well, it’s gorgeous. A local jeweler?”
“No,” Theo says. “We went to Boston for this piece.”
The hair on my neck stands. “The city must hold a special place for you both.”
“Yes, it does,” Theo says, his gaze unwavering. “Have you been to Boston?”
Asshole. As if he doesn’t know. The mention of Boston takes me back to a time when I still had hope for the future, when his father would tell me to keep working hard and used words like potential and gifted, and I believed him.
I wonder if he had any idea his son would strip it all away from me.
“Yes, I have,” I say, trying to remain professional despite my growing anger.
“They have a tremendous independent jewelry scene.” His voice carries a lightness that makes me want to rip my ears off. “Next time you’re visiting, you should check it out. I’ll give you the names of a few places.”
“Thank you,” I say, but I really want to punch him in the face.
I live in a shit studio apartment in the Bronx that I can barely afford, survive on take-out and cheap wine, and whatever funds I have left at the end of the month go straight to my mom so she can take a day off from her back-breaking work.
He must know we come from completely different worlds.
“Why don’t we go to the conference room,” Sydney says. “Lexie, could you grab some refreshments?”
“Of course.” I force a smile, because I’m an assistant wedding planner, not an assistant, as Sydney often forgets. But this time I don’t mind if it means escaping Theo. Once I round the corner and step into the breakroom, I push out a shaky breath. He can’t hurt me. He can’t hurt me.
The knife rattles in my trembling hands and visions of me thrusting it deep into something other than this cucumber invades me. How does he not remember me after what he did?
I’m adding a few sprigs of mint along with the cucumber into the crystal water pitcher when Justin tears into the room. “Are you okay?”
No, I’m not fucking okay. I’ve waited five years for a promotion, and even though I’m grateful I got this job in the first place, that gratitude only extends so far.
This wedding was supposed to be my big break.
After a year of pushing for a raise and being told the timing wasn’t right, I knew the moment I heard about this mysterious new client, and the budget we’d be working with, that this was finally my shot at the raise and title I deserve.
Instead, Theo shows up like some evil phoenix, rising from the ashes just to torch my dreams the second things start going right.
“Lexie, hello!” Justin waves in front of my face to grab my attention again before retrieving grapes from the refrigerator. “What’s up with you?”
God, I love Justin. He always shows up for me without me even having to ask.
Growing up an only child, I always wondered what it would be like to have an older brother, and Justin is as close as I’ll get.
But I’m not ready to tell him about Boston.
“Nothing.” I avoid his eyes and add cookies to the tray.
“I just know I’m going to bust my ass for this wedding and Sydney will probably still deny my promotion. ”
“Do you actually think she’d do that?” he asks, snipping the grapes from the vine. “I mean, Sydney’s Sydney, but you’ve been due for a long time, and this wedding’s the ticket, right?”
I shrug.
Theo can’t hurt me. I repeat this over and over, but deep down, I know he absolutely can. He did. A man like Theodore Astor will never change. He salivates off destruction and the bodies he leaves in his wake.
“I think I should ask Sydney for you and me to swap,” I say. “You can assist on this one, and I’ll take over your current project. What do you think?”
“Are you kidding? Working on a Barlowe wedding is a freaking dream.” He wipes his hands on a towel and reaches for a bag of pistachios. “But are you sure? You might be giving up a golden opportunity.”
He’s right. But I’m also saving myself from future manslaughter charges and prison time, so it’s a win-win. “I’m absolutely sure. I don’t think I’m a good match for them.”
Justin starts filling up a bowl with the nuts. “That groom, though, right?” he says, wiggling his brows. “Pretty sure if you looked up the western definition of tall, dark, and handsome, it’d have his picture.”
A short puff of air comes through my nose. The devil is not sexy. He’s nauseating. “Yeah, well, he seems like a total dick.” I keep my voice low even though the conference room holding Theo and Annabelle is across the office.
His eyes scrunch. “The groom? Are you serious? He seemed pretty cool.”
“I’ve met guys like him before. I know guys like him. A bullshit level of charm, the type of guy that thinks his looks and money excuse bad behavior, is not cool.” I death-grip the stirrer for the water pitcher. “I can’t believe people are impressed by him.”
Justin stops picking at the nuts and gives me a hard stare. “You are channeling a hell of a lot of hatred on a man you’ve just met. I mean, I love talking shit as much as the next person, but you don’t even know this guy.”
If Justin only knew. I’ve had years obsessing over the man who stole everything from me.
For seven years, he’s occupied my mind more than what’s considered healthy or sane.
“There’s just something about him I don’t trust.” I hesitate, then remind myself that Justin’s safe.
“And I don’t know if I buy their relationship. ”
His mouth drops. “Lexie. What the hell?”
I don’t care that I sound unhinged. My heartbeat has not slowed since I laid eyes on Theo, and the fact that I’m not jumping on a desk and screaming at him is a miracle. “Someone who seems too good to be true, always is,” I say. “There’s something off about those two. I smell it in the air.”
The ping of a cell phone in the hall stops my words and Justin’s eyebrows rise. Shit. I close my mouth and add the final touches to the tray, while he returns to his desk.
Breathe. No matter how much I want to tell his fiancée that he’s a piece of shit and she should run away, no matter how much I’m owed for what he did to me, nothing good can happen with me fulfilling a revenge plan.
I need this job. I need this promotion. I need my fucking life back.
So, I’m going to do nothing but sit, smile, and obey. Just like I did all those years ago.
And I feel as sick about it now as I did then.