A very long, very deep sleep.
Chapter 26
Kallie
Kallie felt sick to her stomach. She couldn't eat. She could barely sleep. And everywhere she looked, there were reminders of Ash. Her bed. Her walls. Her windows. Her bathroom. Hell, even her damn office. He had touched every part of her life, both physically and metaphorically, and she couldn't shake him. It hurt to breathe. It hurt to blink. It hurt to think about doing anything else other than lying in bed and being depressed. But she had a job to do and clients who were still there, despite the news being run on her. So she got up and dragged her depressed ass into the office.
She walked into her place of work and tried not to remember the time she and Ash had made passionate love there. She tried not to recall when he pinned her to the wall and bent her over her own damn desk. The cum stains were still etched into the facade of the desk. The area a little darker than the rest of the wood around it. It was the first time she had admitted to herself that she loved Ash. The first time she was truly convinced she had moved on from James and made the right decision.
The right choice.
Kallie sat down at her desk and forced herself to work. She took telephone calls and booked times to go give quotes and she had videoconferences with people who needed help with all sorts of things. Rearranging their schedules. Managing their money. Rebuilding their finances. The works. It was one phone call and one videoconference after another, and for a moment there she forgot all about Ash. All about the violent storm raging outside the walls of her pathetic office.
But it was a storm she would weather alone.
Because Ash wasn’t there any longer.
She breathed a sigh of relief when all of her meetings were done for the day. Despite the media storm and the fire blazing all around her, she had nine people call for her services. Nine in one day. That was a record for her business. But that still didn’t erase the reality of the life she was leading. It still didn’t erase the heartache she felt deep inside.
Kallie sat back and stared at her computer, moping as her mind ran away with her.
She couldn't concentrate. Every time she pulled up something to do, her mind would wander to Ash. To the island. To the storm they had gotten stuck in and all the lies that led them to this point. She forgave him when he wasn’t what he seemed. She trusted him after blatantly lying to her about some incredibly important things. Had he forgotten about that? Had he forgotten how she initially reacted to him having money? Was he being that opaque about all of this?
Kallie tried calling Ash three separate times before she pulled up her social media.
She guessed he was being that opaque about it.
She scrolled through the contents of her social media life and scoffed at what she saw. Women applauding her for using men the way they’d used women for so many years. Other women debasing her for being the poster child for why men never trusted women. Never leaned on them for anything. And it didn’t take her long to stumble upon pictures of Ash.
Pictures of him with other women.
His arm was around a young, black-haired woman in a short black dress. Thigh-high boots. She was handing him a drink before another picture showed them dancing together. Grinding on each other. She recognized that club. That was the club he had found her at. The club Eris had dra
gged her to that night.
Despite what she knew was best, she clicked on the article and continued scrolling.
Pictures of him in that place were everywhere. Blond women. Brunettes. Tall and short. Thick and thin. Covered in glitter and completely clothed. All of them up against him. All of them being touched by him. He had a massive smile on his face. He gazed into their eyes as he ground his hips into them. His legs were between theirs and his arm was hanging onto them. He was throwing back drinks and laughing with fervor, surrounded by beautiful women she could never hold a candle to.
Well, he certainly didn’t take much time replacing her.
What an idiot Kallie had been to think otherwise.
What she and Ash shared hadn’t been real. It couldn’t have been if he didn’t trust her. If he couldn't see through James’s bullshit. If it was this easy for him to flee to a club and wrap himself around other women, then he clearly never could have loved her. Never could have enjoyed her the way she thought he would. She felt her heart slide to the floor as it gasped for air. She kept scrolling through the pictures, hoping to find some redeeming quality. Maybe a photo of him walking away with a grimace on his face. Or a frown. Anything to signal to her that it was a ruse. Or fake. Or simply a mistake on his part.
But there was none.
Only smiles and laughter and drinks and beautiful women.
Ash Worthington.
And he wondered why he was a goldmine for gold diggers.
“Knock, knock.”
Eris’s voice pulled her from her trance just before her office door opened.
“I come bearing gifts of food.”