‘He means it affectionately.’
Ash looks awkward, uncomfortable. Has he guessed I was eavesdropping, or is he still reeling from the conversation with his father?
‘I know.’
I wait for the door to close before taking up my wine glass and heading over to the chair his father had been sitting in. Ash tops up his own glass and sits opposite me, but his attention is on the fire. He’s distant. Thoughtful.
‘Who’s Jess?’ I ask.
His eyes snap to me. ‘You heard?’
‘Sorry.’ I grimace. I don’t want him to think it was intentional. ‘I couldn’t help overhearing the tail end of your conversation, but it kind of feels like something I should know.’
‘I don’t talk about her at all if I can help it.’
‘But you can tell me anything—you know that, right?’
He studies me, unblinking, long and hard.
‘Ash?’ I press softly.
He comes alive, the air shuddering from his lungs as he leans his elbows on his knees, his eyes falling to the glass he’s cupping in his hands.
My gut twists. Did he love this Jess that much? He looks so broken...torn apart. Maybe I don’t want to hear this after all. Maybe—
‘We met at school. She was the popular girl every guy wanted and every girl wanted to befriend.’ He gives a harsh laugh I don’t recognise. ‘I guess you could call me the male equivalent... I was smitten, so was she, and we were together right through school, university... I thought that was it—she was the one.’
I sip my wine, hoping it will ease the sickness inside, but instead it burns a path all the way through me. ‘The one?’
His eyes flick to me. ‘I was coming to the end of my gap year and she’d been doing a placement in Paris. She flew home and I surprised her in Arrivals with a diamond ring.’
‘You proposed?’
He nods his head, his eyes on his drink. ‘She said yes. It was sorted. We agreed we’d complete our studies and then have a grand wedding in the summer, start our lives in earnest.’
‘What happened?’
‘Clive happened.’
I frown at him, not putting two and two together and fearing it’s because my heart is breaking with every word he says.
‘The second my family’s money left the equation, she walked.’
I shake my head. ‘I don’t believe that. No one would be that shallow.’
He scoffs. ‘You’d think that, wouldn’t you? Hell, I thought so too—until I ended up falling foul of it.’
‘But that’s sick.’
He shrugs. ‘It wasn’t just the money—it was the scandal too. She didn’t want to be tarnished by it.’
‘But you cleared your father’s name, proved he was innocent, recouped some of the money.’
‘Oh, yeah, I did all that.’ He leans back in his seat now, slumped, almost defeated. ‘And she came back, all right—told me she’d made a mistake, that she loved me, begged me to understand.’
He rubs his fingers over his jaw, his eyes lost in the memories, and then I remember the night we first met—the night he told me I wasn’t his type.
‘That’s why you were so harsh when I first met you?’