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Shaking my head, I turn around to leave, praying my car hasn’t been towed already. Because what do I think I’m doing? Letting a few apple blossoms make me forget a year of torture?
Leopards don’t change their spots: you know it, and I know it. And don’t go saying that’s only a cliché—clichés only get to be clichés because they’re true so much of the time. So with a big sigh, I’m on my way back to my car, thinking at least I have a hot-looking suit to keep as a memento of the day I went certifiably insane for a few hours.
“Ainsley!”
Uh oh.
“Ainsley, get back here!”
I turn to see Scott running towards me, flying down the sidewalk, dodging people like a running back.
“You’re not the boss of me,” I say, but I’m smiling because I just feel happy to see him and hear his voice, despite four seconds ago planning to never see him again.
“Dammit Ainsley, I’ve been wanting to talk to you for days! Come on up to my office, now that you’re here.”
“I thought you were in meetings all afternoon.”
Scott laughs. “I am, Ainsley. But I’m also the boss. They’ll wait.” We get in an elevator and there are just enough people in it that I have to stand close to him, close enough that I can smell that potent combo of his outrageous cologne and his man-smell.
I am way too susceptible to scent. I wonder if anything can be done about that.
Scott takes my hand and pulls me down a corridor. People fall back, staring. Then we’re in a conference room with a beautiful mahogany table and paneled walls and a stunning view.
“Nice,” I whisper.
“Okay, first, that stupid photograph? Ainsley, you’ve got to be kidding me.”
I hang my head just a tiny bit. “Yeah, well. You have to admit it was very well done.”
“No, I do not admit that! It was a joke, ridiculous, typical of the stuff that websites like that come up with. And you know how it is, when you have a certain amount of wealth…you become a target. It’s no big deal, it just amuses me. Honestly, I couldn’t possibly care any less and my father was just using it to cause trouble. He wanted to get out of the picnic, and ruin things for us.”
The way he says that—the us. It’s making my knees wobbly. Dammit.
“But the thing I’ve been wanting to talk to you about since, well forever, but especially since we were just home again together…I want to explain why I behaved so terribly to you years ago.”
I’m listening. I cannot imagine what he’s going to say.
“I wanted you to leave home.”
The whaa—?
“I did everything I could to make your life miserable so you would leave. Because I knew you could make it on your own, Ainsley. You are incredible, you’ve always been incredible, even at sixteen. You can do anything. And I couldn’t just stand by and watch while….”
“While what?” I say, completely confused about what he’s telling me.
“Listen. My father is a complete shit,” he says, his voice low and dark and angry. “The way he was looking at you…I could tell, Ainsley, that if somebody didn’t do something, he was going to come after you.”
I just stand there with my eyes as wide open as they will go. Because the instant I hear the words come out of his mouth, I know it’s the truth. I know it, and I knew it back then, but I stuck it in a box and ignored it, because it hurt and I didn’t want to think about it.
“Scott—”
“I know for a fact he molested a girl next door, when she was sixteen,” he says. “She was a friend of mine. We weren’t close, but you know, we were neighbors and went to the same school and gave each other rides and stuff like that. And she broke down one day and told me what my father had done. Not just one time, either.
“The family was too scared of Randy to go to the cops. They ended up moving across town and nobody ever heard a word about it. And you know Randy—elbowing old ladies out of his way as he goes into church, wanting to show everyone what high morals he has, not to mention money to hire the very best lawyers and PR people. It would be a battle, getting anyone to believe he did something like that. Anyway, the point is, Ains, I saw how he looked at you. You’re so beautiful, so sexy—and he doesn’t care about who he hurts if he wants something. You, your mother—everyone’s expendable to him.
“So what I’ve wanted to say is…I’m so sorry. I was only sixteen and I couldn’t come up with any plan except to drive you out of the house. Please accept my deepest apologies for that.”
“Scotty,” I manage to croak, because my throat has tightened and tears are threatening to overflow and spread mascara from here to New Jersey. And then his arms are around me just like I’ve been dreaming about, and we both let loose a gigantic sigh because it’s like we’re finally, finally home where we belong.
In each other’s arms. Together.
After a long, deeply close moment, I let go and stand up straight, smoothing out my skirt. “I’m really glad you told me. I guess I wish you’d told me back then what you were worried about, because you know…all this time, I thought you hated my guts.”
