Chapter 52
"Amaya, um, I’m staying for a few days here." Chase walked into the bedroom, where Amaya lay on the bed, staring upwards. He could feel her pain and sense her confusion, and he could see the purple marks his fingers had left on her tender skin. He flinched inside but let nothing of his horror show on his face or in his voice. "You and Tommy should pack." Chase’s head inclined towards the wardrobe. "I’ll arrange the transport to my mansion, and I want you to cancel my diary for a week—I will stay on for a while. When you’re back, report to Justin. I already called him, and don't worry about the wedding; it's all handled, including the contract." And he reeled off his orders, spoke of nothing but work, and even managed to look her straight in the eyes as he did so.
Amaya sighed. "Does it mean business as usual?" Amaya got his point—oh, she got the point, alright!
"Yes. I'll take care of everything about our wedding. Just fit the wedding dress. And don't give me that tone! That was what you wanted. I assured you that you wouldn’t lose your job over this. Of course…" he gave a brief, mirthless smile. "…if you choose to leave, I will provide an excellent reference. I have some contacts…"
He wanted her gone.
With no excuse or explanation, he just wanted her gone.
"Don't worry, I have my word, and besides, I owe you money, and this is all, after all, a pretence." No one could deny the pain in her voice; it was all so clear, yet Chase chose to ignore it.
"What happened, Chase?" she wanted to know. She just didn’t get it. "Everything was wonderful."
"For a little while, perhaps," Chase said. "But I’m bored with you now, and this marriage will do me good, but I don't want you nagging me, asking me... we are not a real couple, Amaya. Remember that!"
Bullshit! She thought. How could he hurt her so badly?
"Should I send myself some flowers?" Amaya sneered.
Deep beneath the pain of his dismissal, amidst her loss, there was a small coup—a little surge of triumph as, though his expression appeared unmoved, she registered the slight bob of his Adam’s apple and knew she had unnerved him. She felt a little flicker of satisfaction as she refused to dance to his beastly tune.
"That’s what you usually make me do when you break up with your many flings." Oh yeah, Gabby told her that whenever Chase ended a relationship with so many girls, he would ask Gabby to send them flowers and jewellery.
"Sure, if you must, or buy yourself a leaving gift," Chase suggested.
She sneered; the pain in her teary eye almost choked him to death as she added, "But who said I’m leaving? I need to pay what I owe you." She damn well wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. "When did I say that I was looking for other work? I’m very happy where I am—unless you have any complaints about my work?"
She watched his lips tighten just a fraction before he answered.
"None," he groaned.
"Very good, then I shall see you on your return." She took off the earrings and necklaces and, attempting some dignity, held them out to him, but Chase merely shrugged.
"Consider them a bonus."
Okay," she replied vacantly.
And just like that, she was dismissed from his personal life; they were dismissed, everything they had shared these past days was cheapened and soiled.
"While we’re still on personal time, before it’s back to business…" There were no tears in her eyes, no waver in her voice, as she meant every word. "I hated the fact that I was too naive to even consider something. Just so you know," Amaya said, in a voice that was surprisingly clear. "When I smile and bring you your coffee, or laugh at one of your jokes, or join you at some function, or when you think that I’ve forgotten what you did…" Her eyes briefly met his. "I haven’t. Just so you remember, I hate you to the moon and back."
For the past few days, Amaya has seen her place of work as a refuge. There, she had felt in charge of her life and had worked hard at putting together all the building blocks that gave it definition and purpose. A few days without Chase in the office felt like a vacation for her; at least Eva and Gary had been nice and considerate after she told them everything.
Now she felt jumpy. On tenterhooks. Always on the lookout for Chase, who arrived last night in the mansion and had some presents for her son, and for the past couple of days, had often appeared to talk to her at the phone.
"Justin would normally handle this, but seeing that he’s on an extended holiday abroad, and seeing that that extended holiday is likely to become permanent, you’d better start getting acquainted with some of his responsibilities, Amaya, because I'm transferring you to him and Gary to me…" He said this at five o'clock earlier today, when most of her colleagues had mentally switched off in preparation for leaving and had been all agog at the appearance of the big boss.
Amaya had kept as cool and collected as she could, but her nerves had been all over the place.
Surely the head office should be handling this situation. Amaya had ventured to ignore him all the way, watching her back like a howler as he had perched on the side of her desk and then dragging her eyes away from his muscular thighs and the way the fine fabric of his trousers was stretched taut over them. But, no. Chase Johnson was swamped by several huge ongoing deals—and besides, these matters would qualify as fairly small peanuts for him. Not after he suggested that the wedding would be held on the farmland.
God, she wondered why, but yeah, it's not like she could do something about it.
She doesn't care anymore! Whatever pleased the asshole she thought to herself.
Afterward, some of the girls hovered, waiting for her to emerge from her cubicle, and proceeded to ply her with questions. None of the questions had anything to do with work. They wanted her opinion of Chase. As a hunk. Amaya had made it a point never to engage in conversations like that, but she had been pinned to the wall and had found herself admitting that he was all right but not her type.
So she was sure the rumors about their wedding weren't in the media yet.
Good! She thought that at least she could still breathe some fresh air without the girls sending her daggers.
So how come he’s been around so much since early this morning? Oh yeah, he was ignoring her alright, not that she cared.
Argh! She had become just the sort of mindless robot she had never been, and it had left her all hot and bothered. Not that she cared.
Of course, she doesn't care anymore! After what he told her?
How could she care? How could she—
Damn it! She thought.
And yet now, at home far earlier than she normally would have been, on yet another cold evening, Amaya looked at her work computer with jaundiced eyes.
It wasn’t yet six, and she couldn’t face sitting in front of her computer and picking up where she had left off during the day.
Wandering through her room, she had plenty of time to think about the social life she lacked.
At work, having almost given up on asking her, two of her colleagues had invited her to go to the pub with them, and she had felt a little surge of panic because...
Because her whole life was devoted to work and to her son.
How had that happened? Okay, she knew how, and she knew why; she just didn’t understand how it had all run away with her so that she had lost all her perspective.
Not only was her social life practically nonexistent, but where was the guy she should be dating? Where was the exciting sex life she should be having? Not that she was thinking about what happened in Greece. Of course, she wasn't thinking about Chase.
She clearly promised herself that she would indeed forget and hoped for something else when Chase was involved.
At this time, he had been miffed—because how hard would it have been for him to just give her some breathing space? Surely it had been enough that they’d had fun in Greece? But Amaya wanted more than just fun on the weekends. She wanted more, and clearly, Chase told her that there was nothing more for them.
That alone was so obvious.
So now here she was—alone. Tommy had gone to bed after playing at the park with the nanny. She wouldn’t have wanted to be with Chase still. No, in retrospect, he hadn’t been the man for her, even though he had ticked a lot of the right boxes. But shouldn’t she have moved on? Be having a good time finding his replacement? Somewhere?
She was so alone, for heaven’s sake!
Frustrated with the direction of her thoughts, she slammed shut the glass balcony door so that she couldn’t be reminded of what she was missing by the smell of barbecue wafting into her house.
Then she had a shower.
Then, in a pair of tiny shorts and a cropped top, she prepared to wait out the annoying train of thoughts that were suddenly bothering her.
For which she blamed her wretched boss, who had somehow managed to get under her skin and make her feel somehow inadequate...
And as soon as she started thinking about Chase, she found that she couldn’t stop.
He was just so alive and vital and brimming over with restless energy, yet he was also an asshole who could easily break someone's heart. Her heart!
Next to him, she felt like a pale, listless shadow, going through the motions of having a fulfilling life when she wasn’t.
Absorbed in pointless speculation, she was only aware of the knock on her door when it was depressed with such insistence that she was forced to dash and pull open the door or else risk the staff complaining about it.
Chase Johnson was the last person she expected to see standing on her doorstep. In fact, she blinked rapidly, trying to clear her vision and turn him into someone else. But no, he was still there. Tall, dynamic, broad-shouldered, and way too exotically good-looking asshole.
He didn’t say a word. Just looked at her. He had obviously come straight from work because he was still in his work trousers—charcoal grey, super conventional, and yet somehow quite fitted on him. But there was no jacket, and he had shoved the sleeves of his shirt up to his elbows, revealing muscled forearms liberally sprinkled with dark hair.
She seemed to have forgotten how to speak.
"Are you going to ask me in?"