Total pages in book: 66
Estimated words: 65939 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 330(@200wpm)___ 264(@250wpm)___ 220(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 65939 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 330(@200wpm)___ 264(@250wpm)___ 220(@300wpm)
When the appetizers arrive, I excuse myself to go to the bathroom. Emma is waiting for me when I emerge from the stall, but I avoid her gaze, not ready to answer her inevitable questions.
I don’t know why I haven’t told her what happened three years ago, but I’m even less inclined to do so now.
When I get back to the table, Marcus and Emma do their best to make the meal less awkward, but what it actually takes is three glasses of sangria, after which the buzz takes some of the edge off and allows me to tell them about the crazy errands Tierre sends me on.
“Why?” Emma asks when I describe the time Mr. Boss tasked me with locating him a female virgin with his exact blood type.
I shrug. “He read that giving an older person a blood transfusion from a younger person can make the former feel more youthful.”
“I think the ‘why’ Emma meant was, ‘Why a virgin?’” Marcus chimes in.
“My boss’s mind works in mysterious ways?”
To prove this point, I tell them a few more anecdotes in the same vein, but then the conversation veers toward crazy dating stories, so I share about the guy who was dead set on showing me his ex-girlfriend’s picture, no matter what I said. As I go on, I notice Ashton squeezing his fork and glaring at me through a clenched-teeth smile.
Huh.
Is he afraid I’ll tell them the story of how we met?
Serves him right, but no. That isn’t what I want either, so we end up talking about our favorite shows and movies instead—because that’s safe… unless someone here is an avid fan of Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo.
The conversation flows, and I manage not to cause a scene until the check comes, which is when Marcus and Ashton start fighting over who’ll pay it—and decide to split it in half. As if I were Ashton’s date.
Oh, no. Fuck that.
Normally, I don’t mind letting a guy pay for me, but not Ashton.
Never Ashton.
Unable to stop myself from shooting Ashton another glare, I whip out my credit card and plunk it into the waiter’s hand, telling him to put my portion of the bill on it.
“This isn’t a double date,” I say to Emma when she raises her freshly groomed eyebrows.
Without waiting for a reply, I chug the rest of my sangria, and as soon as the waiter comes back, I sign the check, mumble a rushed farewell to Emma and Marcus, and hurry out as fast as my Manolo Blahniks can carry me.
* * *
The first thing I do when I get home is pack my shoes in a plastic bag and seal it thoroughly to lock in the odor. The second thing I do is brainstorm something I should’ve figured out as soon as I finished my MFA: a dress design that is completely my own. That lasts about thirty seconds before I give in to temptation and look up Ashton Vancroft.
Holy fuck.
He’s got a whole fitness empire now. His ThriveFit app is at the top of all the app stores’ charts, with ravingly great reviews, and his clients include every celebrity I can think of.
And there are interviews with the asshole. Tons of them.
How did I manage to miss his rapid ascent? Normally, I know everyone and everything.
The only explanation I can think of is that after that night, I’ve pathologically avoided anything to do with gyms and fitness, my morning runs excluded.
In a moment of weakness, I click on a video of an interview with him and hear in his own words how the techie side of his business began when he wanted to help his clients remotely but couldn’t find an app that did everything he needed—so he had one created.
Stopping the video, I snort.
Help his clients remotely. What is that a euphemism for—phone sex or sexting?
Resuming the video, I listen to the rest and cringe as Ashton pretends that he cares nothing about the financial aspect of his achievements.
“Ultimately, I’m in the business of bringing happiness,” he says. “And that’s all I care about.”
Somehow, that just makes me angrier—because in a fucked-up way, it’s probably true. “Bringing happiness” one orgasm at a time was what he was doing when I met him. Catherine sure seemed happy with his services.
Maybe I should’ve been too?
No, fuck that. I didn’t know he was simply rendering services. He made me feel special, like what happened between us was unique—until I learned there was a conveyor belt of other women who felt exactly the same.
Well, whatever. Clearly, his strategy worked, and he’s insanely rich now. If not a billionaire like Marcus, then well on his way. No wonder he was dressed so nicely at that brunch—it’s all chump change to him now.
I must be a masochist because I pull up more articles about him and learn that he actually comes from old money. Which explains his air of commanding arrogance. Come to think of it, he even had it when we met three years ago, when he was still just a trainer who was working through the Kama Sutra with his clients on the side.