Look After Us (12 page)

“Ava, baby, will you marry me?”

My smile almost burst from my lips. It wasn’t even a question that needed a moment’s thought. I’ve always known the answer since the minute he declared his love to me in that hotel room in Miami all those months ago. I may have been there before, stood in front of a beautiful man on bended knee, but it wasn’t like this. Even though it was romantic as hell and I cried—a lot—it was wrong to say yes the first time around because it wasn’t enchanting; it didn’t take my breath away, my heart didn’t gallop in my chest, my skin didn’t erupt in tiny little goose bumps at the impact of his words … but now they were and I’d never known anything so right, not until that very moment.

I looked at Lily with amusement and asked her, “What do you think, baby girl? Should I say yes?”

She saw my smile and hers beamed even brighter as she nodded her head. I turned to Ashton and the smile I saw on his face, one that said he was in love with me, it made me fall even deeper in love with him than I ever thought possible.

“Yes, I’ll marry you!”

His nervous smile was gone and was replaced with a huge-ass grin—so huge you’d think he’d just won the lottery—and he was on his feet in an instant. I shifted Lily to my right side as Ashton took hold of my left hand before sliding the ring on my finger.

“I love you!” he exclaimed before slamming his lips onto mine. It was short-lived when Lily’s hands began to claw at our faces and we pulled away. He looked down at Lily and with a chuckle he said, “No need to get jealous. I love you, too.” He brushed his lips along her forehead.

“Now that you’re my fiancée, can we eat? I’m starving.”

“Trust my son to think about his stomach seconds after proposing!” pipes up Alana as she cracks up with laughter once I’ve finished telling them my proposal story.

Mia gives out a dreamy sigh. “That’s so romantic … and to include Lily too … damn I think my ovaries just exploded.”

A round of laughter roars around the table, and as I take a sip of my wine, my eyes fall on Riley and I notice just how forced her laugh seems, especially as her smile doesn’t reach her eyes. I keep thinking it’s my paranoia, but I get the distinct feeling that her feelings for Ashton—even after all these years—are still unresolved. It’s pretty sad to be hung up on someone who clearly doesn’t reciprocate those feelings. I would feel sorry for her if it weren’t for the ulterior motives of trying to get my man’s attention with her skimpy little outfits and the way she’s pawed over him all day.

Hell, I’m glad we’re only here for another two days because I sure as hell don’t want Ashton anywhere near her. I have no idea how far her efforts will go in a bid to gain Ashton’s attention, and that scares me.

I turn my focus from her to Mia, trying desperately to eliminate the nausea I feel in my stomach at the sheer jealousy of Riley ever succeeding with her efforts. She wouldn’t because Ashton loves me, but … the thought is still there, irrationally so. It’s like the seed of doubt has been planted and my mind just continues to run away with itself.

“So, how did Tyler propose?” I ask, intrigued.

She takes a sip of her water before placing it back on the table. Leaning back in her chair, with her bare leg hanging over the arm, she smiles. “Not as romantic as Ashton proposing in the place you first met, but it definitely has its merits.”

She begins to tell us how Tyler took her to her favorite restaurant for her birthday. “After dinner, the dessert was brought to our table. It was a chocolate fudge cake—my favorite. Once I began digging in, I noticed just how nervous he suddenly seemed.” She turns her attention to Alana for a moment. “He was doing his eyebrow twitchy thing, you know the … ” She demonstrates by raising her eyebrow up in a rapid motion causing us to laugh out loud at how ridiculous she looks while doing it.

“Oh Lord, my boy sure does twitch when he’s nervous,” Alana says once she’s stopped laughing.

“Seriously, I thought he was having some kind of epileptic fit, but when I asked him what was wrong he just shrugged and said he had something in his eye. I didn’t argue, I just continued to eat my cake. After another minute or so of even more twitching, I lost it and dropped my fork on the table to ask him what the hell was wrong with him, and … well that was the moment I saw the diamond ring embedded in the middle of the cake.

“Before I could take in what was happening, he was suddenly down on his knee in front of me, taking the ring out of my cake, wiping it down with his shirt before proposing to me in the middle of the restaurant. It was so sweet the way he did it but,” she looks down at her ring with a smile forming at her lips, “it took forever to get the melted fudge from out of my ring. I think it’s only just found its original sparkle.”

After the discussion of romantic proposals, I excuse myself to use the toilet; after three glasses of wine and a bottle of water, my bladder is about ready to burst. Once I’ve done my business, I make my way towards the kitchen when I suddenly stop in my steps when I hear Alana in a heated discussion with someone.

“I don’t know what the hell you’re playing at, but you need to leave him alone. Ava might not have noticed your indiscrete flirting with Ashton, or Ashton for that matter, but I certainly have. Ava’s been through enough shit in her lifetime without having some little hussy trying to get in the way of her much deserved happily ever after. They’re happy and in love, and whatever you’re thinking may happen between you and Ashton is never going to happen. Never. He didn’t love you when you were kids, he will never love you now. You need to leave them alone.”

My heart is racing as I take in Alana’s sharp words that, I assume, are being directed to Riley. Nervous laughter follows and I find myself leaning towards the entrance of the kitchen to try and hear better.

“Alana,” I hear Riley begin with a slight stutter. “Seriously, I don’t know want you think you saw today, but I swear to you it was innocent. I didn’t mean anything by it. He’s just an old friend.”

“Well the flirting needs to
stop
. It’s disrespectful to Ava and quite frankly flirting with a man who’s engaged to be married is downright distasteful, no matter how innocent it is. You don’t want to cross me or my family because I guarantee it will end badly for you, so back the hell off, okay?”

“Is that a threat, Alana?” I hear the condescending tone in Riley’s voice and my mind is left reeling, shocked. Is it a threat?
Holy shit, is this conversation really happening right now?
I was sure this was all in my head, but Alana just confirmed that my insecurities were most definitely warranted.

Silence only follows from Alana, and after a moment passes a set of footsteps descend from the kitchen. I flinch when I hear the sound of a glass slamming along the countertop and Riley muttering, “Fucking bitch.”

After a few minutes, once I know the coast is clear, I finally make my way through the kitchen out onto the veranda, pretending that I didn’t overhear their heated conversation.

“Hey, honey … you were gone a while, is everything okay?” Alana asks, concerned. Ignoring the heated stare I can feel coming from Riley, I smile timidly at Alana as I take a seat and grab hold of my glass of wine, forcing myself not to down it in one as I try to make sense of the conversation I just heard.

“Yeah, I’m fine … just got a little sidetracked.”

This weekend has become a little more interesting that’s for sure; I just wish I wasn’t the center of the rift between the maid of honor and mother of the groom.

I take a long gulp of my wine, just as Jo says, “You know what we should play? Twister! It’s always more fun with a little wine in your system.”

“Oh yes!” Mia says matching Jo’s excitement. “I’m being in charge of the spin board!”

And with that, the tension at the table is diffused and we spend the next hour with our limbs spread out in the most unnatural positions.

I can hear noises. They sound like female moans coming from upstairs. I force myself up the stairs, the sounds only becoming louder and more frequent with every step I take. It sounds like someone is having sex … and it seems to be coming from my bedroom.

My heart races recklessly as I finally make it to the top step. My ears are pounding and my glands are dripping with sweat as I prepare for the scene that I pray I don’t see the moment I open the bedroom door.

Please, God … don’t let it be what I think it is. Taking a deep, calming breath, I slowly approach the bedroom door, my eyes filling up with unshed tears from the animalistic moans coming from the other side of the door, within the walls of my tranquil nirvana. The door handle rattles under my touch and after counting down to three—three times—I finally turn the handle and open the door.

The scene in front of me leaves me in a gasping state of shock.

My broken heart lays in a bloody mess beside my feet as I just stare ahead, frozen to the spot, taking in the love of my life having sex with another woman … but not just any woman … it’s Riley, his high school sweetheart.

Ashton doesn’t see me as he continues to pump in and out of her, but Riley does, and the evil smirk I see on her face tells me she’s enjoying witnessing my heartbreak as it kills me from the inside out.

My eyes shoot open, a gasp falls from my lips, and my heart is slamming inside my chest as the sinking sensation of heartbreak brings me out in chills. I sit up, running my fingers through my hair as I take in the darkness of my surroundings, trying to calm my speeding heart rate. I blink a few times through my blurred tears and I sigh a breath of relief when I realize it was just a dream. I’m still in Dallas, not at home ... it wasn’t real but
fuck
if it didn’t feel real.

Desperately wanting to feel Ashton’s comforting arms around me, I turn my body towards him, but frown when I see he isn’t sleeping beside me. I grab my cell phone from the side and my frown furrows deeper when I see that it’s 3:00 am.

Surely the guys must be back from the bachelor party by now?

Feeling parched, I decide to head on downstairs for a glass of water and go in search of my missing fiancé. He’s probably just passed out on the sofa or in the pool house with Tyler, but I’m struggling to shake the dream from my conscience. I need to see his beautiful face. I think it’s the only thing that will help calm me down.

I quietly make my way down the stairs, hoping not to wake anyone up. I’m in a world of my own as I turn the corner to the kitchen, but when I finally look up, my whole body freezes on the spot. My world spins on its axis as I see Ashton and Riley in a kissing embrace and the crippling heartbreak that I felt only moments ago comes back with a vengeance, but instead of it being a dream, it’s very much real. I choke on a silent sob and my bare feet stumble backwards until I’m running into the direction I just came from.

Once I reach my room, the dam finally breaks and the tears fall freely from my eyes as my heart cracks straight down the center, leaving me struggling to catch my breath.

How can this be happening to me?
How could he do this to me?
I finally found it, my happily ever after, and now it’s being snatched away from me by the woman I’m convinced is my karma in disguise.

Karma for what I did to Sebastian.

Karma for finally being happy.

Karma for simply
existing
.

Fuck. Is this what Sebastian felt when he witnessed Ashton and me kiss? The one kiss that almost ended it all for him?

As well as the pain ricocheting within every nerve of my body, a newfound hatred adds salt to the wounds, hatred for the pain I caused to the sweetest and gentlest guy you could ever meet.

I feel it; I feel the months of pain he had to endure because of my selfish decisions and I’m re-living it,
his
pain,
his
torture,
his
heartbreak.

I’ve always hated myself for what I did to him, but now the hatred has hit a whole new level … one that leaves me brutally raw.

I hate myself …

I
fucking
hate myself.

Angrily wiping away my tears as sobs wreck through me, and without switching the light on, I clumsily begin to throw my clothes into my suitcase. I struggle to see through my blurred vision and the darkness of the room, and have no idea what I’m actually throwing inside. Right now, I’m too angry to care.

I don’t bother to change out of my shorts and tank top pajamas; I’m more focused on getting the hell out of here, away from Ashton … away from
Riley
.

Once my suitcase is zipped closed, I hurriedly slip my feet into my Converse before exiting the room with my suitcase in tow. I almost lose my footing on the stairs as I rush down them, trying to navigate my phone through tear-filled eyes, searching through my contacts for Caleb, but failing miserably.

I growl frustratingly as I wipe my tears away, but it’s no use. I still can’t see shit as the tears continue to flow.

“Ava?”

My head snaps up at the sound of Ashton’s voice as my foot finally meets the bottom step. My jaw cracks from clenching down on my teeth as I see him coming out of the kitchen. I ignore him and angrily make my way towards the front door, but I don’t even get halfway before he’s hauling me towards him.