Bexley
A few days had passed since our sleepover date night that started out full of promise and ended with tension. Since then, I’d busied myself with work and near constant worry over Aston. He’d texted that the witness he procured was going to speak up in court in two days at a preliminary trial.
This whole thing was surreal—with deep pockets, Aston was still walking around a free man and tackling full custody with his kids. I had no clue what type of alternate universe I’d entered, but it wasn’t one I’d grown up in.
Especially when my phone rang, and I swiped accept call.
“Mom!”
Piper had called from some unknown number—lucky for her, I’d picked up. Call it a sixth sense, or one of my hunches, but I knew it was important.
“Mom! Are you there?”
“Piper, calm down, what’s wrong?” I tried to steady my voice. Her shrieking was freaking me out, but I had to be the strong one.
“I’m stuck in the Italian restaurant in the Village Shopping Center. Come get me, please. Hurry.”
“What? Why? What happened, Piper?” I shrugged off my robe, letting it fall to the floor, and stood stark naked in my closet as I grabbed clothes. “Piper? Are you there? What happened? Why are you stuck? Where’s your dad? Aston?”
A million questions ran through my head at lightning speed.
Aston had taken Piper for a daddy/daughter date, trying to give her some individual attention despite being pulled in a million different directions. I’d planned to take a hot bath and relax.
Aston wanted to get to know her, look out for his other kids, be kind to Tyler, deal with Cass, exonerate himself, and care for me at the same time. He’d murmured something about me doing some self-care while kissing me, his tongue teasing mine. There were promises about him sneaking into my bed later, with a piece of tiramisu and a crème brûlée, about feeding me and licking whipped cream off of me.
Christ, I need to concentrate on what’s happening.
“Dad’s gone. Aston, I mean. Mom, hurry! The police were here.”
“What?” I shrieked.
Shaking, I put the phone on speaker and shoved my legs into a pair of jeans, forgetting underwear, and tossed on an old bra and a ratty white T-shirt. My flip-flops were on my feet before Piper spoke again.
“He . . . he . . . I mean, we were eating. Aston and me. Everything was great. He’s so nice, the best. Then his dad, Peter, you know who I mean? Aston’s dad came up to our table and stared me down. Marched right over . . .”
“Take a breath, Piper. I’m coming.” Unsure how I could ask her to do something like breathe when I couldn’t, I grabbed my purse.
“He said all these mean things, Peter did. Then I remembered you told me he’s not nice, so I tried to ignore him. But then he said something about Dad—I mean Aston, not Seth, okay? He said Dad better get rid of some evidence he recently found, or—”
“I’m coming, baby,” I told her, turning on the car, grateful that Tyler was at Seth’s place.
“Mom, he said or he would get rid of me. Peter said that. What does that mean? Mom, are you there? He wants to get rid of me. I didn’t do anything. And what does that mean?”
I was speechless. My heart cartwheeled in my chest as my daughter shrieked on the other end of the line.
Thank God I was on autopilot, backing the car out of the carport.
“I’m here. Don’t worry about what that means, honey,” I told her, and then told myself to not worry either. Aston was there . . . he would protect her, right?
He hadn’t stood up to his dad in the past, though.
“Mom, listen. I’m trying to tell you what happened. Dad got so mad, he stood up and punched Peter in the face. Blood sprayed everywhere. I think his nose is broken. Dad’s fine, though, but the restaurant called the police, and they took Dad with them after Peter said he was going to press charges. What does that mean?”
“I’m on my way, sweetie. Sit down and order a Coke. I’ll be right there. Promise.” My voice was steady, but I was anything but calm.
What kind of person told their granddaughter they would get rid of them?
And what would happen to Aston’s witness now that he was in jail? His preliminary hearing was in thirty-six hours.
Just as I was pulling into the shopping center, my phone rang through the Bluetooth.
“Hello?” I said without glancing at Caller ID.
“Bex, it’s me.”
“What the hell, Aston?”
“I’m sorry. Things got carried away. My dad’s a prick, you know.”
“Um, yeah, I can’t talk. I’m parking now at the restaurant to get Piper. She’s scared half to death because your father said he’s going to get rid of her. Do you understand what that does to a young girl?”
“Fuck, Bex, that’s why I’m sitting where I am. I wanted to kill him with my bare hands. It’s because of the witness. He’s trying to quash it.”
“You know what, Aston? I don’t care.”
I’d spent the better part of a week worrying, and then Aston hauled off and acted like a testosterone-filled teen. And how the hell did his father get off talking to my daughter like that? Rationally, I knew Aston couldn’t control Peter, but my mom guard had shot up and wasn’t going down.
“You go deal with your own mess of a life, Aston. And I’ll deal with the monsoon of disappointment that, once again, you left in your wake.”
I disconnected the call and tossed my phone in my purse, determined to rid myself of Aston Prescott for good.
Aston
“Listen to me!” I pounded my fist onto the desk.
“Aston, that’s not helping anything,” Aidan said, grabbing my arm, and I shrugged him off me.
“Look,” I said to Dan, the police officer. “Do you have kids? Because I’m not a violent man.
