Undying Love (13 page)

FOURTEEN

I
 tossed and turned all night. Allee never called me nor did she come home. Unable to sleep, I tried calling her several times on her cell phone, but it went straight to her voice mail. I was so pissed I almost tossed my phone across the room.

I finally drifted off, only to be awoken by the sound of my intercom buzzer. Who the hell could it be at eight o’clock in the morning? I knew it couldn’t be Allee, as she had a key to my loft. Groggy, I staggered out of bed and checked my surveillance camera. My half-shut eyes grew wide. It was Charlotte. What the hell was she doing here? I hadn’t seen or heard from her for over three months. And this early hour was a far cry from her usual ten o’clock wake-up time. Seriously, she was the last person I wanted to see, now or ever. With the exception of my father.

I buzzed her in. She sprightly bounced out of the elevator, wearing one of her Chanel suits and carrying a chic, colorful plastic folder under her arm.

“Hi,” she said seductively.

“What’s up, Charlotte?” My tone was terse.

“I thought you’d like to see these.” She handed me the folder. “Open it.”

Her green eyes stayed glued on me as I unwound the string that fastened the folder. A proud smirk spread across her lips.

“Your new girlfriend is a very hard worker.” Her voice was dripping with sarcasm.

I removed the contents and froze in shock when my eyes met the first photo. It was a shot of well-dressed man in his sixties kissing a beautiful, sexy young woman—Allee! The imprinted date on the picture indicated that it had been taken earlier in the week. The night Allee had to accommodate one of her massage clients. Nausea rose to my chest. I wanted to throw up.

“Have a look-see at the rest of them at your leisure.”

“Get the fuck out of here, Charlotte.”

“Whatever. I’m off to the D&D building to meet a new client.” She flashed a smug, toothy smile. “Feel free to call me when you’re done.”

She breezed over to the elevator and let herself out. I was shitting in my pants.

My hands trembling, I flipped through the stack of photos. Obviously, my ex had hired a private investigator to follow and spy on Allee. Each photo was more shocking than the one before. Here were shots of Allee kissing, undressing, teasing, and, damn it, fucking well- dressed—and undressed—older men in all kinds of positions. Her wardrobe ranged from tight short, low-cut dresses and stilettos to lacy black pushup bras and skimpy black panties with garters to absolutely nothing. She had on lots of makeup and wore her hair loose. With each photo, I grew sicker and sicker. So, this was Allee’s real second job. God fucking damn it. She was a high-priced hooker.

I finally got to the last photo. I recognized the dress immediately. It was identical to that tight blue dress I’d seen on the woman leaving the Four Seasons bar the night I’d had drinks with my father. It
had
been Allee! Quivering, I studied the photo. Allee’s back, draped with her long, dark hair, was to me, her body ensnarled in the arms of a man whose face I couldn’t see because he was obviously kissing her. There was something familiar about his suit. I examined the photo more closely, zeroing in on the monogrammed gold and diamond cufflinks he was wearing. The initials inscribed in them brought a rush of bile to my mouth. R.M. It was my father.

Okay. I’ll admit it. I puked my guts out. Nothing had prepared me for the shock of this discovery. Did Charlotte recognize my father? I didn’t think so because she would have rubbed it in my face.

After cleaning up the mess I made in the living room, I took a long, hot shower. I was still sick to my stomach. It was hopeless. No amount of water could flush the photos out of my head or wash away my disgust and hurt. Fighting another bout of nausea, I slid down the travertine wall and let the steaming water pound onto my bowed head. I didn’t know if I still loved Allee or despised her. Only one thing was for sure: I loathed my father.

My father’s office building was located on the northeast corner of Park Avenue and Fifty-Eighth Street. I took the elevator to his thirty-fifth floor penthouse suite, my eyes focused on the panel of lit-up floor buttons. The passengers, who surrounded me, were a blur.

The elevator doors parted, and I stomped straight past the receptionist to my father’s corner office. His attractive, blond secretary gazed up at me. “Ryan, do you have an appointment with Mr. Madewell?”

My eyes burned into hers. “Hazel, I don’t need a fucking appointment. I’m his son.” I marched straight into his office.

His office was enormous and furnished with the finest antiques money could buy. Floor-to-ceiling windows overlooked the city. One wall consisted solely of a bank of flat screen monitors that were streaming news channels from around the world. He was seated behind his imposing desk, on speakerphone.

“Father, get off the phone.” My voice was authoritative. It was the first time in my life I had ever told my father to do anything. To my surprise, he ended the call.

“What is it, son? Is there something urgent I should know about
Arts & Smarts?”
His voice was business-like and calm.

“No. It’s something you should know about
you
.” I handed him the folder that was tucked under my arm. “Open it.”

Fumbling, my father unwound the cord and pulled out the contents. His eyes grew wide and his hands shook. When he got to the last photo, his mouth dropped wide open with shock. He threw the contents onto his massive desk. All color drained from his face.

“Listen to me, Ryan. She’s nothing to me. I only fucked her twice.”

Twice? Once was too much. Rage was rushing through my bloodstream.

“And Father, was she as good for you as she is for me?”

My father lowered his head and didn’t answer. “Please don’t tell your mother.”

Is that all he had to say? Didn’t he care one bit about the fact that I was—or had been—in love with this woman? That she was
everything
to me?

With shaking hands, my father assembled the photos and put them back in the folder.

“Take them and get out of here.” He rose and shoved the folder back into my hand.

“Don’t you want to keep them, Father? You can publish them in one of your tabloids. I’m sure they’ll sell lots of copies and drive up the price of Madewell stock.”

His eyes clashed with mine.

“There’s something else I want to leave you with, Father.”

With one seamless move, I did something I’d always wanted to do. I lifted my right hand, clenched my fist, and punched my father in the face. I hit him so hard, my knuckles stung.

My father, stunned, put his hand to the large red welt I had left on his cheek and rubbed it. Blood flowed from his nose. He couldn’t get his mouth to close or spew a single a word.

“Bastard!” Without looking back, I stormed out of his office.

Instead of my father disowning me, I disowned him.

My next stop: The Met. I had to confront Allee. Marcus expertly wove in and out of the mid-day traffic, making excellent time uptown. I glanced down at the folder on my lap. My stomach clenched. My emotions teetered between extreme rage and extreme dread, though they were tipping on the side of dread. I had no idea of how I was going to feel when I saw Allee. Or what I was going to say. For a writer, my command of words often failed me.

The museum was bustling with visitors and tourists. I spotted the beautiful, blond, long-legged tour guide I had encountered when I first met Allee. I had learned from Allee that her name was Samantha, Sam for short, and that she had become Allee’s best friend at the museum.

“Do you know where I can find Allee?” I asked her.

She gazed at me flirtatiously. She definitely was a looker, but I didn’t have time for small talk. My nerves were like little electrical impulses, ready to explode.

“She’s conducting a VIP visitors’ tour of the Impressionist collection,” she replied.

“What floor is that?”

“Second.”

I dashed off without thanking her.

“Observe the way the colors dance in the light and…” Standing before a large painting of a Degas ballerina, a weary-looking Allee was giving a guided tour to a small group of well-dressed Japanese tourists. When she spotted me, she stopped in mid-sentence. Her jaw stayed open wide.

I grabbed her by the elbow and jerked her away. Stunned expressions washed over the faces of the tourists.

“What the fuck are you doing, Madewell?” The Asian tourists oohed at the word “fuck.”

“We need to talk.” Clutching the folder with the photos, I dragged her over to a nearby observation bench. I shoved her down onto it. She defiantly stood up, only for me to shove her down again and hold her there forcefully with my free hand.

“Didn’t you get my text? I don’t want to see you anymore.” She tried to squirm away from me, but it was futile.

“Madewell, let go of me. You’re gonna make me lose my job.”

“Then, we’ll be even.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“This.” I flung the folder onto her lap. “Open it.”

Slowly, she undid the fastener and removed the contents. She gasped and her face turned white as a ghost. Her hands trembling, she leafed through the photos. When she got to the last one of my father all over her, her body shook.

“Oh. My. God.”

“When were you going to tell me?” Fury fueled my words.

She bit down on her quivering lip. “Oh, Madewell, I’m so sorry. So, so sorry.” Under her spectacles, tears leaked out of her eyes. Normally, I would have lifted her eyeglasses onto her head and wiped them away, but today I didn’t.

“I didn’t know he was your father. You have to believe me.”

“It doesn’t fucking matter.” My voice was harsh. “Just tell me—why?”

“I tried to warn you,” she sniffled. “I needed the money.”

Rage was consuming me. Eating me alive. “Bullshit!”

She gazed up at me with her watering eyes. “I’ve tried to get out of the life, but it’s not easy with Sid.”

“Well, it won’t be hard to get out of mine.” I barked the words.

Her tears amplified until she was audibly crying. “I already am,” she sobbed. “We should never see each other again.”

I loosened my grip around her heaving shoulder. She remained seated, her now uncontrollable sobs holding her prisoner. Her tears fell, drop after drop, onto the photo with my father. The tear-stained photo made me feel worse than I already felt. I didn’t want her to shed tears over my father in any way. I snatched the photo away from her and ripped it to pieces while she tearfully watched. I gazed down at the ragged shards on the floor. The photo was as torn apart as our lives.

Allee’s flooding eyes stayed locked on me, and as much as I hated her at this moment, her beauty still touched me in a profound, bitter way. I needed to leave. Get away from her. As I pivoted on my heel, she choked, “Golden Boy, I wish we’d never met.”

Her words burned through me like acid. She knew from the beginning our relationship was doomed. It just took my father to put it over the edge. The pain was too much. I wanted to rip out my heart and throw it at her.