“Jasper happened, I suppose.”
“Why the hell didn’t you break it off sooner. Why go along with it from the beginning?”
She shrugged. “I agreed to the arrangement years ago when I had nothing and no one in my life. I didn’t understand the concept of love; I was only concerned with power, wealth, and social standing, and making Daddy happy.
My father was an important man. He was a senator for the government before he left the Senate to become the mayor of Newport. It was expected that I should marry well. My parents drove that message into me from a young age. I had to do my bit for future generations. The expectation to create a society union that would pave the way for the continued success of the Summer’s family was paramount.
I grew up forever attempting to make my father proud, something I felt I never managed to do. When I agreed to Theo Remmington's business proposal, Daddy looked at me like I had finally done something right for change.
It was hard growing up in a household where everything and everyone was supposed to be perfect. I guess I just accepted my fate. Apart from my parents, I’d never cared for anyone more than myself before. Being an only child, you had no one else to compete with. Sharing a future with Jasper made sense to me. I would be secure and safe. I wasn’t like most girls my age; I never dressed up in my mother’s clothes and pretended to be a bride, or played with dolls, dreaming of being a mom one day. I didn’t believe in fairy-tale romances. Those were things that I never really wanted.
And then I met a boy, one who frustrated the hell out of me. I couldn’t bend him to my will. He told me no and gave me shit when I was out of order. I’d never had that level of attention before. I liked it and hated it at the same time.”
Listening to Storm rationalizing a future that had been planned for her started to untangle that knot in my stomach. I knew from Phoenix that her wedding to Jasper had been arranged, but hearing her talk about it made me feel another wave of relief. Yes, I was from the wrong side of the tracks, but I knew arranged marriages were popular for social standing and financial gain.
“I wanted to call things off with Jasper years ago, but I was put in an awkward position.”
“In what way?”
I watched the smooth line of her throat as she swallowed, a shudder running through her, like she was terrified to admit the truth. “Tell me, Storm. What did that fucker threaten you with?”
She closed her eyes and rested her head on the shelter wall behind her.
“I know he was gay.”
Storm lifted her head and looked at me. “How?”
“The envelope I spoke about. It contained pictures of Jasper with other men.”
Her mouth dropped open.
“I had him investigated.”
“And you threatened to expose him today?”
I was determined not to allow her to shut down and push me away again because of that prick. “Yes. So, you have nothing to fear. Whatever shit he held over your head, he is powerless now. He can’t threaten you anymore. What I have over him is just as powerful.”
“It wasn’t me he was threatening.” Even before those words left her mouth, I knew I had known that for some time: even before he’d hired those thugs to fuck me up.
I listened as Storm told me that Jasper Deam Remmington the Third had threatened to take my NFL career from me even before it had begun. The fury that bubbled in my stomach was raw and real.
The fact that Storm had sacrificed her happiness for me almost made my head spin.
“And that night, the day I left and came here. I messaged you asking you to meet me. You did come, didn’t you?”
“How did you know?”
Leaning forward, I placed a finger in the neckline of her dress and pulled it down, revealing that thin, messy scar.
“Phoenix told me,” I raised my hand, automatically making a fist.
Storm continued to talk about everything Jasper had said and the way she had been treated. Thankfully, he had never laid a finger on her, in anger or passion. If he had, I wouldn’t stop until the fucker was ten feet under.
As we spoke, the years continued to melt away. Storm and I discussed our journeys—the joys, the mistakes, and the silent wishes that we had never voiced before.
As we sat putting our world to rights, Storm dropped her head onto my shoulder.
We both observed at the graffiti-lined walls and that space where I had etched a heart with my penknife when we were both eighteen-year-olds, with way too many raging hormones and bad decisions.
