“Don’t you think you’ve done enough?”
I didn’t know what he was talking about.
“I shouldn’t have come up here. We shouldn’t be together.”
“What?!”
“People like you and me don’t mix. I knew that. But I ignored it and look what happened. It’s my own fault. You’re trash. Nothing but trash!”
He turned around and walked out of my life.
I felt tears jump into my eyes as I remember how I’d felt when he said that. This was what Matthew thought about me. I looked at our apartment now, my home for the past twenty-three years. It was small and messy, but cozy. It was no mansion, not filled with expensive antiques and ornaments centuries years old. There was a throw over the couch that my mother had crocheted, to hide cigarette burns and chocolate stains. Our floors were wooden, varnished, but there were cracks in them and in places, some of the boards had come loose and we’d learnt to walk around them.
I watched my mother put the dishes in the sink. We were many things, colorful and loud, and we made mistakes. But we were not trash. We were no better or worse than the Waterstones, who might have had more money and opportunity but who didn’t know how to treat others or how to love. Not properly, not like we did.
In my books, this meant way more. It was more valuable too and you couldn’t put a price on it, either.
I went over to hug my mom.
“Call Vic,” I said, and felt her arms tight around me in response.
I kissed her cheek. No more thinking about Matthew. Or Dax for that matter.
I was finished with men for a while.
“I’m going to go shopping,” I announced.
“I think I need some boots.” “A girl can never have enough boots,” my mother grinned at me.
I would not let a man get me down, ever again.
Chapter 12
Matthew
I met Jared McPherson at his house in Malibu. I wasn’t pleased about the location for our meeting. It had been set up for his office in the city, but shortly after my plane landed, I got the text to meet him at his house instead. It was an extra drive out to the coast, and I didn’t like the change of plans.
“Matthew!” Jared came out to meet me in the driveway of his villa, dressed in shorts and a t-shirt. He looked like he was on vacation instead of having a normal day at the office.
I got out of the car, feeling overdressed in my suit.
“I hope you don’t mind meeting here?” he said, with a twinkle in his blue eyes. His face was tanned, and his blonde hair was cropped short. His smile was movie star white. “The weather was simply too awesome for us to be locked away in an office, don’t you think?” He didn’t wait for my answer but gave me a brotherly slap on the back and led me inside.
The weather was indeed beautiful. The sky was blue and wide open, not a cloud in sight. I thought of the cloudy New York that I had left a few hours ago, already beginning to feel the nip in the air that fall brought. Over here, it was still the middle of summer, it seemed.
Jared led me into his house, and I had to stop to admire the view of the ocean. The house made the most of its breathtaking location with big, glass windows and patio doors opening onto a wide porch overlooking the Pacific Ocean. The décor was minimalistic, with a few items of furniture and bright flashes of color against the walls in the form of abstract art.
Jared had made his fortune in a fitness empire that was comprised of specialist gyms. He’d started out as a personal trainer decades ago and his charm and physical abilities had quickly won him a following. He started his own fitness regime, expanding into a chain of gyms that was now nationwide. Each gym had a café, selling a range of healthy food items, including smoothies and various cookies and snacks. We wanted to buy the protein bars and rebrand them under one of our health ranges. Market research had shown that there was interest in similar products and Egal’s marketing consultants had been working on a strategy of renaming. We had looked at a few products and I’d had talks with various people over the past few weeks. Jared was open to selling the rights to his protein bar at a good price. As it turned out, it was not his core product and he wanted to focus on expanding his gyms and various health programs.
“What do you say we go hit the surf?” Jared asked, handing me a wet suit.
“I… uhm…”
“We can talk while we catch some waves!” Jared said, flashing me another one of his toothy grins.
“I don’t actually surf,” I said, sounding a bit silly, even to myself.
“Of course, you don’t, city boy you!” He winked at me. “The waves are flat today, so let’s just paddle out and get a feel for it.”