The Rebound Guy (26 page)

But realizing that he didn’t have much choice, Dex stripped out of his clothes and jumped into the shower. They still had two hours before the wedding ceremony started. With any luck, he could grab a minute with Asia so he could tell her what he needed to tell her.

That he wasn’t letting her go. Ever.

Chapter Seventeen

Asia grinned as Lizzie’s mother fussed over the dress her daughter had chosen, which was apparently nothing like the picture Lizzie had emailed her.

“Exactly what did the dress you emailed look like?” Asia asked once Lizzie’s mother had left to fuss over flower arrangements.

“Something from
Modern Bride
circa 1985,” Lizzie said. “It was easier to lie and deal with her ranting for twenty minutes than to send a picture of the actual dress. We would have fought over it for months. There’s not much she can do now except demand I get married in a bathrobe, and I have to believe my choice is better than a bathrobe.” Lizzie held her arms out and took a slow twirl.

The form-fitting gown was stunning, with a V-neckline that came nearly to her navel in the front and had a similar cut in the back that exposed a healthy portion of skin. The slit up her right thigh was trimmed subtly in pink and yellow stones that reflected off of the overhead lighting. Not every bride could make such a gown look elegant, but Lizzie pulled it off.

“I’ll admit my choice is quite risqué,” Lizzie said. “I knew it would get a rise out of Mom.”

“Is that the reason you chose it?” Asia asked with a knowing smile.

Lizzie’s grin was all the answer Asia needed. “Just think. You probably saved my mother from having a heart attack three years ago. If that thing with Charles had ever come to light, she would have died of embarrassment over her wild daughter’s indiscretion.”

Asia barked out a laugh. It was likely true. Due to her skills as a crisis manager, the affair Lizzie had engaged in with the married CEO of the national bank where she’d worked had been kept out of the public eye. Asia doubted they would be here today celebrating Lizzie’s wedding if the media had ever gotten wind of it.

“You know I’ll never be able to thank you enough for what you did, don’t you?” Lizzie said, her voice taking on a serious note.

Asia answered with a light shrug. “I was just doing my job.”

“Asia, you never just do your job.” Lizzie captured her jaw in her palm. “You always go above and beyond anything that could ever be expected from one person. I hope you realize just how much you do for people.”

“Thank you,” Asia said, putting her hand over her friend’s.

“Okay, enough sappy stuff. It’s time for this wild child to get hitched,” Lizzie said.

Asia laughed. “Let’s get to it.”

As the wedding party started lining up, Asia left the dressing room through a door that led to the side lawn where the ceremony was taking place. The brilliant display of flowers provided the most breathtaking scenery.

White, slat-back wooden chairs were positioned in equal rows on either side of an aisle littered with yellow and pink rose petals. The officiant stood at the head of the aisle, under the arched entrance to a gazebo covered in fragrant blooming clematis vines.

Asia spotted Dexter sitting in the second-to-last row on the bride’s side. She slid into the chair next to him.

“Where have you been?” he asked.

She looked over at him, her forehead creasing at the desperate tone in his voice. “I told you. I was helping Lizzie get dressed.”

“I need to talk to you,” he said, grabbing her hand and rising from his chair.

Asia pulled her hand away. “The ceremony has already started,” she whispered.

He jerked his head toward the aisle. “They’re just walking the parents of the bride and groom up right now.” He tugged again.

“Dexter, stop it,” Asia said between clenched teeth. “Whatever you have to say can wait until after the ceremony.”

The look in his eyes said very clearly that it couldn’t. Her heartbeat stuttered a step. She had no idea what could have him so anxious, and she wasn’t so sure she wanted to find out.

With a low curse, Dexter relented, releasing her hand and turning his attention to the aisle, where Cortland and the maid of honor, Lizzie’s younger sister, were walking up the aisle. When Lizzie appeared, the guests stood. Murmurs of approval and a catcall from Lizzie’s brother sounded around the gardens. Emotion lodged in Asia’s throat as she watched her friend walk up the aisle to a waiting Rodney, who looked as if he was going to burst into tears at any moment.

The ceremony was short but lovely, and after it ended, the guests were guided to the south gardens, where hors d’oeuvres and cocktails were to be served, while the wedding party remained to take pictures in the gazebo.

“Can we talk now?” Dexter asked, taking her arm again.

“Dexter, can’t this wait?”

“No.”

“Well, it will have to,” Asia insisted. She didn’t want to think about whatever it was he had to tell her.

Instead of focusing on her friend’s wedding, she’d spent the ceremony contemplating the urgent matter that had him so on edge. Had something come up that required him to return to New York tonight, and he wanted to demand the rest of his money before leaving? She wasn’t ready to hear that kind of news.

After the conversation she’d had with her mother, she’d thought about what she really wanted. It was the man standing alongside her. But Asia knew she could never have him; she couldn’t stomach the thought of sharing him with other women, even if those women were just “clients.”

She had decided that she would enjoy the time she had left with him, before her carriage turned back into a pumpkin tomorrow.

“Asia, please, just give me ten minutes,” Dexter said.

Asia’s hands clenched into fists. He was ruining the few hours she had left to indulge in her fantasy.

She turned to him. “Look, Dexter. Whatever it is that you have to say can wait until after the reception. I want to enjoy my friend’s happiness. Please, just let me do that first.”

He looked down at her, his jaw twitching. “Fine,” he said. “But I’m holding you to it. No avoiding me, Asia.”

“I won’t,” she said. “I promise.”

The reception flew by much too quickly, but Asia managed to enjoy herself. She danced more than she had in the past five years combined, going from Dexter’s arms, to Lizzie’s brother Chad’s, to Rodney’s.

Someone tapped her on the shoulder. Cortland stood a foot away. He held his arms up in invitation. “One dance?”

He knew she couldn’t say no, not with what felt like the eyes of the entire slew of wedding guests on them.

Backed into a corner, Asia stepped into his embrace and said, “You’re such an asshole.”

“That’s your opinion,” he replied. Asia nearly stepped away from him, not giving a damn whether she caused a scene or not. But Cortland tightened his hold on her. “Fine, I’m an asshole,” he said. He shook his head. “I’m sorry. Okay?”

She rolled her eyes. “I’m not giving you the ring, Cortland.”

“This is a real apology, not one just so I can get a ring out of you.”

“Why the change of heart?” she asked. “Just a few weeks ago, you said I was cold, and heartless, and incapable of ever finding someone to love me.”

“Admit it, Asia, you can be cold at times.”

“I don’t need this.” She tried to step away again.

“Okay, okay,” he said. “I’m trying to justify what I did.”

“There is no way to justify it, Cortland. If you were unhappy, you should have told me. We could have parted ways and that would have been the end of it. Instead, you were screwing around behind my back. And what you told me outside of Rodney’s place?” Asia cursed her voice for cracking.

“I said that to hurt you,” he admitted. He let out a sigh as he stared toward the lake.

Coward couldn’t bring himself to look her in the eyes.

“I was tired of always coming in second,” he continued. “How do you think it made me feel to have you always skipping out to go and take care of someone else, Asia? I wanted you to feel some of the pain I felt.” He glanced at her. “I’m sorry.”

Asia wasn’t sure whether she believed him, but then again, it didn’t matter. Cortland was officially a part of her past, some guy she’d dated for a time who no longer had any bearing on her life.

But, still, she needed to know...

“Was it always bad?” she asked him.

He pulled in a deep breath. “Not always,” he said. “But I started to feel as if you had less and less time for me. After a while, I decided our relationship wasn’t worth it.”

His eyes connected with hers again, and for a moment, Asia thought she spotted a hint of sincerity.

“I’m telling you because I don’t want anyone else hurting you,” he said. “You need to learn how to separate the job from the rest of your life, Asia. Learn how to start living your life, for you, not for GPPR, or your sister, or that guy you’re dating,” he said, gesturing in the direction she’d last seen Dexter.

“Thank you. That’s very thoughtful of you, Cortland,” she said. “I won’t wish you and Nina a lifetime of happiness, because I’m not that evolved as a person just yet. However, I will stop wishing that you both come down with a fatal case of dysentery,” she said. “It doesn’t have to be fatal.”

Cortland chuckled. Asia didn’t join in. She wasn’t that evolved either.

But she refused to spend any more of her energy on him or thinking about what other people thought about the demise of her and Cortland’s engagement. Relationships ended every day. She’d managed to come out of this one unscathed, for the most part. Actually, she’d come out of it with more than she’d gone in.

Her eyes were open now. Incredibly, indisputably wide open.

She didn’t need Cortland to tell her what she needed to do to be happy. She’d already figured it out for herself—with the help of her mother’s imparted wisdom, of course. And with the help of the man she’d hired several weeks ago, who had turned out to be so much more than just a mechanism for revenge.

Asia glanced around the grounds, looking for him.

“Are you finally ready to hear what I have to say?”

She turned with a start. She hadn’t had a clue that Dexter had snuck up behind her. He stood with his hands clasped in front of him, looking in his dark-blue suit like every fantasy she’d ever held of her dream man.

But it was time for her to face reality.

Asia pulled in a deep breath and nodded.

***

Standing in the flower-covered gazebo, Asia held her breath as Dexter took her hands inside his.

“I’m in love with you,” he said.

The breath she was holding rushed out. “What?”

“I knew it was happening, and I tried to fight it, but I’m not fighting anymore, Asia.”

She opened her mouth, but nothing came out. She tried again.

“How?” she finally asked. “Dexter, what do you...How am I—?

“I
love
you,” he cut her off. “That’s all that matters.”

She shook her head. “I can’t do this.” She looked up, galled at him for taunting her with a prize he knew he couldn’t fully provide. “How can you tell me you love me, knowing that you plan to spend the foreseeable future dating other women?”

“Because I won’t be dating other women. Hear me out,” he said, when she opened her mouth to protest. “Remember how I told you that the idea for my relationship-consulting business grew out of what my sister went through after her divorce, and how I wanted to help women based on the experience she went through?”

“I thought it was the breakup with your ex that prompted you to start your business, because you wanted to save other guys from being the rebound guy?”

“That was a part of it, but my true vision for Forward Momentum is to help women recover and move forward after ending a long-term relationship. I realized that I’ve been focusing all of my energy on just one aspect of what a woman needs to really get back on her feet.” He held his hands up. “Don’t get me wrong, I still think having someone to provide emotional support after the initial breakup is important, but making sure a woman is financially stable is just as important, if not more. That’s something that I can help with, Asia.”

She looked up at him, her eyes widening with understanding.

“You said it yourself when we were discussing my business model,” Dexter continued. “You talked about how much worse things would have been for you if you had had to rely on Cortland to take care of you financially. My sister was in the same bind.”

“What happened to her?” Asia asked.

He blew out a deep breath. “I wasn’t going to tell you this, but one of the main reasons I took you on as a client is because my sister was losing her house after her ex-husband missed months of mortgage payments. She’s been divorced for two years and was still at his mercy.”

Asia’s heart squeezed in sympathy. “She’s not alone. My mother found herself in the same situation.”

“It happens to women all the time. But it doesn’t have to,” he said. “I can help women get their financial houses in order. Financial planning is what I do. It’s what I’m good at.”

Asia pulled her bottom lip between her teeth, afraid to hope, just in case she was setting herself up for further disappointment. “What about those other services you provide?” she asked.

“I don’t plan on abandoning all the other aspects of the business. I think it’s all still relevant. But it will be more in theory than practice,” he said. “If a woman wants advice on how best to work through that rough period after her breakup, I can share what I’ve gain from experience. I think just being aware of the situation is half the battle.”

“Does ‘more in theory than in practice’ mean that you don’t plan to sleep with any more of your clients?”

Dexter just stared at her for a moment before letting out a sharp crack of laughter.

“No. Asia, what do you think I’ve been trying to tell you?” He stepped in close, until mere inches separated them. He brought his hands up to her cheeks, cradling her face in his palms. “You’re it for me. The Rebound Guy is officially off the market for all other women. There’s only one woman whom I want. I just need to know whether she wants me, too.”