I have to make this right, I thought, setting my drink down on the bar as I stood up. I can’t let her think that I ruined everything.
I slipped a fifty-pound note under my glass and headed out the door, pulling my cellphone out of my pocket as I searched for the number of the news station that had covered the scandal when it first made the air. I was going to make things right, even if it ruined my own life in the process. I swore to myself that I wouldn’t be the man that my father and stepmother thought that I was, and I wasn’t about to stand by and let Gwen think that I was that kind of man either.
“Hello,” I said as the phone stopped ringing. “My name is Tristan Wolfe—yes, the very same. I’d like to offer you an exclusive interview about the story you released concerning my stepsister and I. Yes, I can be available as early as tomorrow morning.”
19
Chapter 19
I couldn’t bring myself to go into the office, not with the threat of a crowd of jeering men snapping pictures with their phones crowding around the doors to the building. There had already been vandalism on the front door, a spray painted sign declaring me a slut and a harlot. It was too much for me to handle, too much for anyone to handle. I just wanted to hide somewhere and not come out until the world completely forgot my name or that I’d been stupid enough to fuck my own stepbrother.
Clients had left in droves after the news story broke, even some former clients coming out of the woodwork to claim that I’d slept with them as well! I couldn’t believe the nerve of some people, or the desperate need some have to be in the spotlight. If it were up to me I’d never grace the newscasts ever again. I just wanted to disappear.
Tina had honestly stepped up more than I had ever imagined possible, even giving a statement on my behalf in regard to the scandal, brief as it was and denying any and all claims that I had slept with any of my other clients. I could have kissed that woman if it wouldn’t have turned into another scandal all on its own. With the evidence of my affair with Tristan, it was best to not deny what was already proven, but that hardly meant I had to give them all the details. Thankfully I made sure that I had minimal contact with the press—or my mother for that matter.
For the last few days my mother had tried to call me, trying my number again and again to mock me or try to tell me just how disappointed she was to have a slut for a daughter. Her last message had been particularly venomous, especially the parts where she declared that she wouldn’t even bother to disown me, since my own inheritance was already set to be given to my soon-to-be baby brother. I didn’t care. I didn’t care about any of it. All I wanted was to be left alone by the rest of the world to try and salvage what was left of the life I had built.
All that I had left was my business, and I was determined to take whatever was left after this disaster and build it back, better than ever. I could only hope that I at least had some of my clients left.
“With us this morning we have Tristan Wolfe, son of Lord Wolfe who recently made headlines after it was discovered that he had been having a rather sordid affair with his own sister,” came a voice from my TV. I’d almost forgotten that I’d had the damned thing on, and it was only Tristan’s name that had brought my attention back to it.
For a moment I froze, time seeming to slow around me as I turned my head to gaze in shock at the television screen.
What is hell is he doing? I thought, turning my attention back toward the screen.
“Good morning,” Tristan said, dressed in a sharp looking blazer, with a conflicted look on his gorgeous face.
He ruined everything for you, I reminded myself, but the fluttering in my heart was a hard feeling to ignore. I wanted so badly to simply hate him with every fiber of my being.
“Mr. Wolfe,” the interviewer began, “tell us how all of this began.”
“Well,” he said, “it started when we were in our teens actually, though as it was this time, the flirtation was mostly one-sided.”
“Your stepsister did not return your advances?” the woman asked.
“Not at all,” he said. “She refused me several times up until the point when I left to begin my first tour of duty.”
“You might consider this unrequited love then?”
“Perhaps on my end,” Tristan said. “I am sad to say that I employed a great deal of manipulation on my part in order to get my stepsister into the position we were caught in. A lot of promises I had little intention of keeping”
“Is there something that you’d like to say to your sister if she’s watching this?” the woman asked.