“Who would cheat on Carolyn Banks?”
“Exactly.”
There’s another silence, and the ice around my heart starts to chip and break. Maybe it was a kindness originally, but it must have gone wrong.
Can I blame her for that?
Can I forgive her?
“You sure it’s over?” Eli is poised with another bite of steak.
I look him right in the eye. “No.”
Chapter Forty-Three
Carolyn
Jess’s words ring in my ears on the way back to my apartment, and it’s not until I’m in the quiet that I can even begin to sort them out.
“There’s only one way to find out.”
She’s absolutely right.
The only way I’m going to know if Ace can put this behind him is to ask him. Basically, I’m going to have to grovel on my hands and knees and beg him to forgive me.
I can’t stop from rolling my eyes, even while my heart turns over. Maybe not quite on my hands and knees.
I still feel shell-shocked, and even after eating the breakfast sandwiches, I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that my face is still monstrously pale.
But I know what I have to do.
Before I can approach Ace, I have to make sure that the rumors are out of my life forever. Otherwise, this scenario is bound to repeat itself until the end of eternity, and then what? I’ll be fabulously wealthy, but alone.
I’m going to have to call the tech team. They’re the ones who are going to be able to shut down the site, to wipe out its memory, to make sure the name is locked down forever so that nobody can resurrect it.
First, though, I need to sit down and watch a shitty rom-com on Netflix. After that gut-wrenching conversation with Jess, it’s all my mind can handle.
I spend Thursday parked on the couch with my laptop, sorting through all the things I’ll need to do before I can erase Rainflower Blue from the Internet. Ace is on my mind with every single breath, and it doesn’t help that all the most popular threads have to do with him. And me. And the so-called murder that he never committed.
I finally work up the courage to look through the packet from Aida.
My heart aches when I read it.
It’s information regarding Elisa’s death. No sign of foul play whatsoever, just a painful end brought on by cancer. Aida has included several items, including a police report that seems to have been filed by Elisa’s father, which accuses Ace of abusing her. The evidence, Aida says in a note, is completely falsified.
He’s an innocent man, and every second that the website is live, people who probably claim to be his friends are tearing him to pieces, speculating on when he’ll be arrested and tried in the United States’ courts.
I set up a meeting with the tech team, followed by one with my financial manager, for Friday morning, when I can be sure that I’ll have their undivided attention.
I’ve owned the site long enough to know that there are things I can do from my own computer to shut it down, but not as completely as I might like…and though I spend several hours with my mouse hovered over the button to discontinue database operations, I can’t bring myself to click it.
I’m so fucking torn.
I can’t take it anymore and flip the laptop’s cover closed, then snatch my phone from the couch beside me, my heart in my throat.
I wait for it to calm down before I tap out a text to Jess.
I thought about what you said.
Yeah? :)
I’m going to shut down the site
That’s probably for the best
Yeah. But I just can’t do it
Why not?
Shouldn’t I prove his innocence first?
There’s a long pause.
Care! Don’t be insane. Nothing you post on that site is going to prove anything to those people. It’s way past that point. All you’re going to do is put personal information they don’t need in front of their ravenous faces. Trust me. Just let it go
My face goes pink.
I’ve really helped other people before, though
I’m sure you have. But I don’t think this is that kind of scenario. Let me guess—you told people if their husbands were visiting hotels without them?
Yeah, that kind of thing
I know your heart is in the right place, Care, but Ace doesn’t need you to protect him from rumors. They’ll fade away on their own.
Another pause, another text.
I really feel like you should focus on proving to him that what you want is him, not to profit from the fact that he’s a person of interest in New York’s hottest scandal. Of course we both know this isn’t a real scandal….
You’re right.
She’s absolutely right, and I’ve been an idiot.
Ace Kingsley is the kind of man who can fend for himself. That’s one of the things I like best about him—that he does what he needs to do for himself.