Chapter Eight
Ashlyn
“So, I fed you.”
He kinda had. Flat-out ignoring her protests that she could pay for her own damn dinner, Mason had pushed aside her money and paid the delivery guy. The poor kid looked like he didn’t know what to do and hightailed it back to the red four-door parked in her drive with the big ‘China WOW’ sign stuck to the side.
“Are you ready to explain why it is you think you need to withdraw your testimony?”
The word ‘no’ came to mind. Ashlyn sighed. Settled on the couch with his feet kicked up on the coffee table beside an empty take out container, Mason didn’t look like he was in a hurry to go much of anywhere. Waiting him out could take all night and they both knew she didn’t possess that kind of patience.
“Do you know who my mother is?” Ashlyn dunked a piece of deep fried pork in the small, plastic container of sweet and sour sauce and popped it in her mouth.
“Your mom?” Mason abandoned his half-eaten egg roll, prepared to give her his undivided attention, and shook his head. “Should I?”
She took a deep breath. It wasn’t the type of information she went around handing out freely, but she’d known Mason long enough to know he wouldn’t treat her differently because of it.
“Meredith Mills.” When he continued to stare at her as though that meant nothing to him, she blew out a frustrated breath. “Jeez, take a history class, Mas. Senator Meredith Mills?”
“Your mom’s a senator? Like a U.S. senator?”
A sarcastic reply pressed hard against her teeth, but she bit it back.
“Wait.” Disbelief gave way to confusion. “Your mom’s a senator . . . and you work at Bart’s?”
“Yeah, well, she’s not particularly thrilled about it either. Like you’re one to talk, though.” She didn’t know much about Mason’s family, but she knew they had money. Lots of it. Yet he’d worked at Bart’s with her for over a year before moving on to bigger and better things . . . at the freaking Pizza Palace of all places.
“Touché.” Mason ducked his head in acknowledgment. “But what does that have to do with the trial?”
“I . . .” Ashlyn sighed. “Everything I do reflects on my mother. It affects her career.”
“And what? Helping to put away a scumbag is a bad reflection?” Mason sounded incredulous.
“Being associated with a scumbag in any way is a bad reflection.”
“That’s stupid.”
“That’s politics. The how and why don’t matter. Only the who, where, when, and what. That’s what makes the headlines. It’s all anyone sees. All anyone cares about.”
“Who’s ‘anyone’?” She had to give Mason credit. At least he was making an effort to understand where she was coming from.
Dragging the throw blanket from the back of the couch, Ashlyn teased the frayed edges to give her fingers something to do. “Her campaign manager. The press. The voters. Anyone who matters.”
A long moment passed in silence. She could feel Mason watching her. The maroon fabric flipped back-and-forth, back-and-forth.
“You weren’t on that list.”
He spoke so low, Ash wasn’t sure what she’d heard. “What?”
“The ‘anyone who matters’ list; you weren’t on it.”
“Yeah, well . . .” Now he was getting the picture. “I don’t get a choice.”
“You do get a choice. Of course you get a choice. You’re a twenty . . .”
Ashlyn let him squirm at the end of his self-inserted hook for several painful moments before filling in his precarious blank. “One. I’m twenty-one.”
“Right. You’re a twenty-one-year-old woman. What you do is no one’s choice but yours.”
Technically speaking, but he didn’t understand. Making choices required good judgement, and the last time she’d trusted her own judgement . . . she’d proved it wasn’t something worth trusting.
“Ash . . . if you want to drop out of the trial—”
“I have to—” A warm, calloused finger pressed against her lips was an effective silencer.
“Not have to. I’m asking if you want to withdraw. If you’re scared, if you can’t go through with this . . . it’s okay. Em and Jay will understand. No one’s going to hold that against you.”
Fantastic, now he thought she was a coward. That bothered her more than it should have. “No. I don’t . . . I’m not . . .”
Em and Jay. Two people she cared about very much. Two people she loved. Considered family. If Jay’s father was released . . . if something happened to either one of them . . . when she’d had the power to help prevent it . . . Was that something she could live with? There was a question that was easy to answer.
“No.” Inhale. Exhale. Sometimes this close to him it became too easy to forget that breathing was a necessity. “I don’t want to withdraw.”
“Then, don’t.”
Defy a direct order from her mother. Ashlyn’s stomach took a sudden drop. What if she was wrong? What if the threats weren’t idle? What if something happened to her? To Mason? What if she tanked her mother’s career and—
“If it helps . . .” A smile tugged at the corners of Mason’s lips. “I think you made the right decision.”
It helped. It helped a lot. Ashlyn ducked her head to avoid giving him the satisfaction of knowing just how much it helped.
“What are you gonna tell your mother?”
Wasn’t that the million dollar question. “Nothing. For now.”
She hadn’t outright agreed to her mother’s demands. As with most things, the senator had simply assumed they’d be obeyed. Ashlyn had every intention of allowing her to go on assuming for as long as possible. She’d deal with the fall-out of that shit when it hit the fan.
“But if I’m doing this . . .” A lightbulb lit, illuminating sheer brilliance. “. . . you’re doing it with me.”
“What do you mean?” The wariness in Mason’s tone brought a smile to her face. Payback was a bitch.
“There’s a gala coming up in my mother’s honor. I’m expected to be there. And my ticket just so happens to include a plus one.”