Chapter Sixteen
Ethan
I felt uncharacteristically nervous as I entered the ballroom at the hotel. I knew it was because Kayla would be there.
Everything was perfect, from the stylish decorations done in red, blue, and silver chrome, all the way to the rock and roll band playing a blend of modern day songs along with classic hits. The delectable hors d'oeuvres were being served by waitresses in trendy miniskirts and motorcycle jackets. The whole place had the all-American biker vibe I wanted, while maintaining a high level of class and sophistication.
The launch party was being lauded by the press as the social event of the season. Everyone from mega movie stars to musical legends, from rising politicians to heads of corporations wanted to be there. Many of them already owned one of my bikes, and I knew the ones who didn't would buy one after tonight. The launch of the All American would be my most profitable and successful motorcycle yet.
"Mr. Colson!" a reporter for a premier news show called at me from across the barricade security had set up. Her flash of red hair caught my attention, and I worried she might be Angela coming to ruin my evening, but thankfully, she wasn't. So, I graciously strolled up to the reporter, despite the rush of paparazzi camera flashes that temporarily blinded me.
She held her microphone out towards me and asked excitedly, "You've been heralded as a power magnate behind America's most powerful motorcycle. What do you have to say?"
"Well, I have to admit I like the title, but I don't know that I deserve it. I work hard, but so do a lot of people at Speed Motorcycles. I think the true secret to my success lies in them."
"Why did you name the bike the All American?"
"Because it's made by Americans and driven by Americans. They take them out on our highways, country roads, dirt trails, raceways, city streets, and neighborhood roads. They wash them on weekends, take them out with friends, and enjoy riding them to summer barbecues. There is nothing more all-American than that tradition, and I feel like this motorcycle design is a tribute to that."
"And, how did you come up with the company's name, Speed Motorcycles?"
I feigned not being able to hear her and pointed towards the party inside the ballroom. "No more questions for now. I'm afraid I'd better be going."
She lowered her microphone in disappointment, but looked pleased as she turned back towards her cameraman. I'd given her a good sound bite for her show that would no doubt boost their ratings and her career.
There was no way I was giving her anything more than that, especially since it might harm mine.
Turning my back on the frenzied line of paparazzi, I strolled into the party and breathed in heavily, taking in the celebratory atmosphere.
I was wearing a new tux by Dolce and Gabbana and looking damn good. The alcohol from the bar was flowing freely, and everyone was having a good time. I just couldn't see the one person I was looking for.
Slowly, I circulated through the party, shaking hands and chatting with old friends and new, ingratiating myself to the public and smiling for selfies. A lot of my old friends from college were there, and we talked about old times and current successes. Graduating from an Ivy League university, a lot of them had gone on to head Fortune 500 companies, and inviting them to the launch party was a good way to market to potential customers with the kind of funds to sponsor future design research. It was the kind of P.R. bullshit I hated, but an important part of making my company a success. Besides, I needed a way to keep myself occupied until Kayla arrived.
Every time I saw a head of blonde hair, my heart skipped a beat, but when the beauty turned around, I was always disappointed to find it wasn't her. Where was she? What was taking her so long to get there?
Suddenly, a pair of soft, feminine hands covered my eyes from behind and a sexy voice whispered, "Guess who?"
Grinning foolishly, I turned around to face her and cried out in surprise. "Gwyneth, what are you doing here?"
She was the last person I wanted to see. Gwyneth Manzranni was the girl who had broken my heart over two decades ago. We started dating in college and then she brutally betrayed me, leaving me feeling shattered. I guess the fact that I hadn't had a real relationship with a woman since was proof that I never put the pieces of my heart back together again. We saw each other rarely during social events over the past few years, but whenever we did, it brought back all those old ghosts.
She looked just as good now as she did back then, perhaps even better. She wore her blonde hair short now, in a sexy shag that flowed freely around her still un-lined face. Her green eyes were lively and sharp, and her red lips were plump and begging to be kissed. She was dressed in a black cocktail dress that hugged her voluptuous curves in all the right places. The plunging neckline played peek-a-boo with her full breasts, while the short hemline showed off her best feature: her tanned, athletic legs. Just looking at them, I remembered how good it felt when those legs were wrapped around my waist while we were making love under the light of the moon. It stirred feelings in me I wished would die forever, but just kept coming back up every time I saw her.
"Victor invited me. I'm his plus-one," Gwyneth said in answer to my question, and I knew she meant my former college roommate, Vick Plumb.
We'd been frat brothers and then roommates. He’d been there during the tough months after I'd quit Krueger and hadn't yet sold my first bike. He was there for the birth of The Rebel and the struggle it had been to finance it. He'd paid my share of the rent when I wasn't able to, and I tried to make up for it by giving him a free motorcycle every year since as a way of saying thanks. Vick was a good friend, but how he could bring Gwyneth there when he knew how I felt about her was beyond me.
"Well, aren't you going to ask me to dance?" she asked, batting her lashes in an exaggerated fashion.
"I'm not much of a dancer," I glowered, but she grabbed me by the hand and pulled me towards the dance floor.
"Come on. What better way to show there are no hard feeling between us?" she said, knowing there was no way I could object without admitting I still hadn't gotten over our break-up.
I'd been nothing more than a kid when I met her. She wore her hair long back then. We were both hanging out with our individual groups of friends at a bar near the university. I'd thought she was cute, and my buddies dared me to go up to her and offer to buy her a drink.
I thought she was way out of my league; after all, I was just a kid on scholarship and she was obviously from a rich family. So, when she said yes, it exceeded my wildest dreams. Before I knew it, we were knocking back shots and she invited me back to her place to snort lines of coke.
"I've never done anything like that," I had said, not sure I even wanted to.
"It makes sex even more incredible. Just wait and see," Gwyneth had purred, and that was all the convincing I needed. She'd been right, and after that night, my heart was in her hands.
She’d convinced me that I could be anything I wanted to be and do anything I wanted to do. She was the one who gave me the courage to strike out on my own when I'd quit Krueger.
"You've always had money. You don't know what it's like to wonder how you're going to come up with next month's rent," I'd told her, with my head in my hands. "Maybe I should go to Krueger and beg for my job back."
"Fuck him." Gwyneth had sounded so confident as she came up behind me, naked. She wrapped her arms around my chest, and I could feel her naked breasts against my back as she kissed my neck. "You don't need to go crawling back to some asshole who doesn't respect your creative genius. You can manufacture your designs without him."
"Yeah, right. How?" I scoffed. "You got a spare $100,000 you can give me?"
"I don't, but the banks do. Go apply for a business loan. Then, you can start your own motorcycle company and be your own boss."
"Do you really think I could?" I had asked, but my heart was already pounding and my mind was already turning with ideas. She had planted the seed within me, but I was the one who turned it into a thriving orchard.
Those happy days of Gwyneth playing the supportive girlfriend were long gone, though. They'd been replaced by memories of a harping, nagging bitch, watching my every move, complaining constantly, always judging, and continuously telling me what to do.
"You're the biggest fuck up God ever made. Everything is turning to shit around you, and if you keep going the way you're going, you'll never amount to anything," I remember her screaming at me at two o'clock in the morning.
The neighbors had called the police that night, but by the time they got there, the fight was over and Gwyneth had moved out. That was the last time I saw her until years later. I'd thought I'd gotten over her, but seeing her again just brought back all the memories, all the feelings, and all the pain.
After that, I avoided her at all costs. We still had some of the same friends, so if I knew she was going to be at a particular social event, I’d make up some excuse not to go. Most of our friends knew it and respectfully didn't invite us both to the same events. A few of them made a point of doing the opposite and intentionally trying to bring us together in attempt to mend old wounds. It seemed Vick had become one of those.
Gwyneth seemed to be reading my mind as we swayed out on the dance floor in time to the music. In an almost apologetic voice, she smiled and said, "Vick means well. Let's just give him this one dance to show that we tried, and then we can go back to avoiding each other."
"I'm not avoiding you," I objected just a little too quickly, making Gwyneth smile.
"Actually, I was talking about me; but now you have me wondering if I'm not the only one."
"You're saying you've been avoiding me?" I was genuinely surprised. Gwyneth had the kind of power, sophistication, and charisma that she didn't have to avoid anyone. She commanded any room and it was up to others to clear in her wake. I couldn't believe it was possible that she might have felt intimidated by me.
"Didn't you wonder why I didn't go to Krista and Jeremy's wedding, or to Vick's house warming party?" she asked with large eyes.
"No because I didn't go to either of those because I thought you'd be there," I said, and we both laughed with chagrin. It felt good to genuinely express an emotion of joy with her, and all the unease between us was dissipated in that moment. The band started playing a slower ballad. I pulled her into my arms with a grand twirl, and we danced cheek to cheek, smiling as we spun around the dance floor wrapped in each other's arms.
"Well, I'm glad Vick tricked me to coming here tonight," she giggled as the song came to an end and a faster tune filled the air. "He told me we were going to an art exhibition. I nearly punched him when the limo pulled up in front of this hotel, but by then I couldn't refuse to get out the car, so I had to come in."
"Well, I'm glad you did. I'm sorry I've been avoiding you, and I'm really sorry for everything that happened back when..."
I didn't need to finish the sentence. Gwyneth put her finger to my lips in a shushing gesture and smiled softly. "I know. I'm sorry, too."
"Well, let's go thank Vick for our resolution of conflict." I led her from the dance floor to find my oldest friend standing by the bar. I slapped him on the back in a hearty hug and the three of us toasted to the good old days and times past.
"I knew that if I could just get the two of you in same room for more than five minutes that you'd work out your differences," Vick said.
"Yeah, but don't think that just because Gwyneth and I have made up with each other that we're both not still mad at you about it," I said, holding up a fist in mock anger.
He passed us both a champagne glass from the bar and held his up in a toast. "To old friends."
"To old friends," I parroted as we clinked glasses, but as I brought mine to my lips I stopped just short of taking a sip of the sparkling white wine within. Staring at me from across the room was the one woman I'd been searching for all evening: Kayla.
She looked radiant in the mermaid-cut evening gown made all in white with delicate crystal beads shimmering all over. It made her look like an angel just descended from heaven. Her long, blonde hair was swept up in a pile of curls on top of her head, with just a few, soft tendrils left loose to frame her beautiful face. Her make-up was subtle, with just a hint of pink gloss to highlight her kissable lips and a swish of mascara to darken her lashes. She didn't need anything more. She looked absolutely stunning, but she also looked upset.
There was an almost imperceptible crease in her brow that told me she was withholding negative emotions and the smile on her lips was only on the surface and didn't shine through to her eyes. I knew her well enough to see the truth behind the facade.
What was wrong? Had she seen me dancing with Gwyneth? Did she think I had betrayed her as my date? I wanted to run to her, to pull her into my arms and tell her she was the only girl for me, but the very thought had me frozen in place, helpless to move as Vick continued to tell his tale and Gwyneth laughed all around me.
"Who is that, darling?" Gwyneth suddenly asked me, using the old familiar pet name from when we were kids.
"Who?" I was startled from my thoughts and stammering over my own tongue.
"That girl you can't keep your eyes off of. Is she my replacement?" she teased, but her taunt had hit too close to the mark.
It broke the spell I'd been cast under and I was once again able to move and speak. I saw Kayla start to turn away, and I knew that in a moment, she'd slip back out the door and I would lose her. I had to act quickly, so I threw up my arm and called out to her jovially. "Kayla, there you are. Come here, I want to introduce you to everybody."
She strolled across the floor with gently swaying hips, the perfect blend of graceful and sultry. When she got to me, I pulled her into my arms.
"I've been waiting for you, but the way you look is well worth it," I said and she blushed under the compliment. "These are my friends from college: Victor Bruckheimer and Gwyneth Manzranni. This is..."
I was about to introduce Kayla by name when she abruptly cut me off. Holding out her palm to shake hands with Gwyneth, she said clearly, "I'm his girlfriend, Kayla Brandt."
Gwyneth’s eyes grew wide as she shook hands with Kayla, and then she turned to me with a mischievous wink and said, "So, she is my replacement."
I was caught completely off guard. It was obvious Kayla had seen me dancing with Gwyneth and wanted to establish that we were a couple to drive away the competition. I didn't know what to do or say.
In reality, this was my first date with Kayla. The afternoon under the oak tree had been part of work and the night together after the cover shoot couldn't quite be counted as a date, either. This party was the first time I had asked her out and we'd gone on a planned activity together. Did that make her my girlfriend? If not, and I called her on it in front of Gwyneth, Kayla would be humiliated. Not to mention, Gwyneth had made the situation so much worse by making it clear to Kayla that she was a former girlfriend of mine.
I was faced with two deadly choices: agree with Kayla and be trapped in the role of boyfriend for the first time in 25 years, or denounce her and lose the chance to ever get to spend time with her again. As much as I hated being bound in a romantic relationship, the alternative was too horrible to fathom. So, with a huge grin on my face, I put my arm around Kayla's petite waist, stared into her crystal blue eyes, and said, "Yes, she is."