Page 45 of Ashes of Us

Danica spent Thursday morning with Cecil answering calls and messages about Jasper's funeral, reaching out to the various banks and companies with which he had business or bills, and gathering information about shutting down his accounts and where to send copies of the death certificate.

After they ate a quick lunch, Cecil left to visit some of his relatives, and Danica, unable to handle being alone in the house, got aboard the Firebird and went for a drive.

After aimlessly driving for an hour, she found herself pulling into her spot next to Alex's jeep in the underground parking of the hotel.

She wasn't sure why she was there at first, but after sitting for a minute, she realized she wanted to talk to Alex.

He was the only person she had, besides Maverick, who was outside of the Preston family and knew what was going on in her life, and she was paying Maverick to be her friend.

After a moment of hesitation, she pulled out her phone and checked Alex's calendar to see if he was in a meeting.

She could see he had blocked out the afternoon as “busy,” but there wasn't anything specific.

Figuring that meant he wanted to work on paperwork without being disturbed, she decided to go to her office, check her emails and work on a couple of things that she was starting to fall behind on.

Sitting at her desk, she booted up her computer and sent a quick text to Alex, letting him know she was there. Two minutes later, her door opened, and Alex walked in, looking confused. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, of course.” Danica watched as he closed her door behind him and sat across from her. “I just couldn't handle sitting in the house doing nothing anymore.” She turned her attention to the computer and started deleting emails she knew were spam so she could focus on the important ones.

“Doing nothing?” Alex sounded completely baffled by her response. “Isn't Jasper's funeral tomorrow? How are you doing nothing?”

“Because it's not the same as it was with your dad.” She looked up again and smiled briefly.

“We had his memorial last Friday, and we couldn't have an open casket; he was too beat up, so we decided not to have a wake.

It's just a half-hour, graveside ceremony tomorrow at ten, and everything's done for it.”

“We?” Alex raised his eyebrow, his confusion melting away to curiosity and something else Danica couldn't quite identify. She almost wanted to call it jealousy but mentally shook her head. That was ridiculous. Why on earth would he be jealous? “Who's we?”

“Well, after you dropped me off Monday night, Jasper's father turned up at my door, bag in hand, at three in the morning,” Danica explained, realizing that she hadn't told him that in her message about needing time off and when the funeral was.

“He left Amy because when they got home from the hospital, she informed him Lucy was moving in and then the two of them, “very proudly,” showed him the nursery they had put together with all of Jasper's old baby things.”

Alex stared at her for a second, his mouth dropping open. “I'm sorry, what?”

“Oh yeah.” Danica nodded, leaning back in her chair and letting out a dry little laugh. “Would you like to hear everything that's happened in the last two days, or is there something you need to do this afternoon?”

“I just got off a video call with my divorce attorney that didn't take as long as I thought it would.” Alex waved his hand dismissively. “So yeah, fill me in.”

Liking that he wanted to hear about it way more then she should, she shoved that feeling aside and told him about everything that happened since he dropped her off Monday night, from what Cecil told her about Amy being taking in by Lucy's delusions to what Maverick found out about Lucy's past and what the psychologist said about her potential issues and then the meeting she had with Sergeant Galvan and what she heard on the recordings.

Alex listened quietly, asking a few questions for clarification on a couple of things, and when she was done, he smiled at her.

“Well, at least you know for sure Jasper didn't cheat on you.”

“Yeah,” Danica smiled sadly. “But you know I didn't really believe he did.” She hesitated. “I had divorce papers drawn up after the fight. I didn't think we could come back from it, but I also couldn't bring myself to give them to him.”

“Why not?” Alex rested his elbows on the armrests of his chair and folded his hands.

“Because he was trying so hard to fix things.” She murmured after a moment of thought.

“He agreed to do couples therapy, and after a couple of sessions, he decided, on his own, to get individual therapy to help him work through his issues. Everything I asked him to do, he did, without complaining or arguing with me about it. He even took financial classes.” Danica shook her head and rubbed her face, trying to put her thoughts into words.

“I still wanted to leave him.” She whispered, feeling a little queasy in her stomach.

“Really?” Alex furrowed his brow and tilted his head to the side. “If he was doing what you wanted and trying to fix things, why did you still want to leave?”

“Because when we started doing the audits, he stopped communicating while we were gone.

He'd ignore texts for hours or not answer them at all.” She took a deep breath and blinked back tears.

“One short phone call before I went to bed, no video calls.

He wouldn't ask me how my day was or how I was, and would answer my questions with short, vague answers that didn't tell me anything.

Then, when we'd get home, he would be all over me to the point that it was smothering me.

He'd pick me up from the airport, and there would be flowers, or a bag of my favourite comfort food, or something he saw that he thought I might like on the passenger seat. If we were home together, he constantly wanted to touch me and hold me.” She dropped her hands and looked at him. “And the house would be spotless.”

Alex laughed and leaned forward, smiling as he grabbed a candy from the dish on her desk. “That was a problem? He cleaned the house?”

Danica slumped and nodded miserably. “Yes, I couldn't figure out why it annoyed me so much until my therapist explained what love bombing is.” Alex raised his eyebrow and waved his hand in a circle, silently asking her to expand.

“Love bombing is when someone overwhelms you with excessive attention, affection, gifts, etc.

It's considered abusive if it's used to gain control or make someone depend on you emotionally.

My therapist thought that in Jasper's case, he was trying to make me happy so I wouldn't be upset about being ignored while I was away.”

“You know, just because everything Jasper was doing was a response, doesn't mean it wasn't genuine,” Alex said slowly after a moment of silence, making Danica look up, surprised he understood why she was so reluctant to let the idea of divorce go.

“Look, sometimes people need something serious to happen to motivate them to step up and do what they need to do to make something right. He recognized that he had severely damaged your relationship and trust in him, and he was doing his best to repair it and rebuild your connection. And hey, maybe you were right, and divorce was the right way to go, but at least it would have ended with both of you knowing you had done everything you could to save it.”

“Were we though?” Danica leaned back and folded her arms, avoiding his eyes.

“Yeah, Jasper didn't cheat on me, but he still did something he knew I would be livid about and hid it from me for months despite being in couples therapy and swearing he was being open and honest about everything.

I had divorce papers drawn up after I promised to work on things and never told him that I didn't think it was fixable, I just let him keep trying and agreed to things I didn't really want to do because I wasn't ready to let go.” She wasn't sure when or why she decided Alex should know what her motivations were, but it was out now, and it felt like a weight she didn't know she was carrying was lifted off her shoulders.

Alex shook his head, smiling at her. “So, neither one of you was ready to let the marriage go, so what?” Her skepticism must have been showing on her face because he leaned forward and held out his hand for hers.

“Dani, you just lost the man you considered a father figure.

You were scared and not ready to give up the only family you had left, and that's okay.” He squeezed her hand gently.

“It doesn't make you a bad person. As for Jasper hiding that he was with Lucy, if he knew you'd be livid and your relationship was already fragile, he would have been scared to tell you what he did.” He paused and looked like he was debating with himself.

“Can I ask what you would have been livid about? Was it the drugs or the fact that he was with Lucy?”

“Both,” Danica admitted sheepishly. “If he was smoking a bowl with just Jimmy and giving me space, I wouldn't have cared. But Jasper high and around other women? No. He fucking knew better.”

“Never took you for the jealous type, Dani.” Alex chuckled, looking greatly amused as he released her hand and sat back. “Or was there a reason?”

“Jasper was very touchy-feely when he was high,” Danica explained shortly, rolling her eyes. “With everyone, but especially with women. I couldn't so much as glance at a guy without him getting jealous and sulky about it, but it was fine for him to look and, if he was high, to hug and flirt too.”

“Ah.” Alex nodded sagely when she explained.

“The old 'rules for thee, but not for me' shtick.

Yeah, I know that one all too well, it's one of Heidi's favourites and it never failed to cause a fight between us.” He looked out the window for a long moment.

“I also know what it's like to be afraid to let go of someone, even when it would be better just to rip the band-aid off and leave.”

“What do you mean?” Danica felt her breath hitch in her chest. She half hoped he was about to explain his marriage to Heidi, because she didn't understand how or why they were together as long as they were.

Her curiosity about had kept her up a fair few nights as she got to know Alex better and realized he wasn't the complete jackass she thought he was.

“The Heidi I dated and fell in love with wasn't the woman I ended up married to.” He admitted after a moment.

“The way she presented herself to people was a very carefully crafted and curated public image that was socially acceptable.

She didn't come home for Moms funeral or to help out after because she wanted nothing to do with my parents after my Dad informed us he wasn't retiring two weeks before we were supposed to move home and at the time, I thought she was justified and didn't question it, but she was completely different person when I went back to London.

She was angry that I stayed in Boston for two months after the funeral, something she didn't mention until I got back, and she just stayed mad.

She was cold and mean, and nothing I said or did to apologize made her happy again.

She insisted it was my fault, and I had to fix it.

I tried for a while, but I'm not an idiot. She was nothing but sweet and supportive the entire two months I was home; she never once mentioned she wanted me to come back to London, so how the hell was I supposed to know she was upset?” He rolled his eyes and took another candy from the dish, unwrapping it and popping it in his mouth.

“The fights we had about my inability to read her mind were so bad and so frequent, the neighbours called the police during one that got particularly loud, and that was enough for me to tell her I wanted a divorce.

I couldn't do it anymore. If she couldn't let it go after close to a year, I couldn't keep living like I was walking on eggshells, worried about setting her off over something small.” He let out a bitter chuckle.

“And it was like a switch was flipped, and she was sweet and loving again. I figured that was it, things were fine, and I tried to continue our marriage. But I started noticing how condescending she was when she spoke to people she thought were beneath her, how incredibly self-centred and shallow she was, how every single relationship she had was superficial and centred around what it did for her. Hell, she forgot my thirty-ninth birthday completely but made me take her to Bali to make up for being in Lisbon for work and not being able to make the first of several parties and get-togethers she had planned for her thirty-fifth birthday week.” He scoffed, and Danica could hear how much bitterness was in his voice about it.

“Never mind that I purposely rescheduled the meetings so I would be there on her actual birthday, despite the dates making it worse for me and the manager of the Lisbon hotel to connect and get everything we needed to do done.”

“Anyway, months later, I found out she had been stealing from me, and that was it.” He turned from the window and smiled at her.

“And my meeting with my lawyer this afternoon was to tell me that the judge has struck down her last attempt to delay things, told her the division of assets was fair and followed the prenup we both signed and agreed to.

She has thirty days to move out of the house since she can't buy me out, and it will be going up on the market immediately.” His smile got wider. “I'm officially divorced.”

Danica smiled back at him, genuinely happy that he was finally free of all Heidi's bullshit. “Congratulations.”