“That pink dress washes you out; next.”
“Oh, that’s not good at all.”
“Seriously, Lace,” a long groan, “why is your closet so bland?”
It was 10 p.m on a Friday night, and while most people were reveling in their weekend break after the hectic week, Lacey was forced to try on dress after dress after dress, desperately hoping that the current one would be the final one. But, alas, Adi kept on saying no to the dress, so much that Lacey regretted taking him up on his offer to come over to help her pick out a dress for the wedding.
Yup. Lacey had finally decided that she would attend the mysterious wedding. If not for anything else than to figure out who sent he
“You’re Lacey, aren’t you? I can tell because of the eyes. Mark’s been waiting to meet you.”Mark, that was the groom’s name, Lacey recalled, but why the hell would he be waiting to meet her?Seconds felt like hours as Lacey stared at the outstretched hand. Seeing that she wasn’t about to shake him, the smile on Adam’s face started to get smaller.“No?”Lacey didn’t respond immediately. Now the four pairs of eyes that were looking at her had similar eager glints in their eyes. Apart from that, the youngest girl also wore a shy smile.“I’m Lacey, bu
After driving for a couple minutes, Lacey parked her car by the roadside. Maybe it was because of the fresh air coming in through her windows, but the tears that had threatened to fall earlier were no were to be found.A calm breath passed through Lacey’s lips as she rested her head on the headrest.“I feel like I’m in a cheesy drama right now,” she muttered to herself, then let out a laugh that was part humorous and part disbelief.What kind of person sends a wedding invite to a daughter they haven’t seen since she was born instead of calling her to ask if she would like to attend? If her father…Wai
“We hope you have a nice stay at Monsoon Resort, Mr. Taley.”Jonathan bopped his head in a polite gesture as he took the key and walked to the elevator. His current location was a remote resort on an island, where he had come for a two-week long nature retreat.The retreat gave Jonathan an avenue to distance himself from work for a little while, but the main reason he was there was because he found out Jada Reign was going to be staying at the same resort to attend the same retreat. It provided Jonathan an opportunity to meet the director and leave a good impression on her.The first event of the retreat was an orientation, which was happening tomorrow, so for the rest of today, Jonathan was going to remain indoors.
“That brings us to the end of today!”Lacey breathed out heavily, joining the other trainee actors in a round of cheers for the instructor who just made the announcement.Three weeks had gone by so quickly at JT Entertainment, and Lacey was enjoying nearly every aspect of it. The classes were more technical than those she took back in college, but the challenge made it all the more fun.Those were the good parts, meaning there were also the not-so-good parts. It was a tiny issue. One of the other trainee actors had found out that Lacey used to be married to Thomas Wright, and that person thought it necessary to share it to the whole class.Lacey’s relationship with them had been c
“I think you’re more my type, Lacey.”Those weren’t the words that Jonathan had thought to say, but when it left his lips, he found that those were the words in his heart. In a way, it was aj outward confession to Lacey, but also to himself.He couldn’t deny it any longer; he liked her. And now, he could freely admit that it played a big role as to why he had been so annoyed at her when he thought she was cheating on Steven. That then hadn’t only been about protecting his brother, Jonathan was ashamed to admit that.“Also, I’m sorry.”“Sorry?” Jonathan turned sideways for a split second and saw perplexion all over Lacey’s ex
“You live in the Penthouse?”When Lacey took Jonathan up on his offer to go up to his place, she didn’t expect that he would lead her over to the private elevator. You know, the one that led up to the Penthouse.A million people lived in their apartment building—obvious exaggeration but fifty floors meant that there were a lot of people going and coming—but Lacey had been vaguely aware that the place was owned by a hotshot politician. Honestly? She’d stopped by to listen to the receptionists’ gossip a few times.When she mentioned that fact to Jonathan—not the gossip part, but the politician part—he simply nodded, agreeing with her.&ldquo
It took about a couple seconds for Jonathan’s question to sink in. When it did, Lacey opened her mouth, then shut it. Actually, she didn’t know what to say.She liked Jonathan, that much was clear, and he liked her back. But it wasn’t easy to make a decision easily when her last relationship had been with someone who ended up betraying her. So, to open up her heart to someone she didn’t know that well…That wasn’t easy.Lacey was still thinking of an answer when her ringtone filled the space. Until then, Lacey hadn’t recalled that her ringtone being that loud, but maybe it was because of the open air space of the Penthouse, but the sound seemed to fill everywhere.“...”
Peace of mind was a thing of her imagination. Weeks had passed and Maddy still didn’t have peace of mind over her unavoidable situation with Liam Tirro. After the day he visited the school, Maddy, thankfully, hadn’t seen him again, but it was hard not to think about him whenever she saw Maria Tirro. Lacey wanted her to tell him, but Maddy didn’t agree with that. Like at all. Every day turned to be a paranoia-filled one as Maddy imagined Liam Tirro showing up at her parents’ house to demand for Lea. Although she was aware that it wasn’t possible, Maddy couldn’t stop those thoughts from filling her brain. “Mama, the pink dress, pleasee.”At her daughter’s plea, Maddy’s eyes fluttered as she remembered where she was. Her parents were throwing a get together for some friends, business partners, and acquaintances, and had insisted that they wanted Lea at the event, which was basically going to be a roomful of people whose main purpose of being there was to show off and find new gossip.
Even though Jonathan didn’t get the chance to talk to Lacey, he wasn’t too bummed out by it after seeing that she wasn’t mad at him. She was back home safe, plus she had a friend to stay with her; those were enough for him. Upon getting back to his Penthouse, the first thing he did was go through his mails. Tomorrow, he was meeting with Director Jada Reign, and he wanted to make sure that she hadn’t sent an email canceling after the news his company was embroiled. Thankfully, there was no mail of cancellation, which meant they were still on for tomorrow. Jada had picked their meeting location; a newly opened fine dining restaurant Jonathan had never been to before called Maria. According to her, while she was in Italy, she had food made by the chef, and wanted to check out his new place. Jonathan didn’t protest. Jonathan found it a little weird that she wanted to go to a fine dining restaurant in the morning, but he kept that to himself.There were also a couple messages from his pa
“So, how was your date?”Steven had a huge grin on his face all through the day, so much that when school was over and he passed by the front of her desk, Maddy had to ask. Almost like he’d been waiting to ask, Steven immediately plopped onto the spare chair at Maddy’s table. “It was my first time officially being on a date, but we clicked so easily.”“Hmm.” Maddy cocked her head to the side with an amused smile. “Does that mean you’ve been on unofficial dates before?”As Steven’s laughter subsided, he noticed Maddy wasn’t her usual self. She was smiling, but there was a blank look in her eyes. So he asked, “Do you have something on your mind?” Turning her head towards her friend, Maddy groaned a bit before responding. “I think I have a date, but unlike you, I’m not too excited for it.”Today was the day she was meeting Liam Tirro, but without Lea. After much deliberation on the matter, Maddy decided not to introduce her daughter to her father just yet. There were a couple reasons,
Lacey quickly took in the presence of the three people standing at her door. She had been about to go into her room when she heard the sound of her keycode and went to check who it was. Since the only people who knew the code to her apartment were her mother and friends, she wasn’t all that surprised to find Sangah there. Except, there were two other people at the door. One face was unfamiliar, while the other person was a face Lacey seen earlier that day. Actually, he was the person she had wanted to reach out to the most. “Sangah, you’re back from South Korea?” “We flew in tonight. Holly and I were going to crash here. I thought you would still be at your Mum’s place.”Holly. Lacey’s eyes fell again on the beautiful woman whose arm was connected with Sangah’s elbow and smiled. Lacey took in her outfit of a flashy black dress and couldn’t help but wonder if she flew on the plane like that. “Holly?”“Holly.” Sangah turned a smile at the woman beside her. “Holly is my girlfriend. Ho
“Let’s meet. Where are you? Office? I’ll drop–”“Adam, you seem to have a lot of free time lately,” Jonathan interrupted the other man with a sharp tone. Recently, Jonathan had had more contact with the other man than he would have liked, and he didn’t want to see the other’s face for a while. Which was why he added, “Tell me what it is you’re calling about.”Given that he was calling so soon after Lacey’s post went up, Jonathan had an easy guess as to what Adam Rashidi wanted. A playful, buoyant laugh came over the phone right before Adam responded. “It’s always business with you, isn’t that right, Jonathan? Well, you must already have an idea why I called you…” This was followed by a small pause before Adam continued, “Lacey Thalmes, send her to me.”Resisting the urge to hang up the phone, Jonathan opened his mouth to speak but Adam beat him to it. “Your company seems to be doing a bad job at protecting their artists. Give her to me and I promise to make her more famous than JT En
The moment Lacey pressed the upload button and sent out her post into the world, she turned off her phone as a flurry of emotions hit her hard, the predominant ones being, of course, excitement and fear. She’d already given her friend group a heads-up of what she was about to do so they wouldn’t be too surprised if they came across her post. They were her friends so they would be on her side, but if what Jamie said was true, then the post was going to reach a lot more people. People who only knew her because of Thomas, people who didn’t know the real her, people who would be quick to write off her words as lies, and maybe also people who would believe her and be on her side. The enormity of the situation made Lacey want to shovel herself under the blankets, and stay in the room until it all blew over. Not on Jamie’s watch though. When Lacey was about to retreat back into the room, the other woman stopped her. She was the mastermind behind Lacey taking the decision to fight against
Jonathan’s car was idling at a distance not so far away from Lacey’s mother’s house. Lacey told him to leave, but he didn’t want this to be how things ended between them. He really was going to do everything he could to fix it. But how? After he sat in his car thinking for a while, his ringtone filled the car. It was Riley calling. Unexpectedly, when he answered, Riley immediately started speaking. Her words were jumbled into each other and Jonathan couldn’t make them out. “Slow down, Riley. What happened?”“Are you with Lacey Thalmes right now? What silly ideas did you put in her head, Jonathan? Huh?” Riley’s words came out hard and fast. She was ticked off. This made Jonathan pay closer attention. “Tell Lacey that she can come back to JT if she takes down the post right now!”At first, Jonathan had been confused, but he heard clearly now Riley’s last statement. “Wait a minute. Did you fire Lacey already? What the hell, Riley? Why are you doing things without my permission?” There
“Are you willing to fight?”It wasn’t the first time since meeting the woman that Lacey was left stunned, but this topped all those other moments. Jamie’s words made her heart beat faster. As part of it was from trepidation, but another part of it was the excitement that things could actually turn around. Jamie was right. If she let it go again this time, what was the assurance of a next time not happening? Would she have to spend the rest of her life looking back to make sure Thomas wasn’t catching up with her, ready to ruin her life one more time? In these past two years, he’d never been far from her though even after he was out of her life. Oh, is Thomas going to decide today to lie about me again? She had never fully stopped worrying about that. So, after a few moments of contemplation, Lacey came to a decision. Wearing a determined expression, she said, “I am going to fight. Thomas broke me once and almost ruined my life. I don’t want to let him do that again. But…” That was w
“Lacey, are you okay in there?” A knock on the door made Lacey look up from her phone. “What’s going on? Why is the door locked?”It was tempting to ignore her mother, but after the fainting scare earlier, she didn’t want to find her mother in another dangerous situation, so Lacey placed her phone on the bed and got to her feet. Unlocking the bolt, she opened the door. “Lacey, what’s wrong?”“Nothing, Mum. Just something came up at work. Don’t worry about it.”Lana Thalmes’ expression grew even more worried. “It’s something serious, isn’t it? Earlier, before Jonathan left, I heard you shout. Did he do something to you?”Lacey’s head swayed side to side. She wasn’t in the mood to answer her mother’s questions, what with her world and entire life being overturned for the second time in two years, and by the same person. Two years wasn’t a lot of time to most people, but in that span, Lacey had gone through a divorce, turned her life around and gotten a job, only to find herself back in
“Calm down, Adi. I can’t hear you,” Lacey said into the phone. She’d been having a chill time with Jonathan after he drove her and her mother home. They had been talking about random things, and somehow, it wasn’t weird that Jonathan was in her mother’s house. But then her phone rang, and it was Adi saying a lot of words she didn’t understand. “Lace, I asked where you were? Are you at JT Entertainment?”This time, she clearly heard him. With furrowed brows, Lacey responded, “No. Why? Do you need me to do something for you?”“No. No.” Adi’s voice sounded frantic. “It’s not that. It’s just…” As he hesitated, Lacey raised her gaze to see what Jonathan was up to on the other side of the room. Surprisingly, she found a grave expression on his face as he stared right at her. When he saw her looking his way, his features seemed to crumple in apology. Before Lacey could get confused about what was going on, she heard Adi’s voice through the phone. “What did Thomas do to you at the company?