Ghosts (A Christian Yelich Story)

Chapter Seven: Some Sort of Elaborate Joke

Asher was grabbing breakfast as Christian and I made our way to the castle's front entrance to meet Christian's driver. "Hey, Annie," Asher greeted me, as he shoveled food onto a plate.

"Hi," I mumbled, figuring it best to say something rather than cause conflict by completely ignoring his hello.

Asher acknowledged Christian with a nod before asking me, "Where are you both off to so early?"

"A training facility. Annie is doing me a favor and being my workout partner the next couple of weeks," Christian answered, even though the question wasn't directed at him.

Asher gave Christian an awkward half smile. "Ah, she's pretty committed to the gym. Good choice. Anyway, Annie, can we talk later . . . alone maybe?"

I bit my lip nervously. "I don't know what the plans are for filming tonight. Maybe if there's time?"

"All right." Asher's tone went from quasi-friendly to short really quickly. "If there's time," he repeated.

"Let's get going. Don't want the driver to have to wait for us too long." I was thankful for Christian's attempt to end the conversation. "See ya later, Asher," Christian finished.

Asher looked slightly upset before we walked away and got into the car out front.

"Everything okay?" Christian asked, as we settled into our seats.

"Oh, yeah. Totally," I said, perhaps not very convincingly.

Christian examined my worried expression for a moment. "You don't have to talk about it, but I'll listen if you want to talk about it."

This guy knew all the lines. I decided to give him an undetailed, condensed version of my past with Asher. "I dated Asher for two years. We lived together for about a year of that. I caught him in bed with a good friend of mine. Now he's here, and I don't understand why. It's not just coincidence." The good friend of mine was actually a well-known actress – someone Christian had probably heard of – but that didn't seem important right now.

"I'm sorry," Christian said, and, for a moment, I thought he was going to put his hand on my shoulder to comfort me. It hovered over my shoulder for a fleeting moment before he jerked it away and ran his fingers though his hair instead. I pretended not to notice.

"I don't really understand cheating. If you want to play the field and mess around, just don't commit or be exclusive with anyone." Christian shrugged. "I honestly can't believe someone would cheat on you."

I raised an eyebrow. "What does that mean? I live in Los Angeles. World capital of cheating and deception . . ."

I could have sworn Christian blushed slightly. "I just mean you're obviously attractive, successful, smart, and overall a catch. I get that I don't know you very well, but surface level you seem pretty great, at least."

I was nervous now. Why was this conversation making me nervous? "Nah, I just conned you with my feminine mystique or something."

Christian laughed. "Well, I'm enjoying it. I think I got pretty lucky with the partner card."

I didn't quite know how to respond to that, so I settled on a barely audible "Thank you."

I still couldn't figure out why he was being so kind to me or why Asher was here. I couldn't help but feel like I was the butt of some sort of elaborate joke that everyone was in on but me.