Page 46 of Faking It with my Bestie's Billionaire Brother

I loved the begging, even though it wasn't necessary. I would always give her what she needed. At that moment, I realized that I would give her whatever the hell she wanted—if I had it to offer, it was hers.

I knew that I should pull away before anyone got hurt, and yet, I didn’t have it in me to stop.

Chapter seventeen

Ava

It would never cease to amaze me just how quickly life could change. You could have these long periods of stagnation, and then, before you knew it, poof, your whole world was completely different. That was the way it had been when my father passed. I had known relative comfort and safety prior to that moment, and then, all of a sudden, my North Star had been snuffed out.

It had been such a difficult adjustment. But I also knew that those big changes could come in great ways, too. I was a struggling artist when Penny offered me the gig as a sculpting teacher. I decided to do it on a whim, and everything had gone really quickly from there. And yet, I felt like I was exactly where I was supposed to be. I got to impart my knowledge and enthusiasm for art to young minds, and I still got to do my art without having to stress so much about paying the bills.

All of this chaos with Spencer was all-consuming and disorienting and much more pleasurable than I had ever anticipated. I had figured at the time that I was just trying to help out my best friend and keep her safe. But now, I was gliding home with wings on my feet, eager to see what else Spencer had in store for me, and it never seemed to really matter what it was. Whether it was a simple night where we laid on the couch with old movies playing in the background or if he insisted on taking me out on the town so that we could "be seen."

For all of our outings to "be seen" around LA, it always felt like we forgot why we went out in the first place. Spencer had an ornery streak a mile wide, and I loved pushing his buttons since it almost always led to touching, and touching led to pleasure—a pleasure I had never known the likes of before him.

I was creating more than ever now. Not only was there the original bust of Spencer, but there were three other incantations, too. Spencer being serious. Spencer in the throes of passion. The third one that I had started on showed the rarest side of him: the lighthearted side, the side that I was getting to see more and more of as the days passed.

I was also mulling over the fourth version. I had seen pictures of Spencer when he was still a photographer, and between those and looking over his portfolios, I was trying to piece together the guy he was before he turned into Spencer Ashbury, CEO. My gut told me that was the guy he really wanted to be.

I know there had been a lot of pressure from his father to run the company, but it was hard for me to understand exactly what made him give in and do it when he was so clearly embarking on a life set apart from his father's supposed legacy by that point.

Penny had mentioned that Spencer had refused the reins of the company time and time again, and then, all of a sudden, he changed his mind. It was a decision that so clearly made him miserable, but he seemed determined to stick with it, and I couldn't help but be curious as to why. Every time I broached the subject, however, he managed to change it or give me some cryptic answer and then distract me with his mouth.

Well, those questions were still burning in my mind as I went to have my morning chat with Penny in her office.

I had gotten a little too good at pushing the fact that I was sleeping with her brother out of my head so that I could still maintain our normal conversations. That wasn’t to say that I didn't have my moments of crushing guilt, but those were often balanced out by the intense heights of pleasure that Spencer wrought from my body and the sweet moments that we were having more and more of together.

I felt like a dead woman walking, and yet, I knew I wouldn't be able to stop myself from digging my grave just a little bit deeper.

So as Penny and I were talking about the final details for our girl's day out to get ready for the gala, I found myself asking, "Penny? I don't want to pry…"

She rolled her eyes. "Ava, you're my best friend, is that really possible?"

I bit back a grimace. "It's just that your brother seems so miserable at his job. Why does he keep doing it?"

Penny looked thoughtful. "I honestly cannot answer that question, but I do know what you're talking about."

I let out of sigh of relief that it wasn’t just me who picked up on his hatred for his position. "When I asked him before, he just changed the subject."

"That's classic Spencer," she agreed. "There's a lot about my brother that I just don't know, which sounds strange to say, but his childhood and mine were nothing alike. You know that my mom died when I was born and my dad passed not too long after her, so I never really knew him. It's always been Spencer who's been my parent. But I have heard stories—according to Ralph, my dad shipped Spencer off to this fancy boarding school just to get him out of the way. But they weren't very good to them out there. Ralph said the staff did some awful things to the kids and that if they acted up, they were put in solitary confinement for days, sometimes more than that, at a time. I don't think my brother did well out there. And I know he always resented my dad for that."

"Well, I certainly can't blame him if that’s the case," I interjected.

Penny nodded in agreement. "He's never given me the full details. He just said that he had to do everything in his power to make sure that I would not meet the same fate, so that when he found out my father was thinking about sending me to the same school, he intervened, and that's how he got custody of me. Sometimes, I wonder about a person who could so readily give up custody of their own child, even if I was clearly an accident. But most of the time, I'm just grateful that Spencer was there to save me."

She looked sad for a moment. "There's been a lot of times I've wanted to ask him about what all happened at that school and between him and my dad, but I think it's better not pick at past wounds, you know?"

I looked at her with a small smile. "Oh, come on, Penny, I always want to know."

She laughed. "That's true. I gotta remember who I'm talking to."

With a heavy feeling in the room, I changed the subject to something to do with the kids and classes and let it drop.

But something about Penny's words weighed on me throughout the morning. It was obvious to me that Spencer was hiding much more than just what Penny was saying.

My heart ached for the little boy who was sent away and possibly abused, and my heart went out to the young man who'd stepped into save his baby sister. I mean, I had to give him credit for that because not many people would have taken on the role of a parent for a sibling so much younger than them. He stepped in at a time when most men were consumed with frat parties and keggers.

After my chat with Penny, not having any concrete answers damn near drove me crazy. So, once I hit my planning period, I decided to just take the bull by the horns. I was lucky that my planning period and my lunch were right next to each other, so I had a pretty solid block of time to myself. I decided to quit beating around the bush. I would just go to Spencer and ask him outright what the big secret was because it was obviously eating him up. Plus, I couldn't quite dismiss the feeling that it had something to do with why we were all in this mess to begin with and why we got those creepy pictures.

---