The Worst Best Man(95)
“Your dad is going to hate me even more,” Franchesca moaned.
“The only Kilbourn you need to be worried about is me. And I’m proud of you for standing up for yourself. And I also owe you an apology. Our relationship is the reason you’re dealing with this, and I can’t tell you how sorry I am for that. But I will make it right.”
“Oh, God. You’re not going to kidnap him, are you?”
“Do I look like Elliot?”
She gave him a ghost of a smile. “So, you’re really not mad?”
“I’m furious. But not at you. Never at you.”
“You hide it well. I feel it, I blow up, and then I spend a day or two regretting it.”
Her phone buzzed on the bar, and she picked it up, wincing. “Oh, God. Brenda, my boss. I can’t lose that job, too.”
“Let me pay off your credit card.” Aiden knew it was a mistake as the words were coming out of his mouth, but he could do this for her, give this to her.
She was already shaking her head. “Uh-uh. Nope. Not happening.”
“You know it’s nothing to me,” he argued.
“Just like you know it’s something to me. I’m not some trust fund kid who goes to Mom and Dad to get bailed out.”
“First of all, I look nothing like your parents.”
“Har har. I’m not taking your money, Aide.”
“Would you take Lionel’s?”
“What?”
“Would you take Lionel’s money if it came in the form of an apology for his behavior?”
“Oh, hell yes.”
“Then I’ll get you whatever it is he owes you. What’s your balance?”
Frankie named a figure so paltry that Aiden had to close his eyes and take a breath. “You’re really that close to not scraping by, and you won’t let me do anything about it?”
“You’re furious at someone else, not me. Remember?”
“You’re going to give me a headache.”
“Oh, sure. I bash one of your pals in the head with a tray and douse him in champagne, and you’re totally fine with it. But I turn down your billions, and then you get a migraine,” she pouted.
“What if there was something that I needed desperately that was in your power to give so easily?”
“Money is different. Money is power and control, and I want my own, not someone else’s.”
He hated to admit it, but he could see her incredibly misguided and stubborn point.
“Fine. I’ll get you Goffman’s money.”
She shook her head and gave a soft laugh. “You’re something, Kilbourn.”
“Back at you, Baranski. Can we watch the video again?”
Girlfriend of Aiden Kilbourn has secret life of catering jobs and sexual harassment…
Aiden Kilbourn’s girlfriend assaults Upper West Side fundraiser attendee…
Aiden Kilbourn’s new girlfriend brings Brooklyn bar fight to art gallery fundraiser…
Aiden Kilbourn threatens lawsuit and charges against girlfriend’s attacker…
Chapter Fifty
“I have a name,” Frankie muttered at her computer screen. Brenda and Raul had decided it would be better for everyone if she worked from home until the scandal and ensuing news interest died off.
“Damn right you have a name,” Marco agreed in her ear.
“Aiden Kilbourn’s girlfriend,” Frankie snorted. “Every single one of these headlines call me Aiden Kilbourn’s girlfriend.”
“If they didn’t know your name before, they will now.”
“Are you eating?”
“Mmm yeah. Corned beef.”
“I don’t suppose you deliver?”
“Not with everyone in the neighborhood stopping by for gossip on our own Frankie B,” Marco snorted.
“We usually only pull in these kinds of sales around the holidays. But you put us on the map. We got neighbors and reporters crawling out of the woodwork.”
“Oh, God! No one’s talking to the reporters, are they?” Frankie moaned.
“Only in glowing lies about your goodness. You’ve been dubbed Saint Franchesca.”
“You are so full of shit.”
“Relax. We take care of our own,” Marco said, biting into what Frankie could only assume was a giant dill pickle. “Besides, Aiden and his PR guy stopped by earlier in the week and gave us all the standard line.”
“Aiden came to the deli?” Frankie asked.
He’d been so busy in the week since “the incident” they hadn’t seen much of each other. And he had definitely not mentioned the visit.
“Yeah, had a roast beef for lunch and took another one for the road. Didn’t you see the pictures of him carrying the Baranski Deli bag around? Can’t pay for that kind of advertising. Had a real estate developer call us up and ask if we’d consider opening a location downtown.”
“Are you kidding me?” She’d been wallowing in her own stew of embarrassment and anger that she hadn’t bothered to give two shits about anything else apparently.