The cold CEO and her Musician

Chapter 4

She gets to the elevator and heads to the top floor her palms start to sweet, and she lets out a shaky breath that she didn’t know she was holding. This doesn’t go unnoticed by Bernard who is aware of all that is happening around them. He keeps his eyes looking forward, “what’s wrong?” Kaya closes her eyes and lets out a breath, “I don’t remember the last time that I was this nervous. What do you think this means Berny?” Bernard lets out a sigh, “You had a great night with the guy, and you liked him and hit it off with him. That’s why you are nervous to see him.”  Kaya lets out a shaky breath and then closes her eyes for a moment while the elevator rises in silence before speaking again, “all right Berny let’s get this done. Did you tell Ty and dad about this?” Bernard nods and she goes on, “make sure that the family is taken care of and from what I read on the way over here it seems like the reports say that his whole family is here and so are his bandmates.” Bernard nods again and she goes on, “well let’s hope that they aren’t the crazy type, or we are going to have a problem. Did you make sure that you checked out the team that is stationed around the floor?” Bernard nods and sends a file from his phone to her phone. Her phone goes off with a little bing and she sees the background checks that have been done.  She opens the file, “Mal is on her way here. She should be here any minuet. What about Ty and dad?” Bernard looks down at his phone, “they should be 1 minuet behind us. The family is waiting in a VIP waiting room for the us to arrive. I do wonder if you think there will be a reason to have such a detailed security team here. Is it for them or for you?” Kaya stays quiet for a second then says with total confidence, “both.” The doors ding open ending the conversation and Kaya walks out behind Bernard following him to the conference room. 

As they walk down to the end of the hallway they hear someone call to them and they turn. Kaya turns to see her brother and father walking up to her quickly. Her father wraps his arms around her and holds her tight, “I’m sorry princess. I will take care of everything when we get in there.” The pair lets go and Tyler hugs her next, “don’t worry squirt everything will be fine.” Kaya lets go and holds back a sarcastic eye roll, “why are you two acting like this? It’s not like we are together just relax and let me take care of everything. I don’t need softie and softie taking the lead on this one.” The pair of men roll their eyes, and they all start to laugh. After a few moments another voice comes up to them, “well isn’t that a rare treat the Grayson siblings and their father in one room.” Kaya rolls her eyes, “well, well if it isn’t one of the infamous Samson sisters come to delight us with her presence.” Kaya steps forward and Mallory throws her arm around her shoulder turning them to face Tyler and his father. Mallory smirks, “always good to see you Uncle Tim. How is auntie Lee? Is she planning our sweet Ky’s wedding yet?” Kaya rolls her eyes, and her father lets out a light chuckle, “if you keep rolling your eyes like that they will get stuck like that young lady. Hello Mal. I’m fine thank you for asking and no, our little princess here put a stop to that with a very stern phone call if I understand correctly.”  Mallory lets out a laugh, “well that’s a shame I love going to one auntie Lee’s parties. She always remembers to let us go so we can go party in the pool house.” They start walking down the hallway again and Tim laughs, “she remembers what it was like to be your age and doesn’t want you girls to miss out. Besides if you are with any of the parents there is less of a chance that you will get into too much trouble.” They come to the end of the hallway and Kaya lets out a soft, shaky breath to which she gets a nudge from Mallory. She takes a breath and walks into the conference room. There are four men and a woman sitting at the table. Kaya recognizes them all from the files that Bernard sent to her. Kaya walks up to the older gentleman who is simply looks like an older version of Gavin with silver hair. She reaches out her hand, “Mr. Ashford I take it?” The man nods and shakes her hand and she goes on, “I am Kaya Grayson, and this is my father Timothy Grayson, my brother Tyler Grayson, my friend Mallory Samson, and my personal assistant Bernard Hernandez. I am sorry that you must be here. But your son is in the best care in the world and the hospital bill is on me. I really am so sorry that you and your family are going through this, and it seems to have come at a time when rumors were put out there because of some one seeing your son and I together a few weeks ago.” Her voice and charm come through without a problem and she finds herself back in the role of the cold CEO.

Gavin’s father takes his hand back and smiles, “Hello Miss Grayson. My name is Lou Ashford. I am sorry that we must be here too, but I am just happy that my son is alive. This is my wife and Gavin’s stepmother Nancy, our son Randell, and our adopted sons Kevin and Matthew Garrison. How are you doing with all the rumors? Is it causing you any problems?” Kaya is a bit taken aback by his question, “Hello everyone. And no, I have a press conference to settle everything set for later today. It won’t be a problem for much longer. Thank you for asking. Please let’s all sit and talk.” They all sit down except for Timothy who stands at his daughter’s side and reaches out his hand to Lou who takes it, “As a father I am know how upset you are, and you are probably very upset with my daughter, but I thank you for not treating her badly and seeing that she is also a victim in this.” Lou smiles as he shakes Timothy’s hand, “well I figure it takes guts to do all the things that she did to keep my son’s hospital stay private and then meet with his parents. My wife and I both know that, so we aren’t going to give her a hard time Mr. Grayson. And it helps that if we did your daughter is known as Death in the financial world.” Timothy starts laughing, “Call me Tim and well what can I say she is a Grayson after all. They are their fathers’ children.” Lou lets out a laugh in return, “I guess that’s a good thing then. See honey I told you they weren’t as cold and cruel as the media makes them out to be.” Nancy smiles and smacks her husband’s arm before saying, “Lou Ashford if you don’t sit down right now!” Lou and Tim laugh and take their seats while Ky leans over to Mal and whispers, “I can’t help but feel annoyed that they were just insulting me.” Mal smirks and they turn their attention to the rest of the room. 

On the other side of the room Randell is a lighter version of Gavin and has hazel eyes that are staring straight at Kaya.  He is as sexy as his brother and just as muscular as him as well as tall like him. His chiseled jaw line looks like it can cut glass and his frame looks imposing. He gives her a serious expression that she can tell is making him strain himself. She makes a mental note in her mind that he would look better smiling. Next to him are two men who look very much alike, and Kaya has no problem seeing why girls see them as the four Greek gods of the boy band world. The taller one has dark ash brown hair cut short on the sides and long on the top. His body is muscular and lean like Gavin and his brother, but his skin tone is lighter than them. He has light green eyes like his brother and Kaya can see why girls would throw themselves at him. His brother has the same features, but his demur is much lighter than the other two who seem to be forcing themselves to look mean and intimidating. Kaya mentally rolls her eyes and is not impressed by their little show. She looks over to Gavin’s mother Nancy who she knows from her own file that tells her the woman manages the boys since she isn’t very trustworthy when it comes to her kids. She is a beautiful woman slender and average height. She has a small figure and looks like the girl next door type. She notices her soft brown hair that comes around her face in a well-done bob. She sees her honey brown eyes and they are confident and full of passion. The woman is a beauty and if she saw her on the street she would notice her and her beauty as she walked past her. After moment or so of silence as Kaya scans everyone to memory she clears her throat and starts, “Well first thank you for meeting with us and secondly you will not have to worry about the bill Ms. Samson, and I will be taking care of that. I don’t mean that to be disrespectful in anyway. I just would like to help out since I am also at the center of this perfect storm.” Lou puts his hand up in the air and stops Kaya from going on, “you can say it dear s**t storm the proper term for this is s**t storm.” Kaya smirks, “thank you now as I was saying this s**t storm is going to get worse before it gets better. It seems that someone leaked those photos of us because he was seen with me so in reality I am the problem here and I will do all that I can to keep A.L.P from feeling the side effects of this s**t storm as Mr. Ashford thankfully put it. Do you have any questions?” Kaya hears someone on the other side of the table clear their throat and looks over and then she hears Nancy speak on her side of the table, “No you don’t Kev! I promise you will pay for it if you say anything stupid to either of them. I’m sorry Ms. Grayson my boys are brats when they want to be. I am thankful that you are taking such good care of us and my kids, but may I ask why you think this is only your problem?” Kaya smiles and as she is about to speak she feels her father’s hand on her shoulder and hears him say, “because my daughter is used to people using our family for all they can get from us, and she is doing what she does best second only to business and that is protecting her family and friends from people who would otherwise do us harm. Now, please before you say anything I am not saying that you are doing that or want to do that, I am simply saying that her behavior is based on a reality that makes her fight everyone off. Now I know this is highly unorthodox, but we did not ask you here to make this go away and keep things hush, hush we asked you here to apologize for the mess that our family has brought to your front door. My daughter is right now that your son has been seen with her if she doesn’t do the press conference he will become the media’s favorite toy to play with and things are going to get ugly for him and his band.” The room is quiet and then Tyler stands up, “listen we aren’t these crazy unrealistic people that the media has made us out to be and you can see that the samson family isn’t either, but we do know that ripping the untouchable Grayson family to shreds is not the best move if you want to make it big in the media world. It would be like ripping the pope to shreds not a good look for them so instead they go after the people around us which is why my sister has set up security and had the whole floor reserved. Now not everyone is out to get us and the people who are number very few like 5% of the media if I did the math but those people will still do anything to get to us. There are many people who want to use us for our money and influence in the world so try not to be too hard on her.” 

There is another round of deafening silence before Randell speaks up from the other side of the table, “Well I guess it is true the Grayson family is kind, and the Cold CEO is as intimidating as everyone says. I think my brother is one lucky bastard to have a woman like you willing to help him out. I told you Kev she is one gazillion times better than Tracey or any other girl he has ever even talked to. Pay up!” Nancy groans, “BOYS! Behave. Yourselves. Or. Else.” Kaya snickers to herself and Matthew speaks up, “Did he really meet you at the club that we were at?” Kaya nods, “He also met Mallory here.” Kevin’s jaw drops open, “that lucky bastard! He got to meet two of the top five most gorgeous and eligible bachelorettes in the world and didn’t call us over! If your brother isn’t dead then I’ll kill him! I demand revenge! Sabotage!” Kaya smiles awkwardly while the boys’ bicker between themselves and then leans over to Mallory and whispers, “Wow I’m kind of scared to tell them he met Pay and Case too.” Mallory gives her a small smirk and then they sit straight, and she clears her throat, “well thank you for that gentlemen but I would just like to know that you and your family accepts our help and forgives us for getting you into this.” Lou smiles a crocked smile at her, “honey s**t happens, and this was not your doing it was the media so don’t worry about having hard feelings.” Nancy pats his shoulder, “Lou’s right it’s not like you told the media to go after him and cause his wreck things will be fine once this all blows over and in the meantime as the manager of these four knuckle heads I will be sure to put out a statement saying that goes with what you say at the press conference. I know what can happen when stories don’t go along with each other, and I know the kind of criticisms that your family faces when small group that you mentioned before they gets the chance to twist everything. I work as the boy’s manager for that reason you never what others are willing to do to get ahead at the cost of others.”

The room fell into a comfortable rhythm of conversation when lunch was brought in since no one was allowed to see Gavin yet. When someone brought over a cup of coffee to the Kaya. The man was still like a robot and Kaya had seen the tattoo on his wrist before. She thanked him for the coffee, and he left. Kaya didn’t touch the coffee which gained the attention of Mallory who asked her a simple question, “like dirt?” Kaya simply nodded and kept on with her conversation when felt Mal nudge her she finally address it, “smells like Bella.” Kaya goes on to enjoy the conversation but doesn’t touch the food or coffee and then the same man takes it away. No one except her family notices the behavior and leave it be for a more private time. After couple hours later a doctor comes in and introduces himself as Gavin’s doctor and says that he is awake and ready for visitors. His friends and family go in while Kaya and her group stay in the conference room. Tim is the first to speak up as he stands by the window and stares out on the landscape, “why didn’t you eat or touch your coffee princess?” Kaya sits back with a water bottle that Bernard brought for her and a snack that he went out to get her, “the coffee had the hints of unripen tomato in it. Reminded me of Belladonna.” Tim makes a fist, “so they are getting bold enough to come after you while with your family?” Tyler sits back in his chair and lets out a whistle, “man squirt whoever is doing this really has it out for you specifically. What did you do to them to have them hate you this much? They really went through some trouble to try to poison you this time.” Kaya smirks as she drinks her water, “nah, I’m actually flattered that they thought of something like that but sadly it wouldn’t have worked just would have made me sick at the most and I just didn’t want our company to see that. I mean I have created a tolerance for the stuff.” Mal lets out a snort, “leave it to our fearless leader to be impressed by someone trying to kill her.” Kaya lets out a chuckle, “it means that they are smart or just really arrogant which in any case means they are not afraid of me and are willing to make an enemy out of the Grayson family as well as the other families. Which means that this will end up being loads of fun for us Mal.” Kaya gets up and moves to the window with her father, “don’t worry daddy you and gramps taught me well and trained me to be able to fight on my own two feet. I’m smart and deadly. I’ll be fine.” They all fall silent for a while and after about an hour they hear a knock at the door and see Matthew poke his head in, “um Kaya, no um, Ms. Grayson Gavin is asking for you.” Kaya smiles a warm reassuring smile, “Kaya is fine Matthew.” He smiles back and says, “Mattie.” Then he leaves and she turns to Mal, “I have the press conference today so I’ll be staying at the office tonight with Berny try to go over and keep mom and dad company for me will you. I’m pretty sure that Anna is gonna want you close by tonight too. I’ll text Pay and Case when I’m on my way back to the office. Try to figure out who your staff member is too.” Mal rolls her eyes, “don’t stay at the office just meet us at the club house and we will work there tonight. I’m pretty sure that Uncle Tim and Auntie Lee would feel better if you did that. Not to mention you haven’t been home and now Albie is going to hear about the attempted poisoning.” Kaya just shakes her head, “fine I know better than to fight with you of all people and I really don’t want you three showing up and then Mr. Harris or Mr. Walters shows up to drag us home.” Mal smiles and says her goodbyes and then leaves with her security. Kaya says goodbye to her father who is leaving to be with her mother and then she walks with Tyler to Gavin’s room. Tyler watches as everyone else leaves back to the conference room and then turns and sits in a chair by the door, “don’t take to long squirt I’m waiting for you to go to the press conference and then make sure you don’t stay at the office tonight.” 

Kaya laughs and says, “fine just try not to embarrass me today or I promise I will set my sister-in-law, your mother, and your mother-in-law on you.” Tyler puts up his hands in surrender and stays in his seat. Kaya opens the door and walks into the big room with a view. There is a huge hospital bed and big shower to one side of the room through an open door and a big couch and then a desk next to it. On the other side there is a dresser set that is built into the wall for stability. She looks around and sees Gavin in his bed then smiles as he sees her and smiles back at her. She walks to the side where there is a comfortable chair next to him. She sits down and looks up at him, “so what’s new doc?” He can’t help himself he starts to laugh, “oh you know just in the hospital after being caught kiss a Greek goddess. Just your standard victim of someone’s jealousy type of situation.” Kaya smirks and looks down for a moment, “yeah I’m sorry for all this I never wanted anything to happen to you. I swear I thought that no one was around, and you weren’t going to be seen with me.” Gavin shakes his head, “don’t worry about it my parents already told me everything you told them and to be honest I agree with my dad s**t happens. You weren’t forcing me to kiss you and you didn’t even tell me your name so how could you have known that this would happen.” Kaya shakes her head and puts it in her hands, so Gavin throws his legs over the bed and takes hold of her shoulders. They are so small in his large vain covered hands. He moves his hand to her chin forcing her to look at him, “it’s not your fault and I promise that I don’t blame you. In fact, I think I should be thanking you Tracey’s minions are keeping her off my back and telling her to leave me alone now that you and I are dating.” 

Gavin starts laughing as he grabs his phone at the sight of confusion on Kaya’s face. He unlocks his phone and hands it to her, “look at the messages from her friends on my IG. They are all talking about how great we look together and how hot you looked that night and how they will make sure that Tracey doesn’t bother me anymore. Of course, a couple of them are calling me an asshole for leaving Tracey for you but that is really only two of her friends that really don’t have very high IQs.” Kaya looks at the messages and see what he is talking about. Then she comes to one that has no picture and simply says try to be careful. She looks at Gavin who is now sitting on the bed again, “did you see this one.” She shows it to him, and he shakes his head. She calls for Bernard and he comes in. She looks at him, “we need to get him a new phone and have them track this one. Make sure no one comes in here without having their badge scanned first for authenticity.” Bernard nods and she goes on, “get his account on the watchlist and figure out who is trying to use him. I want that information yesterday. One more thing you are staying here with him and his family. I trust you so I am sure things will be fine with you here. I call the house and make sure that Albie knows from the car.” She turns to face Gavin who is now giving her an unimpressed look and says, “what?” He shakes his head, “mom said that you wound a bit tight because of who you and your family are, but this is crazy. Look I’m fine and this isn’t your fault. I promise.” Kaya shakes her head, “no it’s not that I didn’t tell your parents the who truth, I think someone is trying to use you to get to me. I have been getting death threats and there have been attempts on my life. There was one while we were eating right now and if I hadn’t caught it then I would be laying in the next room sick beyond belief. You have no clue what my life is like Ashford.” Gavin’s mouth drops open, “well I never, young miss Grayson why in the world are you calling little ole me by my house name.” Kaya can’t help herself she starts to laugh, and Bernard leaves the room to start his tasks. Gavin pulls her up the bed and she sits comfortably beside him.

Gavin lays down now and kaya turns to lay her chin on his chest that is slowly and steadily rising and falling now. She can feel the ripped muscles under his hospital gown and smell his college that just makes her feel relaxed and needy all at once. She looks up at him, “tell me what happened.” He looks at her and runs his fingers through her soft, thick hair, “will that make you feel better?” She nods so he starts to tell her how he ended up in the hospital.