Page 1 of Heartbreak & Cupcakes
ALEX
3:12 AMThrough blurry vision, I read the time on my phone as I swiped up and turned off the alarm that was set to go off in three minutes.
It had been nearly five years since my alarm had woken me up. I’d learned, in that time, that insomnia was a side effect of grief. Makes sense, right? When the pain is the absolute worst and all you want to do is have a few hours that you don’t feel anything, that’s the time your body is like,nah, you don’t need to sleep.
With a resigned sigh, I pushed up on my elbows to a sitting position and swung my legs over the side of the bed. My feet hit the heated hardwood as I scrolled through my notifications, emails, and schedule for the day.
When I read the headline to the link Mia, my assistant, had texted with a cringing face emoji, my jaw clenched.
Meet San Francisco’s Most Eligible Bachelor Alex Vaughn
Not Your Typical CEO: A Story of Heartache, Hardship & Humble Beginnings
The story was running in the local lifestyle magazineThe Bay Lifeand there was nothing I could do about it.
I’d thrown money and lawyers at it, but to my surprise, not everything could be bought. The only concession the publication had made was not disclosing the name of my four-year-old daughter, or the names of my late wife and son. I would protect their privacy at any cost. And this time it had come at the cost of my agreement to attend a charity event where I would be the guest of honor. Normally, I supported nonprofits anonymously. The one exception was the nonprofit I’d started with my best friends— who were my brothers even though they weren’t blood—Fostering the Future, which held an annual fundraising event. Even that, Ihatedshowing up to. Just thinking about going to the magazine’s annual gala had dread churning in my gut like bad sushi. But it was a price I was willing to pay to keep my family’s names out of print.
I was a fiercely private man. Everyone was on a need-to-know basis, and no one needed to know jack shit. So, the fact that a picture of me and a broad-stroke biography was online and in print for public consumption made me want to put my fist through a wall. But I’d learned in my early teens doing that would only hurt me, so I ran my fingers through my hair in frustration instead. It wasn’t nearly as satisfying but it was a lot less destructive and wouldn’t result in a boxer’s fracture, of which I’d had three.
If life had taught me anything it was that I couldn’t control it. All I could do was survive it. So instead of wasting time feeling sorry for myself over the unwanted attention, I deleted the message.
As I walked out of my room, I mentally ran through the schedule that Mia had also sent for the day when a sharp pain stabbed the bottom of my foot.
“Fuck,” I cursed beneath my breath as I hobbled on one leg.
Damn Legos.
After setting my injured foot back on the ground I bent down and picked up the offending plastic torture device. I turned back and tossed the blue piece in the brushed black trash bin that sat in the corner of my room. It hit the rim and fell to the bottom in a satisfying thud.
I sighed knowing that the only person I had to blame for my injury was myself. I should have learned my lesson by now. Never walk barefoot in a home with a creative four almost five-year-old. It didn’t matter that I had a housekeeper who was amazing at her job. The damn things were like gremlins that got wet. They multiplied.
As I continued down the hallway the motion sensor blackout blinds automatically retracted revealing floor-to-ceiling glass. My six thousand square foot Telegraph Hill penthouse sat above the city and faced the water. My not-so-humble abode boasted twenty-foot ceilings, six bedrooms, eight baths, a library, media room, and gym.
Some people might think that my home was a symbol of my success. But it wasn’t. This penthouse was a promise fulfilled. A promise I made when I was a twelve-year-old kid sitting on the steps of the group home the state had placed me in.
