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I wanted to grab her and make her listen, but I knew I didn’t have the right to touch her right now; plus, I was a little afraid she might actually make good on her threat and split my head open with the lamp.
“Grady...”
But they were gone, the door slamming behind them. The last image of Grady, tears running down his round cheeks from behind those owlish glasses, breaking my heart in two.
Holy fuck.
My entire world had just collapsed right at the moment I’d discovered what my entire world was made of.
I stared at the closed door, my heart thundering in my chest.
“I want to marry you, Lauren. Jesus...I’m sorry.”
The ring box slipped from my fingers to drop to the floor.
What was I going to do?
How did I make this better? Was it even possible? Or had I just lost the one woman who was made just for me over a dumbass move that I’d take back in a heartbeat if I could.
I was out of my depth, but I knew I needed to give Lauren some space, even though every nerve in my body was screaming at me to follow her and drag her back.
She just needed to go home and calm down, breathe and realize that I was sorry, and then she would forgive me and we would get back on track to bliss.
Yeah, solid plan. Except my heart was still skipping beats, my palms were sweaty and I felt like I needed to puke.
God, help me. I really fucked up this time.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Lauren
FOR THE FIFTH consecutive day, a huge, ostentatious flower arrangement arrived, and for the fifth consecutive time, I dumped it down the trash chute.
Grady, unusually quiet since leaving Nico’s apartment, watched as I silently fumed at Nico’s dogged refusal to leave us alone.
The calls and texts—I blocked.
The flowers—I trashed.
The voice mail on my home machine—I deleted.
Somehow, he even managed to find my email; I deleted that, too.
I didn’t want anything to do with Nico. I was half tempted to donate the money he’d given me for the fake project to charity, but I needed money to live.
So, even though I hated it, I had to keep the cash, and that just pissed me off all over again.
True to Patrice’s word, she’d trashed me around town. No one would hire me right now. Not even the small newspaper I’d contacted out of desperation.
At this point I’d happily take writing ad copy for dog food, but not even they were willing to hire me.
If Nico’s project had been real I could’ve used it as a great springboard, but just like everything associated with Nico, it was fake and useless.
Each morning, I cried in the shower so Grady didn’t see me break down, but sometimes I couldn’t help myself and I found tears running down my cheeks.
Like right now.
“Mama?” Grady’s worried voice ate at me. I wiped away the tears and tried to smile for his benefit. He crawled into my lap and I rested my chin on his little head. “Are you going to stay mad at Nico for a long time?”
I cursed his name inside my head, hurting for my son as much as I hurt for myself. “Probably,” I answered truthfully.
“What if he said he’s sorry?” Grady asked. “You said that saying sorry is the best thing to do when you’ve done something bad.”
“Yes, but it doesn’t always work that way with adults,” I said, wishing I could erase Nico from Grady’s memory. “Nico isn’t going to be part of our lives anymore. We need to put him behind us and focus on moving forward.”
But Grady wasn’t interested in moving forward. “But I miss him.”
“Eventually, you’ll stop missing him,” I assured my little guy, but I wasn’t sure if that was true because there was a Nico-sized hole in my heart that I didn’t think would ever heal. I wasn’t going to pretend that Grady wasn’t suffering the same pain. I could only hope that eventually Nico would fade away in both our memories.
Fat chance, but I could hope.
“What did he do?” Grady asked.
“Honey, it’s grown-up stuff. I don’t want to talk about it right now, okay?” I kissed his forehead and held him tight. “We don’t need Nico anyway. We’re a team, right?”
Grady nodded, but I felt his sadness weighing me down like a rock in my pocket.
“How about we order pizza and have a movie night?”
But Grady didn’t want pizza or popcorn or even soda. He hated our apartment, wanted to go sailing and wanted to see Nico. Nothing I did was going to measure up, and I just had to weather his disappointment. I’d done the cruelest and most careless thing imaginable—I’d given my little son a glimpse of what it might be like to have a father and then I’d taken it all away with little explanation aside from “Nico did a bad thing.” It was little wonder Grady was sullen, sad and angry.
And I didn’t know what to do to fix things. I had a sinking feeling that only time would make things better, but that didn’t do much for either of our broken hearts.
CHAPTER THIRTY
Nico
I’D NEVER EXPERIENCED the awful drag of time until a month had passed since Lauren left and I thought surely it’d been longer than thirty days.
My ragged heart felt as if it’d been chewed and spit out by a rabid dog and then shit on.
Against my better judgment, I agreed to accompany Dante to the club to hit a couple of balls at the driving range. Golf wasn’t my usual go-to sport to let off some steam, but seeing as I’d been hibernating in my apartment, existing on takeout and ice cream, I didn’t think I’d have the stamina for much else.
I’d even gained a few pounds.
“You need to hit the gym,” Dante said with a grimace when I groaned to tie my shoes. “You look like you’ve gained twenty pounds.”
“Fuck off,” I muttered, breathing a little heavier as I stood up. “So I’ve gained a few pounds, big deal. I’ve been a little messed up.”
“Don’t be a pussy,” Dante said as we walked into the country club, flashing a cool smile to everyone who made the effort to notice us. “You’ve been moping around in that apartment so much you’ve started to grow mold. Pick yourself up, shake it off and move on. Isn’t that what you do best?”
Yeah, but I’d never been in love with any of the women I’d moved on from. Not the case with Lauren. I still dreamed about her, fantasized about her and missed her like a fat kid missed cake.
Except, according to Dante, I was becoming the fat kid.
“She won’t accept any of my calls,” I said, ignoring Dante’s look of disgust. “I’ve had flowers delivered, but she throws them away. How do I know that? I paid the neighbor to tell me if she accepts or tosses them. She tosses them. Right down the garbage chute. I tried leaving a voice mail on her home phone, but she changed her number. Aside from stalking her—”
“Sounds like you’re already doing that,” Dante cut in drily. “Give it a rest. You sound pathetic.”
“I love her,” I said simply. “I can’t give up.”
“She’s moved on. You need to, as well.”
We got to the range and I started to grab my nine iron when I heard a familiar voice. I turned to see Houston Beaumont laughing it up with his buddies a few lanes down. I looked away, not wanting to see the man because I didn’t trust my ability to remain calm when I was already unstable as fuck.
Living on Häagen-Dazs and Chinese food wasn’t great for your mental health or your waistline, apparently.
My plan was to ignore him entirely but Houston saw us and headed over, completely unaware that I wanted to shove my nine iron so far up his ass the hosel of my club used his uvula as my tee.
“Holy crap, it’s the Donato boys. I haven’t seen you in ages. How the fuck are you?” Houston asked, clapping Dante on the back.
“How’s business?”
“Business is good,” Dante answered, squinting against the sun. Houston had never been one of Dante’s favorite people, but now he was Public Enemy No. 1 in my eyes.
Because I was already in a shitastic mood, I decided to poke the bear and see what happened.
“So, you have a kid...” I said, watching his reaction. “Never knew that until recently.”
Dante narrowed his gaze and realized quickly enough where I was going with this. He cut his stare to Houston, and we were both suddenly judging him and Houston knew it.
