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"Hey Britt." I try for casual. Maybe this is all just a huge coincidence. Maybe Tom hadn’t actually said anything to her.
"You’ve got yourself a real cold fish there, boss!" he calls out. Obviously, his pride has been bruised, and like a fucktard, he wants his bank account to be too.
"You’re fired," I call back casually. "Now get the hell out of here." I don’t even bother looking at him when I say it. He isn’t worth my time. I hear a fight break out between him and what I assume is the bouncer for the bar, but I ignore it all. "Brittney?" I say tentatively, reaching out to her like I would towards a wild animal, cornered and angry and ready to bite at any moment.
"How?" She looks up at me, finally making eye contact and I flinch, almost wishing she hadn’t. My beautiful, funny, confident Brittney is gone, and in her place is a woman who looks as if death cannot come quickly enough. I’m not even sure if she’s angry with me, or just in such a state of shock, she can’t feel anything at all.
"I had my guys at work do a little digging," I say desperately, trying to head off her questions. "That’s all. I just wanted to impress you."
"Impress me?" she echoes. "Impress me?! You godda
mn manipulated me!!!" Her roar echoes around the noisy bar and the sound level drops to zero. I swear to god, I can hear people breathing. "You goddamn motherfucking piece of shit! You researched me like you would an acquisition! You gathered that knowledge so you could use it! I can’t believe I fucked you! Well, fuck you!" The whole bar gasps collectively and a white filmy haze drops over my eyes and I realize that I, too, am going into shock.
I’d just wanted to make her fall in love with me.
I hadn’t even been able to show her my dance moves. After three weeks of lessons, I can’t show her a single one.
A tiny – minuscule – part of my brain realizes that my dance lessons aren’t important here, but I’m having a hard time focusing on any one thing at the moment.
Her chest is heaving and she’s glaring at me so hard, I’m surprised my hair doesn’t catch on fire.
"You, Kaden Charles, may be a genius on Wall Street, but you’re a fucking retard when it comes to women. Erica, get me out of here."
And the three women walk arm in arm out of the bar to the clapping and whistling of onlookers, while I simply wish for death to come find me, and quickly.
Brittney
I’m staring down at my tequila shot, the amber liquid saying nothing but "Drink me." Not exactly helpful advice, but I take it anyway and toss back the shot. I feel the warmth of the alcohol spread through my veins, but it doesn’t make me feel any better.
Nothing makes me feel better.
Lisa leans over and gives me a one-armed hug. I snuffle into her arm. I probably sound like a two-year-old crying to her mom, but I don’t even care right now.
"Whhhhhyyyyyyy???" I wail. Lisa quickens her patting pace until it’s almost a fan, cooling me off. "Why do I fall for these assholes?!"
"I know, honey," she says comfortingly. "Guys just can’t help but be assholes sometimes."
She knows what she’s talking about – Diesel had decided for her that she wouldn’t want to move to Long Island, not even bothering to ask her until his broken heart had finally driven him to stop being an idiot.
Somehow, I don’t have as much faith in Kaden. He really is a genius in the boardroom, and an idiot outside of it.
But dammit, he was an idiot I happened to be falling for.
The waterworks display is seriously getting out of control here. Even I realize that. I try to snuffle my tears back. Lisa hands me a tissue and I honk my nose.
God, I’m so ladylike. I roll my eyes at myself.
"The thing is, I’m not even so sure that I mind that he stalked me. Okay, so really, greasing some palms and finding out how much vacation time I have on the books is just totally beyond the pale, but he did it because he wanted to impress me. That’s kinda flattering, really. The fact that he took that much time to really learn about me…I wish he’d taken the time to ask me instead of sending out a team of investigators to discover this stuff, but god, he was just trying to make me happy."
I’ll admit it – this realization took me almost a week to really wrap my mind around. At first, I’d just been too pissed to think straight, and then I was too depressed.
The good news is, I took that week of vacation that my boss has been hounding me about.
The bad news is, I spent that week at home in my PJs, eating Girl Scout cookies, watching every variation of Pride & Prejudice that I could get my hands on, and crying.
I really shouldn’t have any tears left in me. I don’t know how I can still be producing any at this point.
"So why are you so unhappy?" Lisa has changed her pats over to strokes up and down my arm, and I sink into her side even further. This. This is what I need. A balm to soothe my soul.
