Page 62 of The Life She Had

Liam: Client called. Emergency meeting.

Celeste: Damn. Well, I guess I’ll need to take a rain check.

It’s another thirty minutes before he replies with a simple yes. From there, she responds quickly, and he takes about twenty minutes to answer each time.

Celeste: Everything okay?

Liam: Yes.

Celeste: It doesn’t sound like it.

Liam: Just busy.

Celeste: Okay, so I’ll see you tonight, then? Should I plan on you for dinner?

Liam: No.

Celeste: No to dinner? Or no to coming over?

He hasn’t answered that, though it’s been an hour.

Tom shrugs. “Sounds like he’s busy, as you said.”

“He’s texted me from actual court before, and it still didn’t sound like that.”

“Either he’s busy, as he says, or he doesn’t want to talk. There was some tense shit last night. Maybe everything seemed fine, but this morning, he woke up in a mood. It happens. He decided he’d been wronged and stalked off, and now he’s being snippy, waiting for you to drag the truth out of him.” Tom puts out his hand. “That’ll be ten bucks.”

Her brows arch. “For what?”

“Relationship therapy. I have absolutely zero qualifications. Therefore, you get it cheap.”

Celeste looks at me. “What do you think, Daisy?”

“I’m with Tom,” I say. “Liam did say he had an emergency and, no offense, but you keep texting. Or maybe he woke up this morning and decided he was the offended party when he had a bruise from Tom slugging him.”

“I didn’t hit him that hard,” Tom says.

“You knocked him out of his chair.” I turn back to Celeste. “Give him time. If he decides not to come over, that’s his loss.” I push my chair out. “I need to get back to that weeding, but thank you for lunch, Celeste.”

Celeste

Liam’s phone rings through to voice mail. I hang up without leaving a message. After thirty minutes of work, I call again, and this time, I wait through the message. The beep comes, and I take a deep breath.

“Hey, just me. You know I’m not a clingy girlfriend. This is just... Well, it’s weird, Liam. You’ve never left in the morning without saying goodbye. You’ve never even left without...” An unsteady laugh. “You do like your good mornings. Also...”

I take a deep breath, hearing it hiss along the line. “I woke up last night, and you weren’t there. I remember looking at the clock. It was almost three. I figured you were in the bathroom, and I was going to use it after you, but then I fell back to sleep.”

I switch the phone to my other ear. “I’m being paranoid, I know. You must have come back to bed after that and got a call this morning.”

I inhale. “Okay, I’ll stop babbling to your answering machine. Just call, okay?”

An hour later,I open my contact list and pull up someone I’ve spoken to many times but only texted once, to let him know that Liam and I would be late for a dinner engagement. It’s another partner at Liam’s firm, the one who brought him into the company.

Me: Hey, Joaquin, it’s Celeste Turner, Liam’s gf.

It takes ten minutes to get a response.

Joaquin: Celeste! Of course I know who you are, though when you typed “gf” I kept thinking gluten-free. LOL

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