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Why did you think you could hack it in New York?
You should just come home to Kentucky where you belong.
A vicious chorus of criticism ran through my head—Tara’s voice, followed by Damian’s. And each time I felt the itch to distract myself, to reach for my sketchbook, I stopped myself. God forbid Damian see me not 100 percent productive 100 percent of the time.
God forbid I try to advance in a direction ofmychoosing.
God forbid I go after whatIwant.
And above all the internal strife, there was just one question:How had I ended up here again?Not in an office job, not in New York City, buthere—feeling like a small, meaningless annoyance. The one that dragged down everyone else’s plans. Everybody’s favorite letdown.
Tommy had excelled at making me feel this way. But it didn’t start with him.
Quick footsteps interrupted my sulky morning. Damian came down the hallway, his neck bent, phone pressed to his head. He glanced up only briefly as he passed me, and then disappeared into his office, the door clicking shut.
I was left with nothing but the memory of his handsome face and the lingering scent of his woodsy musk.
I slumped into my seat. This wasn’t just uncomfortable. This mother-cluckin’sucked.
I drew a fortifying breath and straightened my back. We could be adults. We could sort this out. I headed for his office. Before the door opened even six inches, I heard his gritty growl.
“Jessa, not now.”
The words were harsh, but the tone was worse. I winced as though I’d been slapped and shut the door again, turning back to my desk.
Goodbye, good times at Fairchild Enterprises.
This felt exactly like when I’d started here, dealing with the moody, work-obsessed version of Damian, the one who couldn’t spare a laugh or a smile. I thought I’d coaxed the real Damian back out, but he’d never truly left his cave.
After stewing and fretting for a half hour, I popped onto the office messaging app and sent Damian a message.
JESSA: Everything okay? You seem tense.
Ten minutes later, his response came.
DAMIAN: Yep, all good.
Things were far from all good, but at least those three words let me know where we stood: square one. He was pulling away again, reinstating that professional distance that was so deep we could both drown in it. I could feel it like a storm rolling in.
Damian was MIA most of the day, which meant he didn’t even see Kendra when she bopped into the office suite, looking for the spare apartment key I’d promised her. She greeted me with a big smile, that same messenger bag across her chest, who-knew-what tucked inside.
“Hey, roomie. I’ve got my stuff all loaded up. I’m ready to move in.”
I rummaged in my purse and found the key, passing it to her with a conspiratorial smile. “I’m ready for you to move in, too. Welcome to the crazy house.”
“Thefamoushouse,” she corrected me, pocketing the key. “Which requires a certain element of crazy to function."
Kendra left, and I was caught between two worlds—excitement for this new chapter of my life in New York and utter sadness over the Damian chapter most likely coming to an end. Because this had to be the end. How could it not be?
At the risk of proving Damian right about my commitment to his company, I informed him I’d be leaving fifteen minutes early for a personal reason and left the office right at 4:45.
Truthfully, I wanted to get a head start on the rest of my day and needed to swing by my apartment before I headed to the Garment District. Class was tonight, and I had so many thoughts knocking around in my head that I needed all the extra seconds possible to get past this Damian drama. He was all-consuming, and I needed to remember what my life felt like outside the bounds of his world.
I flitted through the Fairchild building and headed for the subway. I even caught an earlier train, and I relished in this strange feeling of not being rushed for once.
My heels hit the pavement outside the subway station, only a few people filtering up the steps alongside me. Darkness had already descended upon the city at the unbearably early hour of 5:30. This was late fall in the east, I supposed. The sidewalks were emptier than usual, so I kept my head down and beelined for my apartment a few blocks away.
But I’d barely made it a block when I felt an arm wrap around my shoulders. Strange heat sank into me, an unknown body pressed against me.
