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“Honestly, so have I. It was so nice having you around the office.”
“I’m coming back. Eventually,” I say, cradling my stomach fondly. “I should be cleared to go back to the office in a few weeks. And then our overly extended lunch breaks can resume.”
Rowan smiles. “I look forward to it. Jason from accounting insists on eating with me. It’s been exhausting.”
I frown, trying to remember what Jason from accounting looked like. “Isn’t he the tall blonde with the smile?”
“That’s the one.”
“He’s cute!”
“And he knows it,” Rowan deadpans, rolling her eyes. “I’m just not interested. But he definitely is.”
“Can I ask why you’re not interested?” I ask curiously. She shrugs, and I can tell I’ve touched a sore spot. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”
Rowan glances at me awkwardly. “You’ll probably tell me that I’m being stupid.”
“Try me.”
She hesitates for a moment, and then groans. “I just don’t trust the charming ones. The sweet, charismatic men who say exactly the right thing at exactly the right time—they terrify me.”
“Sounds like you’ve known a few.”
“My first boyfriend was… um… he got angry a lot.” Her skin has erupted in goosebumps. “Half the time, I didn’t know what set him off.”
There’s a note in her voice that snags my attention in a way I really don’t like. “Oh my God, Rowan. Did he hit you?”
She shakes her head. “No, no, no. He threw things and he broke stuff and he yelled, but he never hit me.” She gives me a wobbly smile. “I guess my experience with men has just made me a little jaded. I actually prefer being alone.”
She doesn’t say it with the conviction of someone who really believes that, though. I can sense the loneliness in her like a bruise that won’t heal.
“There are decent men out there, Rowan,” I assure her quietly.
“Statistically speaking, that’s gotta be true, but I sure am shit at choosing them. Even the ones that seem really sweet end up being… Well, anyway.” She takes a deep breath. “I’m more scared of men than I am interested in them.”
It strikes me that even though I probably have a ton of reasons to be scared of Misha, I never have been.
“I should know why I pick the men I do,” she says softly. “But I don’t.”
I had often wondered why Clara picked Moses. It wasn’t like he had approached her. She was the one who had dragged us into the bar that night. She was the one who had approached him with her coal-smudged eyes and her overlined lips.
Is it because she knew he would be the death of her? Maybe not quite so literally, maybe not quite so viscerally, but part of her must have known that he would take away part of her and she would never, ever get it back. Maybe she wanted that. Maybe she craved it. Maybe she needed it.
Maybe I’ve made the same mistake.
“It could be that there’s something in yourself you’re trying to fix,” I suggest to Rowan, remembering that sinking feeling in my chest when I had watched Clara and Moses dancing. “And you think these guys have the solution.”
“Could be,” she agrees. “I just wish I knew what it was.”
I squeeze her hand again and for a moment, I feel like I’m squeezing Clara’s. It was just a feeling back then, but it feels so obvious now, why Clara picked Moses of all the men in the bar that night.
She wanted to self-destruct.
And I was too naïve and stupid to see it.
“I’m always here if you need me. You know that, right?”
Rowan smiles. “Thank you, Paige. It’s been a while since I’ve had a friend I could talk to like this.”
