The Heartbreaker

by Cat Carmine

  “Have you ever been here?” I ask, even though I can tell by how wide her eyes are that she hasn’t. “It’s the place we got delivery from the other day.”

  “Never.” She bites her lip. “I’m from Connecticut, you know. We don’t have places like this there.”

  I smile. “I remember.”

  “You remember?”

  “From your resume. Executive assistant to the CEO of Bloomers flower shop in Highfield, Connecticut.”

  “Oh. Right.” Her cheeks color. “That’s actually my parents’ store,” she admits.

  “I know.”

  “You do?”

  “I looked it up after I hired you. I was curious about what kind of executive assistant didn’t know how to work a coffee machine.”

  Blake’s cheeks are still red, but now she laughs. “I might have exaggerated a tad.”

  “A tad.”

  There’s something charming about her precociousness. In the past, I would have fired an assistant for less, but there’s something charming and, I don’t know, kind of ballsy about Blake. I like it. I like her, I realize.

  “Did you like Connecticut?” I ask, because it seems an easier thing to say than anything else that might come shooting out of my mouth right now.

  She looks thoughtful. “I did. It’s quiet, and ... I don’t know, homey.”

  “So what made you move to New York?”

  She shrugs. “I guess I just wanted to see what else was out there. My sisters both live here, and they always seemed to have these glamorous, fabulous lives, you know? Cool careers, amazing boyfriends, busy social calendars. I was working for my parents, and my social life was getting smaller and smaller, to the point where a lively Friday night was when Netflix got a new season of Orange is the New Black. Plus, when you live in a small town, the dating pool gets really incestuous, really quick.”

  I laugh at that, a genuine laugh that seems to take Blake by surprise. Her cheeks color softly, and a small smile spreads over her lips.

  “I’m pretty familiar with that, actually,” I tell her. “I grew up in Connecticut.”

  “You did? I didn’t know that.”

  “Born and raised. My sister Heather and her family still live out there.”

  “Heather — that would be Jack and Daisy’s mom?”

  “That’s right, yes. She had no interest in relocating to New York. She owns shares in the company, but she had no interest in the day to day management of it. So she attends the annual general meeting, and that’s about it.”

  “And you took over?”

  “Pretty much. It was always kind of a given. I’ve been working here since I was ... well, legally too young to even be working.” I flash her a grin, and she laughs.

  “Child labor. Lovely. I’m surprised you haven’t put Jack to work yet.”

  I chuckle. “Now there’s an idea.”

  A silence descends between us, but it isn’t awkward or tense, just comfortable. Blake sips her soda water and gazes around the restaurant, and I admire the sleek lines of her profile, the way her braid falls softly down over her shoulder. God, she’s really, really beautiful. And the strange thing is, she doesn’t even seem to realize it. She’s so unselfconscious, the way she twists the end of her plait, the way she gnaws at her bottom lip. It’s more tantalizing than the raunchiest strip tease, more stirring than a great work of art.

  She turns to face me again, her chin resting in her hands. Her blue eyes sparkle in the dim restaurant lighting. “Do you ever think about having kids of your own? You know, to shore up the Cartwright labor forces.”

  The question catches me off guard, and I shake my head before I even have time to truly consider my answer. “No way. I love my niece and nephew, but that level of responsibility isn’t for me.”

  Blake gnaws her lip again. This time she isn’t smiling. “But you were so great with them. You’d be a great dad.”

  “That was a weekend. Kids are a lifetime commitment.”

  “I know, but don’t you sometimes think it might be nice to have something … I don’t know, more?”

  I chuckle. “Not particularly, no.” I try to keep the tone light, but the truth is, this line of questioning is starting to get uncomfortable. Right now, Blake sounds a little too much like Heather and my mother. I think of Heather’s word the other day — stunted. Maybe Blake thinks I’m stunted, too. The thought bothers me more than I’m willing to admit.

  She twists her lip so hard, I swear she’s going to bruise it. And I could think of a much more satisfying way to bruise those plump, beautiful lips of hers. When she finally flutters her lashes back up to look at me again, her face is serious.

  “Who broke your heart, Logan?”

  The question stops me cold. Blake’s blue eyes seem to bore into me. My ribs tighten. I could tell her, I think. Tell her about Laura and about what we went through and about how I’m afraid I’m permanently broken on the inside now.

  But then I imagine the piteous way she’d look at me. And I can’t take Blake’s pity.

  So instead, I fix her with a frozen glare. “No one,” I say with a half-grin, half-sneer. “I do the heartbreaking around here. You should know that by now.”

  “Right.” Blake blinks, once, twice, three times. Her eyes look glassy, but that must be the reflection from the candlelight.

  Suddenly, I feel desperate to turn this evening around. “Do you want to get out of here?” I turn my sneer into what I hope is a charming grin.

  “And go where?” Blake is leaning back in her chair, folding her napkin, her bottom lip nestled under her teeth again.

  “I don’t know. Don’t really care, either. But if you keep chewing on that lip like that, you’re going to drive me criminally insane.”

  Blake gives me a weak smile. “Actually, I should probably just get home. I’m feeling pretty tired.”

  It’s not the answer I’m expecting. Frankly, no is not an answer I’m ever expecting. “Is everything okay?”

  “Fine. Like I said, just tired.”

  “Then let me take you home.”

  Blake laughs softly. “Logan, I’m fine. Really. I’ll take a cab.”

  I want to argue, but I know from experience that there’s no point arguing with Blake. “Well, you’ll put it on the company card, at least?”

  “Of course.” A brief smile flits across her beautiful face. “I always do.”

  “Let me just settle up the bill then, and I’ll walk you out.”

  “Okay.”

  As I hail our server over, I catch Blake eyeballing the table next to us. It’s an older couple, maybe twice my age, and they’re finishing up their meal with what looks like the world’s most decadent chocolate cake. Blake rubs her thumb over the corner of her mouth as she watches them eat.

  “You want that cake, don’t you?”

  “Hmm?” she turns to me in surprise. “Oh, no.”

  “Blake, you just wiped away a spot of drool.”

  She touches her mouth again, embarrassed but laughing. “Oh God, I did, didn’t I?”

  “Yes. Let me at least get you some cake to take home with you.”

  “Well...”

  “Come on. Don’t fight me on this one.”

  “Okay. If you insist.”

  Ten minutes later, I put Blake — and three pieces of cake, safely nestled in plastic to-go containers — into a taxi. I stand on the street until long after the cab has driven out of sight, until the chill of the evening air cuts through my suit jacket and I call my own driver to pick me up. We drive aimlessly around Manhattan for awhile, because I can already tell that sleep won’t come easy tonight, and I’m in no hurry to get back to my empty penthouse.

  Twenty

  When Lucy finds me the next morning, it’s sprawled on the couch, surrounded by three empty containers of take-out cake. She closes the door of the apartment behind her, dropping her purse on the hall table and regarding me with a bemused expression.

  I sit up, rubbing my eyes. �
�Did you sleep at Lou’s last night?” Lou is Lucy’s boyfriend, supposedly, although I’ve never met him. All I know is that he works in insurance or something.

  “Yeah. I see you had a fun night.” She’s smirking at me, so I smirk back.

  “Probably not as fun as yours.” I stifle a yawn, as if to prove my point.

  “Oh, I wouldn’t be so sure about that,” she mutters.

  Lucy and Lou have been together for three years, I think, but I can’t say I’ve ever heard her get all gushy about him. Then again, maybe that’s just what happens when you’ve been together with someone for that long. I smile sympathetically, even though I still think she probably had a better night than I did. Dinner with Logan had started out so promising, but any inkling of hope I’d held that maybe we could have something real, that maybe this baby could bring us together somehow, had been well and firmly dashed. Logan is who he is. I’d been an idiot to think that I or a baby could change that.

  Lucy disappears into the bathroom, so I stagger to my feet and bring the empty take-away containers into the kitchen, rinse them out, and dump them into the recycling bin. Just that small amount of motion — or maybe it’s the whiff of leftover chocolate — is enough to trigger my nausea. I lean against the counter and take a few deep breaths while I wait for Lucy to finish in the bathroom, then groan when I hear the shower start up.

  Okay, Blake, you can do this. Deep breaths.

  I pour myself a glass of water and take small sips while I try to ignore the rocking in my stomach. I will not throw up. I will not.

  Nope, I’m definitely going to throw up.

  With one hand covering my mouth, I beeline towards the bathroom and throw the door open. Lucy shrieks.

  “I’m sorry,” I manage, before I hit the tile in front of the toilet.

  When I can look up again, Lucy, is peeking around the edge of the pink gingham shower curtain, frowning at me. “Are you okay?”

  “Fine.” I wipe my mouth with toilet paper and flush. “I guess I shouldn’t have eaten three pieces of cake last night.”

  “You’ve been sick a lot lately.”

  “Sensitive stomach. I’ve always been like that.”

  “Hmmm.”

  I can’t meet her eye as I wash my hands and rinse out my mouth, but I can feel her watching me.

  “All done,” I announce. “You may now return to your regularly scheduled programming.” I slip out of the bathroom before Lucy can say anything.

  Once I’m in the safety of my bedroom, I flop down onto the quilt. I’m going to have to tell Lucy eventually, I realize. I won’t be able to blame my growing stomach on the cake — at least not for too long. But I should tell Logan first, right? That’s the only fair thing to do. Except now I’m dreading that more than ever.

  Not having anyone to talk about this with is killing me a little bit. I need advice. Perspective. Because when it comes to Logan, I seem to have lost mine.

  Just as I think that, my phone rings. Rori, I see, when I glance down at the screen. I almost cry in happiness.

  “Hi!” My voice is as bouncy as Tigger. You’d never know that less than five minutes ago, I was puking my guts out.

  “Well, hi to you, too. You’re chipper this morning.”

  “Just being my natural, perky self.”

  “Right. Listen, Emma and I were thinking of going out for drinks tonight. Do you want to come? The guys are going to some post-golf-tournament drinking thing out at the country club, and neither of us feel like going with them.”

  “Yes!” I almost scream the word into the phone. Then I force myself to calm down. “I mean, yes, that sounds lovely.”

  “Are you sure you’re okay?” Rori asks, after a slight pause.

  “Super.” Never mind that she’s the second person to ask me that so far this morning.

  “Okay, well, we’ll pick you up tonight around eight. Bring Lucy, too, if she wants to come.”

  “Sure. That sounds great. Thanks, Rori.”

  “No problem,” she says, though the tone of her voice is surprised.

  By eight o’clock, I’ve had about thirteen mini-breakdowns, mostly over the fact that all my clothes are horrible and scratchy and tight and I don’t want to wear any of them.

  “Remind me why I agreed to this, again?” I rifle through my closet one more time, as if the perfect outfit might magically appear. All I want to wear is pajamas. Why isn’t wearing pajamas to a bar more socially acceptable?

  “Because you’re a vibrant single woman living in New York City, and going out is what you’re supposed to do?”

  Lucy, of course, looks ridiculously cute in a pink dress and strappy sandals. I’m not even showing yet, and I already feel like a beached whale. What the hell am I going to feel like when I actually have a basketball for a stomach? I can only imagine that once I get to that point, I’ll have given up on what’s ‘socially acceptable’ and fully embraced the pajamas-as-clothes thing.

  “Your sister’s going to be here any minute,” Lucy so helpfully points out as I fling dress after dress onto my unmade bed. “I’m sure whatever you wear is going to be fine.”

  I don’t want fine. The Sex and the City life I imagined for myself when I moved to New York didn’t involve looking fine, it involved looking fabulous. At all times.

  I reluctantly fish some leggings out of the drawer. I opt for a pair that’s at least black and has a strip of leather running up the sides. That makes it somewhat cool, right? Paired with a stretchy jersey tunic, it’s almost as comfortable as pajamas and almost as fashionable as clothes. This is the closest to a win I’m going to get tonight.

  “Ready, Cinderella?” Lucy smirks.

  “Joke’s on you — I’m not Cinderella. I’m the pumpkin.”

  “Oh, please.” She rolls her eyes, then takes my arm and leads me out into the hallway.

  The bar my sisters have chosen is loud and crowded and abuzz with sexual tension. I really do feel like a pumpkin now. I think longingly of all the hot dresses in my closet. Will I ever wear them again? Once I’m a mom — especially a single mom — I won’t have the time or energy to do things like go out dancing anymore. I watch a girl in a black satin dress kick it up on the dance floor and sigh wistfully. That was me, once. Not so long ago, actually.

  “Thinking of switching teams?” my sister Rori shouts. She wears a wicked grin.

  “Huh?”

  “You’re practically drooling over that girl out there.”

  Oops. Busted. “I was just admiring her dress.” I can’t tell Rori that it wasn’t really the girl I was ogling, or even really the dress. It was my former life, the one I’d dreamed of for myself. In a blink, it disappeared. Thanks to one stupid mistake.

  I know the baby is too small, that it’s barely more than a zygote, but still I swear I feel it punch me in the kidneys at that. I rest my hand lightly on my stomach and blink in surprise.

  “You okay?” Rori frowns.

  “Absolutely.” I force a smile.

  “Come on, let’s go get a drink.”

  I let my sister lead me up to the bar, where we find Emma and Lucy already waiting in line. Emma and Lucy were friends first, and I know they’re still close, so when I see them huddled deep in conversation, I get a twisting in my gut that has nothing to do with the little zygote. Would Lucy say anything to Emma about how strange I’d been acting lately, or maybe about the throwing up? Surely not, right? Isn’t that the roommate code, or something? What happens on Tremaine Street stays on Tremaine Street and all that.

  Emma sneaks a glance over at me and smiles. My nerves ratchet up another notch. Is that a knowing smile? Or just a friendly one?

  “Ready to get your drink on?” Emma shouts.

  I relax. At least a smidge. “Definitely!”

  But when we get to the bar, I catch the bartender’s eye and ask for a cranberry and soda.

  “What?” Rori and Emma eye me simultaneously. “Come on, have a real drink.”

  “Not tonight,
” I shrug. “I’m not feeling it.”

  “Come on,” Emma protests. “Live a little. How often do we all go out together anymore?”

  “I know, but we don’t need to drink to have fun, right?” God, I sound like a goody-two shoes preacher’s daughter or something.

  Emma rolls her eyes and laughs. “No, but it helps. Come on. I’m getting you a real drink.” She flags down the bartender again. “Make sure you add some vodka to that cranberry soda,” she shouts.

  The bartender glances over at me for confirmation, but I shake my head. “No, thank you. Just the soda is fine.”

  “Blake, since when do you not drink? Seriously.” She turns back to the bartender. “She’ll have the vodka.”

  I grab her arm. “Emma, stop. I’m not drinking tonight. My stomach’s been a bit off lately, and I don’t want to push it.”

  Emma rolls her eyes. She’s so stubborn sometimes. “Blake, come on. What are you … pregnant?” Her lips quirk up at the end of the question.

  “Yes,” I blurt. Everything stops. The music in the bar is still thumping, but a cavern of silence has grown between the four of us. Emma and Rori stare at me in horror and confusion. My face flushes.

  “Excuse me?” Emma’s face is pale.

  “Did she just say she’s pregnant?” Rori looks back and forth between Emma and me.

  “You’re joking, right?” Emma’s whole body is rigid.

  “I knew it,” Lucy smirks. “Nobody gets food poisoning that often. And nobody eats that many pickles for no reason.”

  The bartender returns and sets our drinks in front of us — cosmos for Emma, Rori, and Lucy, and a cranberry soda for me. I take my drink and sip from it, just so I’ll have something to do with my hands. Everyone is still staring at me. I honestly can’t tell whether they’re happy or mad or disappointed or what. I think the only emotion anyone is feeling right now is shock.

  Which I get. I’m feeling more than a little shell-shocked myself these days.

  “Are you okay?” Rori asks, finally, putting her hand gently on my arm. “This is ... wow.”

  Tears prick my eyes. “I honestly don’t even know. I’m still trying to adjust to this new reality.”