by Mia Ford
“Love you too, sweetie.” He waved as I walked inside.
I shut the door behind me and looked around, realizing that Tanner had been hiding in my room. I sprinted back, but the place was empty, Tanner already gone. My heart sank, even though I knew it was insane to think he had waited there for me. I had left when the situation was flipped, and after what I had said, it would be hard to believe he wasn’t hurt. I picked up my phone and dialed his number, but he never picked up. I didn’t want to leave a voicemail since I wasn’t exactly sure what I wanted to say. I needed him to get in contact with me, to tell me everything was okay, but in reality, I wasn’t sure if it was. I sent him a text and closed my phone, waiting patiently for a reply that would never come.
He may be able to ignore my calls and texts, but that didn’t mean he could avoid me in person. I knew where he worked, and I would make sure to go in tomorrow and show up at his desk. I wasn’t going to let him push me out of his life, not after I realized how much I cared about him. I needed to apologize, I knew that, but my problem wasn’t my inability to apologize, it was the stubbornness I knew he had in him. He always talked about how stubborn my father was, but what he didn’t realize was when someone challenged him outside of his comfort zone, he was just as stubborn and frustrating. It was definitely going to be tough. Knowing that, I had to brace for a fight. Hopefully, I could get to him before he completely cut me out of his life.
I mean, he couldn’t ignore me when I laid it all out on the line. At least, I hoped that he couldn’t. No matter how many times he walked away, he would still hear the words, and that was important. Once they were in his mind, they couldn’t be erased, and no matter how much he was ignoring me, he really did care. I saw it in his face when he came over to check on me, I heard it in his voice when he gave me the week off, and I read it in his eyes as we made love on my couch. He could deny it to himself all he wanted, but he couldn’t fool me. There was no hiding himself from me because I’d grown to know him, to love him.
I went into my bedroom and picked out my clothes for the next day, wanting to look as good as possible. When I was done, I jumped in the shower and let the hot water run over me, washing the stresses down the drain. Finally, after so many days of worrying, I had my father back in my life, but it came at a price. I had lied to him and to myself about my feelings for Tanner, and now I had to fix things with Tanner before it was too late. My father told me I could do and have anything I put my mind to, and I wanted a relationship with my family and a relationship with Tanner at the same time. I just wasn’t sure if it was possible anymore.
Chapter 25
Tanner
It was Thursday, and after yesterday, I wasn’t even sure if I would make it to the weekend. I had deliberately separated myself from my emotions and feelings for Ava, but instead of giving me back my motivation, it left a hole. I felt down, bleak, and pretty empty inside, something that wasn’t going to fly when I met with the investors later on. I was wrapping up a meeting at that moment, but had no clue as to what we had talked about since my brain seemed to have gone in its own direction.
There was nothing worse than fighting your own brain to stay on cue. I knew that this would eventually end, and I would feel better someday, but it was not what I wanted to be going through at such a critical time for the business. I wanted to be focused, on my game, and ready to jump headfirst into this merger with everyone else. I had neglected everything because of the issues with Ava, and now that she had made it perfectly clear that she was not planning on seeing me anymore, I needed to get my life back.
I wasn’t angry per se, but I was definitely feeling hurt, and that was an emotion that I just didn’t know how to handle. I hadn’t been hurt by a woman since my ex, and even that was more angry-hurt than heartbroken. I had seen that breakup coming a mile away, but Ava, after what we had just been through, she definitely caught me off guard. It was hard to ignore her phone calls and texts, but I didn’t even know what to say to her, and it was seeming impossible to fight back or be angry with her. I sighed as I packed up my things and headed for the office, pausing as I passed inside, noticing Ava standing behind her desk. She looked up at me and blushed with an arm full of files. I turned toward her as she approached, wanting to smile, but keeping myself together and looking at her with confusion.
“Hi,” she said, approaching. “I wanted to give you these files. I didn’t want to interrupt the meeting, and it was already going when I got here, so I just sat it out.”
She stood there staring at me for several moments before I reached out and took the files from her hands. She looked beautiful, and she was wearing the tight red dress that I loved. I smiled awkwardly and looked through the files, realizing she had completed the work. When she had ever found the time to do that, I had no idea, but I wasn’t going to complain about it. I wanted her to stay at the company, to feel free to do her work, but I didn’t want her there if it was going to lead to awkward conversations and unneeded distractions. I could tell from the look on her face that she knew I’d heard her and her father’s conversation, but she hadn’t even tried yet, even through her texts, to explain herself. The only thing I could do was believe it was how she really felt and move on with my life. I wasn’t down for the games anymore, and I wasn’t going to chase someone who didn’t want to be with me.
“I gave you the whole week off,” I said, looking down. “You really need to decide what you’re going to do as far as staying here or not. You know I want you to stay with the company, but I can’t make the decision for you.”
She stood there staring at me as I finished up the files and gave each an initial on the left corner so she could move them on to the next section. I tried to ignore the look on her face, the tears welling up in her eyes, and the increased heart rate. I knew if I looked at her and saw her pain that I fold instantly, and I didn’t want to fold. I understood that she had been through a lot, and I understood that her father put her on the spot when he showed up unannounced, but when he did that to me, I didn’t in any way say anything that would hurt her. Sure, her father found out about us because of my phone, but it wasn’t thought out or intentional. She had thoughtfully told her father she wasn’t seeing me anymore, with the full knowledge that I could hear everything that they were saying.
I could feel the anger and hurt welling up in my chest, and I took a deep breath, finishing up the signatures and shoving the files back into her hands. I didn’t look at her face. I couldn’t, but I could feel her standing there staring at me. I turned to my secretary and tapped the desk.
“I don’t want to be disturbed for a while,” I said.
I walked away, moving into my office and shutting the door behind me. As soon as the door closed, I let out a deep breath, leaning back and rubbing my face with my hands. That was extremely hard to do, especially since I wanted to be near her, but at the same time I didn’t want to talk to her at all. I was really hurt, more than I had let myself know, and I didn’t even realize it until she was standing in front of me. Her calm voice and kind eyes hit me straight in the chest, and it sucked to even start to think about what could have been.
I walked over to the window in my office and looked out over the city, the cloudy sky reflecting my mood. Being there at work had always felt good, more homelike than it ever did in the penthouse. However, with the feeling in my chest and knowing that Ava was across the hall, feeling the same way, but with guilt on top of it, I just wanted to be at home on my couch, hiding from the world.
There weren’t many times in my life where I felt completely out of control. Actually, I prided myself on showing complete and utter control of everything in my life. I was irritated by the fact that I didn’t have control over how I felt about Ava. It was like my heart made a damn choice before my brain could even start to protest. It was bullshit, and it made me even angrier about the whole situation. Why couldn’t I just let it go? It didn’t help that the one person in my life that I could talk to happened to be the on
ly person who shouldn’t hear the thoughts in my mind. Dean would normally be the perfect guy for advice in a situation like that, but Ava was his daughter, and at the current time, he wasn’t speaking to me.
I shook my head and turned around, stepping forward and freezing as Ava came bursting through my office door. Lily, my secretary was hurrying after her, a shocked and frightened look on her face. Ava stopped in the middle of the floor and crossed her arms, tears flowing down her cheeks. I couldn’t turn her away, not when she was so passionate about talking to me.
“It’s okay, Lily,” I said putting up my hand. “Give us a few minutes.”
“Yes, sir,” she said giving Ava a sharp glance and then walking back out of the office, closing the door behind her.
I crossed my arms and stared over at Ava who had relaxed a bit after I sent Lily away. She wiped the tears from her cheeks and took in a deep breath. I could tell she was running her next moves over in her head, knowing I didn’t have patience to sit and listen to her yell at me. I cared about her, but I was hurt and from that, my demeanor had become cold and stiff.
“What is it, Ava?”
She sighed and shuffled her feet in front of me, obviously not wanting to tell me. She was nervous, an emotion that I hadn’t seen on her before, and something that was raw in a way I couldn’t ignore. Still, I wasn’t in the mood for her games, nor was I wanting to stand here all day just to have me repeat what I had been doing over and over again.
“I want to say how sorry I am,” she said quietly.
“That’s a bit late,” I said turning to my desk.
“I didn’t mean that I didn’t want to see you again,” she said pleading.
“But you told him you weren’t seeing me anymore,” I replied.
“I know,” she sighed. “I panicked, I guess.”
“Ava, you have the perfect opportunity to stand up for us,” I said angrily. “You had the perfect opportunity to let him know that you cared about him, but that you cared about us, too. How many times do we have to go around and around with this. I know that I screwed up in this, too, but I never made you feel unimportant. I never pushed you so that you were hurt. You knew I could hear you in that room, but you said what you said anyway. And instead of coming in and trying to explain, you got clothes out of the laundry room. It wasn’t because you were trying to protect me. It was because you knew what you did was wrong and hurtful, and you were too much of a coward to face me.”
I slammed my pen down on the desk and looked down, not wanting to make eye contact with her. I could tell she was more than shocked at my outburst, and I had to admit, so was I. I hadn’t had any intention of letting her have it, of showing my weakness, but when I heard her apology, it was just too much for me to take. My mouth opened and everything spewed out, and there was no stopping it. I thought that if I let that happen, I would feel terrible about it, but I didn’t. I knew that people didn’t talk to Ava like that. They never let her know when she had done something wrong. Ava’s frail sensibility was always coddled by everyone in her life, but she needed to know she hurt me. She needed to understand that she couldn’t just say whatever she wanted and explain it away the next day, no matter how much I loved her.
And there it was, the reason I had been obsessing over it all. It was the reason I felt sick to my stomach at the thought of not having Ava close to me. It was the reason that no matter how much I didn’t regret telling her how it was, I still felt bad for saying anything that would hurt her. I loved the girl, whether I wanted to at that moment or not. I sighed, still looking down, not wanting to look up and lose my control over the situation. I could hear her sniffle.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I will be back tomorrow to retrieve my things and bring back any files I had at home to work on.”
She turned and walked out of the office, and I didn’t say a single word. I knew I should stop her, grab her, tell her how much I loved her, but my brain wouldn’t let me. I was so hurt by it all and felt like I deserved to tell her how I felt. I didn’t want her to quit, to leave, but at that moment, I couldn’t look away from my hand grasping the pen in front of me as hard as I could. I stood up and walked over to the office door, slamming it so hard the pictures on the shelves rattled. I was so hurt that I had nowhere to direct it, and I knew that it was only a matter of time until that pain couldn’t be held in any longer.
Chapter 26
Ava
I knew why he was so upset, and I didn’t blame him at all, but I also realized that I might have just screwed up the first real relationship in my life, and just as I’d started to fall hard. I jogged across the hall, trying to hide my tears and grabbed my purse, walking out of the office and down the hall. As I made it past the conference room, I jumped at the sound of Tanner slamming his office door so hard that everyone looked up in fear. He was so angry and so hurt, and I was the reason for it. I broke his heart, a heart that I thought would never beat for me, not even for two seconds. I think I was just as shocked by that revelation as he was. I shook my head and continued to the elevator, letting the doors close before I let the tears continue falling down my cheeks. I leaned against the wall and closed my eyes, taking in a deep breath.
I had not only lost the man I loved, but I also just quit the job that I wanted since I was in my undergraduate program. I had somehow completely destroyed everything in my life, except for my relationship with my father. Don’t get me wrong, that was extremely important to me, but so was the rest of my life. I sighed as the elevator opened up, and I walked out, making my way to the curb and grabbing a cab. I needed to see Brianna, so that was where I headed.
When I got there, she was surprised to see me, but she was even more surprised at the fact that my face was puffy, and my eyes were red. She moved to the side and let me in, looking confused when I shuffled by. She closed the door and walked over to me, sitting down beside me and taking my hands. I shook my head and laughed through a sob, realizing how crazy I was sounding.
“My father came by yesterday, and Tanner was in the apartment,” I said starting my explanation. “He hid in my room while my father and I talked. When my dad asked if I was seeing Tanner anymore, I panicked and said no. He heard it.”
“Uh oh,” Brianna said.
“Wait, it gets worse,” I said drying my tears. “I went to work to try to talk to him, and he let me have it. He told me how hurtful I was, and then I quit, saying I would be back the next day to get my things.”
“Ava,” Brianna said, rolling her eyes. “Why do you insist on constantly torturing yourself?”
“I don’t know,” I sighed. “I have an internal block on my happy.”
“Well, you need to tell Tanner how you feel,” she said, shaking her head and walking over to her kitchen.
“What?” I didn’t want to admit my feelings. “I don’t feel any way toward him.”
Brianna grabbed two glasses and poured a bit of whiskey in each, walking over and handing me one. I leaned back and took a sip, sighing as the warmth hit my chest. Instantly, I began to calm down a bit, and I knew that Brianna wasn’t buying it at all. Why was it so hard for me to admit my feelings for Tanner? It wasn’t like Brianna gave a shit either way. She just wanted me to be happy.
“You know what I think?”
“What?” Here it comes.
“I think you are full of shit,” she said. “You show up at my door with obvious signs that you have been crying. You quit a job you had been working toward for years, and your story revolved around Tanner and how much you hurt him. I think you love him.”
“That’s ridiculous,” I snapped. “I’ve been seeing him for like two weeks, and he is the biggest playboy ever.”
“Well, from the sound of it, you have gotten to that playboy,” she smiled. “And you got to yourself as well. Ava there is nothing wrong with loving someone, with being happy with more than just work, but what is not okay is lying to yourself about it and ruining everything in your life to keep that lie.”
>
“It’s good, then, that you’re wrong, and I don’t love him.” I crossed my arms.
“You are absolutely impossible.” She sighed. “Seriously, you are so hell-bent on proving yourself that you’re hurting yourself. But hey, it’s not my love life, so I’ll leave you alone on it.”
“Thank you,” I said relaxing a bit.
“Come on,” she said, standing up and sticking out her hand. “We are going to get all dolled up and go out to Exclusives, the new club in Manhattan. Me and a guest are on the list.”
I did not feel like going to a club at all, but Brianna was all I had left, and I wasn’t about to fight her on this. I stuck out my hand and let her help me up, following her back to the bedroom. I sat down on the bed as she started pulling clothes from the closet, tossing me a tight, short, red dress. She disappeared into the other room, eyeing the dress. She wanted me to put it on, so I gave her a fake smile and stood up, undressing and sliding the dress over my head. I looked in the mirror and was impressed at how perfectly it hugged my curves. Unfortunately, when my eyes met my face, I cringed. I was puffy and red, something that did not go with the outfit.
“Okay,” she said, coming out in a black version of the dress. “Let’s see you. You look great!”
“Just one problem,” I said.
“What?”
“This face,” I said pointing at it. “I am scary and swollen.”
“Girl, don’t you know me by now? I got this.” She grabbed me by the wrist and pulled me into the bathroom.
By the time she was done curling, scrunching, and teasing my hair, and applying some seriously heavy makeup, I actually looked like a sexy twenty-something once again. I stared at myself in the mirror, shocked at the magic she performed. Now if only I felt as good on the inside as I did on the outside, I would actually feel like I was getting my life back. After that, we slipped on our heels and headed out, reaching the club relatively quickly.
When we walked in, the lights were flashing and the music was bumping and Brianna didn’t waste any time getting us a couple of shots and two strong drinks. I needed something strong that night since I couldn’t seem to get Tanner off my mind, and I was terrified I was going to start crying again. Nobody wanted to be the crying girl at the club, and there was always bound to be one of them. Instead, I started to drink copious amount of alcohol and get wasted. The music was sounding better and better every time I took a shot, and eventually, I found myself on the dance floor dancing by myself under the flashing strobe lights. I let go, allowing the alcohol to take over, forgetting everything shitty in my life and refusing to allow myself to think about Tanner.
