by Alice Ward
“I know,” I choked out.
She waved the waitress over. “We’ll both have the cinnamon apple pancakes. Lots of whipped cream.”
“And coffee,” I woefully added.
“Sure thing,” the waitress said, taking our menus and leaving.
Ann-Marie folded her arms on the table and leaned into them. “What did he do?”
“Ugh. That’s just it. I don’t even know. Last night, everything was good. I mean, after the scene at the bakery.”
“What are you talking about?”
“He came to Crumbs just as I was leaving and started asking Dan all these questions. Like, making sure I’m getting the appropriate overtime pay. Stuff like that.”
“Whoa.”
“Yeah. It was pretty intense. Dan was not happy.”
Ann-Marie tapped her finger against her chin. “I have to say, Xavier sounds like a really protective guy.”
“Yeah.” I lifted a shoulder. “Sometimes. Because he’ll act like that, or he’ll give me some big speech about how I need to be more decisive, and then he’ll disappear. I woke up this morning, and he was acting really weird. He couldn’t even look at me, Ann-Marie. I don’t know what I did.”
She made a disgusted noise. “You might not have done anything. Has it occurred to you that he probably is just dealing with his own shit? You’ve known him, what? Two weeks?”
I sighed as I absorbed her logic. “You’re right.”
“Yeah, I’m right.”
The waitress arrived again, and we fell into silence as she set two cups of coffee down. Ann-Marie bent over to take a drink from hers without lifting the mug. I mixed some creamer into mine and watched the white swirls turn into amber ones.
“How does that Patsy Cline song go?” I asked. “Something about dreams being clouds in my coffee?”
“I thought I was supposed to be the novelist. Don’t get dramatic on me. And it’s not Patsy Cline. It’s Carly Simon… def one of the best songs ever.”
“That’s what this whole thing is like. I have these dreams, these preconceptions...”
“Riley, just do it. Let him go. This relationship has barely begun, and it’s already driving you crazy. Don’t do this to yourself.”
“I know,” I moaned, my head hanging. “This is making me crazy. But I can’t just walk away. I’m too deep.”
“You’re in love with him?”
“I… that’s not what I was going to say. I was going to say that I have to know what’s going on. I need to know why he’s acting like this.”
“But you are, aren’t you? You’re falling in love with him.”
I wrapped my hands around my coffee mug and gave it some thought. I’d only been in love once. It was with Jesse, the guy who’d haunted my thoughts for a year after his disappearance. And I’d barely thought of him since meeting Xavier. In fact, all I’d thought about was Xavier. And each time I did that, it felt like I was filling up with helium and floating away into the sky.
“Yeah,” I answered. “I guess I am falling for him.”
Ann-Marie winced like she was in pain.
“Don’t do that. That’s not helping.”
“Sorry,” she said, continuing to wince.
“Maybe we’re spending too much time together, and he needs some space.” Even as I said the words, I knew they weren’t true. We’d spent most of the workweek without talking.
“Or maybe he’s seriously fucked up, and you need to run while you still can.” She lifted her coffee like she was cheering for something and took a sip.
“You encouraged me.”
“Uh, no, I didn’t. I told you to go out and get laid. I didn’t tell you to get involved with some guy who might end up being a serial killer. I saw on True Crime that—”
“I really don’t want to know about anything that happens on True Crime.”
Ann-Marie narrowed her eyes. “They’re all real stories.”
“Hence the name True Crime.”
“You need to watch out for yourself. If you have any bad feelings about Xavier whatsoever, you need to walk away.”
“That’s harsh.”
“He’s not a normal guy, Riley,” she hissed.
“What do you mean by that?”
She shoved her hair back from her face. “I mean, just put yourself in his shoes. You’re a hot, young billionaire. You own a club where you have the chance to meet a hundred new women a night. You’ve never had a serious relationship in your life, and you take a new date to each event you go to.”
“How do you know those last two things?”
She rolled her eyes. “You haven’t googled him?”
“No. You have.”
“Yeah.” She looked at me like poking around for information on the man I was dating was the only logical thing to do. “And if you believe his past, he’s just like what we suspected he was. He gets around.”
The last statement was almost too much. I chomped down on my bottom lip and held it tight between my teeth. The pain kept me grounded and stopped me from crying.
“I’m sorry,” Ann-Marie gently said. “I didn’t mean for it to come out like that.”
I cleared my throat. I was not going to cry in the same diner twice in one morning. “It’s all right. You’re just repeating information.”
“I don’t want you to get hurt.”
“Yeah, I know. The problem with that is I don’t know what will hurt me more, staying or leaving.”
Ann-Marie solemnly nodded. “I hear you.”
The pancakes arrived, and we dug in. There was a dark gray cloud surrounding me, blocking any of my chances at getting some sunlight and happiness. Ann-Marie did her best to cheer me up by telling me funny stories about her coworkers, and I actually laughed once. For a few brief moments, everything was okay.
And then I remembered Xavier. I remembered the coldness in his eyes. The hard fear. How similar his look of pain was to that of scared animals. He hid something. Whatever it was, he kept it locked down deep inside of himself. And even if I never spoke to him again, I already knew he’d affected me in a big way.
Like it or not, and positive or negative, I would live with the impact he’d had on me for the rest of my life.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Xavier
I scanned the list of numbers and then threw the paper down onto the board table. “This is disgusting.”
Calvin’s lips drew into a tight line. “These are the same reports you saw last week.”
I sat up straighter and adjusted my jacket. “Right. And what’s going on over there in Oahu? Are you selling our plots for fifty percent of what they’re worth?”
The strained look on his face became even more intense. From the other side of the table, someone cleared their throat. It was Vivaca, our in-house consultant. She pressed her hands against the table and stood up. Vivaca reminded me of Rochelle in some ways, and I usually found that endearing, but not that day. That day everything and everyone fucking pissed me off.
Vivaca locked her eyes on me. “Henrick is going there next month to supervise the construction of the hotels. Perhaps you would like to go with him?”
“No, I don’t need to go to fucking Hawaii,” I barked.
Thick tension settled in the room as the other five people sitting nearby froze, becoming completely quiet.
Since no one clearly had anything helpful to say, I went on. “I need people to do their jobs. That’s what I need.”
“Or maybe you need some time off,” Calvin replied.
I whipped my face toward him so fast my vision blurred. “Excuse me?”
He spread his palms wide. “You seem stressed.”
He was trying to act like the comment was an innocent one, like it wasn’t an underhanded attempt to cut me down. But it was really a dirty and cheap move.
I was standing before I knew I’d made the decision to do just that. “You’ve always had an issue with me, so how about we finally talk about it?”
&nbs
p; “Me? Have a problem with you?” He exchanged a grin with someone behind my shoulder.
My anger doubled, and something in my brain snapped. I stepped forward and dug my fingers into the collar of Calvin’s shirt. I was dimly aware of everyone’s gasps as I pulled him to his feet, but they seemed so far away. Calvin’s face quickly turned red, then purple. He wrapped his hands around my wrists, squeezing me tight.
Hands pulled against my shoulders, urging me away from him, but I wasn’t in control of my own body. Calvin had done wrong, and he needed to pay for it.
“You’re crazy,” he spat, a bit of saliva flying at my face.
The words made me freeze. I loosened my grip and lowered him to the floor. Someone yanked on my arm, and I stumbled backward. Vivaca’s face appeared in front of mine, a look of terror on it. I allowed myself to be pulled out of the boardroom and into the side office. She closed the door and turned to face me, her chest heaving up and down.
“Xavier,” she breathed. “I—”
“I know.” I clutched the roots of my hair and turned away from her. I couldn’t stand to look at anyone else right then. If there was a mirror in the room, I probably wouldn’t have been able to stand to look at myself either.
“Is something going on?”
No started to form on my lips, but I paused and reconsidered. I really would have preferred to not answer her question at all. “Postpone the meeting,” I told her, turning slightly to look out the window. “We’ll continue on Monday.”
“Very well.”
I waited to move until the door shut. With Vivaca gone, I collapsed into a corner chair. This was it. I was losing my mind. There was no other excuse. Work had been stressful lately, but it always was. I’d lived my entire life in a constant state of stress. It started with my parents and continued with my career. There was no reason it should have been causing me to come undone like this.
It was Riley. She was the cause of all of this. I should have known it was coming. The second I felt something for her that wasn’t physical, I should have run away. I should have deleted her number and forgotten her name. Instead, I stuck around and allowed myself to grow an attachment to her.
I heaved myself from the chair in disgust and pulled my phone from my pocket. The biggest plus of helming your own company was being able to take an early weekend when you felt like it. I’d pay for it on Monday with extra work, but it would be worth it. Taking a break and clearing my head would allow me to come back to the office in a better state. Two days at my Key West house would probably do the trick.
I made the call and requested that my private jet be ready at LaGuardia in one hour. After smoothing down my suit and hair, I went back into the boardroom. Everyone had left. I was saved from apologizing to Calvin in front of other people, but I’d have to send him a written apology before the day ended. And things would never be the same with us.
I might have been the boss around the place, but I didn’t make a habit of turning my employees against me. It was bad policy.
I tried to keep myself busy on the way to the airport by catching up on emails, but my brain was in a fog. I kept thinking about the way I left Riley that morning. Just looking at her was hard. I knew she was confused, I knew she was wondering what was going on with me. And I wished I could have given her an answer, but it wasn’t that simple. There was so much she didn’t know about me. So much she’d never know.
When we’d parted, I didn’t have a plan for how things would keep going between us. I just knew that we were spending too much time together and it was destroying me. If I wanted to get my shit together, I needed to get real about our relationship. I needed to go back to the methods that had served me so well.
If I could see Riley occasionally and do that, then great. And if I couldn’t… then I needed to get used to the possibility that I might never see her again.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Riley
“It’s not that bad.”
I jerked at the voice so close to me and turned to look at Preston. My coworker smiled and leaned on the croissant case. “I know it’s Saturday, but we’ll be out of here soon.”
“Sorry. Was I moping?”
“If that’s what you call staring out the window with an abject longing look on your face, then yes.”
My face flooded with heat. It wasn’t the sunny day outside that I was thinking about. It was Xavier. We hadn’t spoken since we left his building together, and it was already three o’clock on Saturday. I had a feeling I wouldn’t be hearing from him all weekend. If ever.
I’d been thinking long and hard about what Ann-Marie said, and I still felt helpless. I figured that I couldn’t make a decision about Xavier one way or the other until I learned more about what was going on in his life.
If only he’d let me in. He always managed to dodge any question I asked about his past. I didn’t know anything about his friends or his family, and I felt like I’d shared more about myself than most people did in six months.
Maybe he just needed some space. It could have been that he was having problems with work or a friend, and he needed time to let things settle down. Which meant I just had to wait. Unfortunately, that part ripped at my soul. I had all of the next day off, and no plans whatsoever. If I ended up watching my phone, waiting for him to call, I would lose my freaking mind.
“If there’s time to lean, there’s time to clean,” Dan’s voice boomed. Preston straightened up from where he still leaned against the baked goods case, and I quickly rubbed the towel in my hand against the counter. Hopefully, it looked like I was in the middle of wiping something up.
“It’s dead out here,” Dan commented, coming to stand next to us. He put his hands on his hips and scrunched his face up. I’d already apologized to him about Xavier’s interrogation the other night, but Dan’s mood toward me seemed to have hardened even more. He never accepted my apology and just said, “Don’t let it happen again.”
“We just had a rush fifteen minutes ago,” I offered.
“Hm.” His eyes lazily roved across the storefront. There were two women chatting in the far corner, but other than that the shop sat empty. The kitchen was winding up for the day and Preston and I were the only two staff members left up front. With the next shift coming on in thirty minutes, I wasn’t jealous at all for the night’s closer. They were going to have a long evening ahead of them.
Dan continued to stand near us, staring at the window. Preston shuffled away toward the cash register, where he started adjusting credit card receipts.
“Who’s closing tonight?” I innocently asked Dan, purely out of a need to kill the uncomfortable silence.
“I’ll need you to.”
“What?”
Over Dan’s shoulder, Preston made a disgusted face at our manager’s back. His distaste for Dan had never been a secret — except to Dan.
“You’re not working at your other job tonight, are you?” Dan asked. “You put that you were available on this week’s schedule.
“No,” I slowly answered. “I’m not working there tonight.”
“Great, so you can close up here.”
“But wasn’t someone already scheduled? You know, with more than thirty minutes’ notice?”
He scratched his jaw and looked away. “I couldn’t find anyone.”
With no further explanation, he left the front and retreated into his tiny office, closing the door behind him. Preston immediately came over to me. “He means he forgot to put someone on the schedule for tonight.”
“What? No. How could he forget? There’s a block right there. All you do is fill someone’s name in.”
Preston raised an eyebrow. “He’s done it before.”
My temples started to pound. “Are you serious?”
“Yep.”
I exhaled so hard my lips flapped against each other. “Great.”
“Why didn’t you tell him you can’t do it?”
Tears pricked my eyes, and I blinked them away. “B
ecause I don’t want to be difficult. I need to get promoted.”
Preston looked like he smelled something bad. “Here? In this place? You’re telling me working at Crumbs is your dream job?”
I shook my head. “Just for a little while.”
“Hm.” The front doorbell tinkled, and a family with small children entered. Preston went to help them, leaving me all alone. My skin felt unusually hot, and my stomach churned like I was about to hurl.
“I’m taking my break,” I called to Preston, who waved his hand over his shoulder at me in acknowledgment.
I took my apron off and went out through the front door. There was a bench along the border of Crumbs and the clothing shop next door. I plopped down there, closed my eyes, and began to take deep breaths. I expected each one to make me feel better, but they didn’t. Instead, I just became increasingly panicked.
What was I doing here? What if all the extra time and energy I’d put into impressing Dan turned out to be for nothing? I would have loved to blame my fear on Xavier, to tell myself that his outburst had likely sabotaged my chances of getting promoted, but I didn’t really think that was true. Dan had never shown any preference toward me. There was no guarantee my time at this bakery would ever get me where I wanted to go.
I should just go back to school. I should take the money I’ve saved and do it. Or go to some other bakery. Somewhere that cares about their employees and will give me a real chance.
My phone buzzed, interrupting my meditation session. I pulled it from my pocket and saw a calendar reminder there. Pick up couch. 6PM.
“Shoot,” I whispered. I’d completely forgotten about the couch. That settled it. Putting my phone away, I went back into the shop. The family from earlier had left and there were no new customers, so I went past the counter and right to Dan’s office, where I knocked on the closed door.
“Who is it?” he asked.
“It’s Riley.”
“What’s up?”
“I need to talk to you… about tonight.”
A few seconds passed, then the door opened. Dan looked down at me. “What about tonight?”
“I forgot that I can’t stay late after all. I need to help my roommate pick up this couch. She found a really good one on Craigslist, and we have to go get it tonight or else they’ll sell…” I clamped my mouth shut, realizing I was babbling and overexplaining when I shouldn’t need to.
