Bigger Rock

by Lauren Blakely

  * * *

  I smile, and a sense of calm floods my body.

  * * *

  Wyatt: I can do that. I can definitely do that.

  * * *

  Josie: Of course you can. Just trust yourself. Your new instincts with her, not the old ones.

  * * *

  Wyatt: Promise. I’m a new man.

  * * *

  I put my phone in my pocket, take a deep breath, and wait for the woman I love. The sink is running, so she’s still in the bathroom. As I stand up, I wander past the TV console. Her phone buzzes on the wood. Glancing down, I see a 917 number on her screen. Someone from New York is calling her. It’s not my job to answer it, so I leave it alone and the buzzing stops.

  Then it rattles, like the caller has left a voicemail. The sound draws my attention back to the screen for the sliver of a second.

  That’s enough time for the message to flash. It’s been translated from voice into text. I should look away. I really should. But I don’t.

  “. . . Rhonda Hafner from Hafner and Hickscomb, following up on our meeting. I reviewed the information you sent, and yes, you have a reasonable claim . . .”

  I grab the wall as the floor buckles. What the hell? My head swims, and a strange, new nausea whips through me. I’m even sicker when I click on my phone, run a quick Google search, and find that Hafner and Hickscomb is an employment and labor law firm in New York City.

  As panic thickens in my veins, I cycle through our conversations about lawyers. When the Easy Out service fell apart, Natalie mentioned talking to an attorney friend of Charlotte’s, someone specializing in family law. She said the woman gave her useful guidance on an annulment versus a divorce in New York. At the farmer’s market, we even talked about not needing attorneys, and we agreed to keep our split shark-free.

  By all accounts, we don’t need a lawyer today.

  And that’s when the coldness in my veins turns to dread. My memory latches on to the dinner party, to Charlotte shushing Spencer, to me realizing that Natalie and her sister have secrets.

  Big secrets. Maybe the lawyer they talked to was never the family law one. Maybe Natalie’s making a case for something else.

  I stab the about us section on the website, and that’s when the knife slices through my back. The firm specializes in employment cases of class action, discrimination, whistleblowers, and sexual harassment.

  Natalie didn’t hire an attorney to divorce me. She hired an attorney to sue me.

  “Oh shit,” I mutter, with a palpable fear in my voice as I put two and two together, since I can only get them to add up to this—sexual harassment. That’s why she hired an employment lawyer to make a claim.

  A reasonable claim.

  She’ll have the text messages, too, the whole exchange about a boss falling for his employee. And that same employee lost other work because of that boss. She can’t be suing the dojo. She doesn’t have a contract with the dojo. She has a contract with me.

  My stomach plummets, and I silently curse myself.

  I did it again. I mixed business with pleasure. And this time, the results may be disastrous. This time, it’s not my bad luck with women. The fault is one hundred percent on me, and this is so much worse than a poisoned sandwich.

  I should have gone cold turkey on Natalie a long time ago.

  33

  I do my best to hide the rampant fear that races through me as we stop at Lila’s on the way to the courthouse. I have half a mind to avoid Lila and Natalie, but after the trouble we had with this job before, I can’t be a no-show. Besides, I might need Lila’s money now more than ever. I couldn’t be happier that Natalie and I are filing in three hours. I wish I could speed up the process.

  The clock ticks loudly in my ear with every passing second as we review the plans for the kitchen remodel.

  I’m focused as we talk, narrowing in on the job, not on the woman I just screwed who’s going to try to screw me. I won’t let her. I texted Chase that I need to talk to his cousin again, and I’m sure as soon as my buddy finishes removing a hairbrush from an eardrum or a thimble from a belly button, he’ll ring me.

  “We should have it done in a few weeks,” I say crisply. Tension winds in me so goddamn tight I might snap any second.

  “I’m so thrilled this worked out,” Lila says, and drops a hand on Natalie’s shoulder. “And this woman deserves all the credit. Getting to know her during the self-defense class helped me realize that I wanted this remodel to happen, and how we could make it work. I was scared, but she encouraged me.”

  My eyes widen to the size of the ocean. “Did she, now?”

  Lila nods. “She has your back.”

  “I bet she does,” I say, and the picture comes into even clearer focus. Natalie must have worked her ass off to get this job for us, maybe to try to claim she’s running my business, too.

  Fuckity, fuckity, fuckity. What a sneaky little pussycat she is. Slinking into everything. Jumping into every goddamn bag.

  “Oh, Natalie. Don’t let me forget to show you the closet,” Lila says with a bright smile.

  Natalie sets a hand on my arm. “Lila was raving about the closet here during a self-defense class last week, and I’ve been dying to see it.”

  As Lila scurries her to the closet, all I can think is I’m an hour closer to ending this fucking union with the woman I just fucked.

  The mustached clerk with wire-rimmed glasses takes the papers, staples them together, and stamps them with the date.

  “These will be filed today, and we’ll notify you in a few weeks when the annulment has been granted,” he says, without raising his face. His one-note voice should grate on my ears, but it sounds like sweet music because I’m one step closer to slicing this woman out of my life.

  Natalie bounces on her toes. “Thank you so much,” she says, and no one, not even Mr. Clean himself, could wipe the grin off her face. She’s so happy to be splitting up, and it’s irksome. Suspicious. Another piece of evidence against her.

  I tap my fingers against the worn wood of the clerk’s counter. “How long does this take?” I ask Bored Man.

  “A few weeks,” he drones.

  “But on average is a few weeks one week, two weeks, three weeks, four?”

  Slowly, like it costs him something to lift his chin, he looks up. “A few weeks,” he repeats, which loosely translates to shut the fuck up.

  “But what is that generally speaking?”

  He gives me a you’ve-got-to-be-kidding-me stare. “It’s more than a day and less than many days.”

  I sigh, but like a dog with a bone, I won’t let up. “Can you ballpark, please?”

  Natalie grips my bicep. “Wyatt,” she says, gently, “he said a few weeks.”

  “But I would like to know what a few weeks means,” I say to her. She swallows and looks away from me. I turn back to the guy, trying honey instead of vinegar. “I would be so grateful if you could give us a rough estimate? Just narrow it down a tiny bit more, pretty please?”

  I fold my hands together, as if in prayer, hoping he gets that I’m pleading, and that he’ll show mercy.

  He parts his cracked lips once more. “Here’s a rough estimate,” he says, fixing on a simpering smile. “A few weeks.”

  He shoves a copy of the papers at us, rings the silver bell at his stand, and calls out “next.”

  We walk along the hallway of the courthouse, heading to the exit. “Hey. Want to tell me what that was all about?” Natalie asks.

  Dragging a hand through my hair, I mumble, “Just want this whole damn thing over.”

  “Well, yeah,” she says, rolling her eyes. “That’s obvious.”

  “Don’t try to act like you don’t feel the same,” I spit out as we reach the exit.

  I push open the door, holding it for her. Manners still matter even when everything else falls apart.

  She walks into the bright sunlight of the Vegas afternoon, placing her hand above her eyes to shield them. “You wanted it,�
�� she says coldly. “You wanted this.”

  I frown. “What?”

  “You made it clear from the start how much you wanted this, Wyatt,” she says, and now her tone is exasperated. With me. She tosses up her hands. “I thought you’d be happy. I thought this is what you wanted. Why aren’t you happy?”

  “You think I should be happy?” I toss back at her, frustration bubbling up, rising to the surface. I’m waiting for her to strike. I need to be ready for her ambush.

  “I thought we were going to date?”

  “You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” There’s way more vitriol in my tone than I intend.

  She backs away from me. Holds up both palms in a clear “don’t touch me.” Stares at me as if I’m someone she doesn’t even know.

  Her blue eyes study me before she speaks. In them I see horror reflected at me. She’s horrified at me. “Why are you being so awful?” Her voice breaks. “I did this because you wanted it. You made me pro—”

  Then she clasps her hand to her lips.

  Her words tickle something in the back of my mind. Faint words, and I strain to hear them. Bits and pieces play in my head, and they feel like mine. Like things I said to her the night we married. As a song played. Our song.

  Promise me, promise me, promise me.

  What the hell did I ask her to do?

  And now it’s my turn to search her face. Her lip quivers, and her eyes are wet, as if she’s holding back tears. That ache I felt for days returns, burrows into me, as if the animal that carved that hole is trying to tell me something. That maybe Natalie’s not the cause of my doubt. Perhaps she’s the end of it.

  Rubbing a hand over my neck, I try to figure out what this moment means. And more importantly, what I believe to be true. Seeing her earnest eyes and her honest face, I don’t know how she could possibly be planning to screw me over. I don’t know how she could be stabbing me in the back. This woman—she’s not like that.

  Call it a gut instinct.

  Call it a feeling.

  It’s true.

  The question now is can I listen to it? If I was burned before, does that mean I’ll be burned again?

  A reel of images flickers in my mind—all our times together, right down to that moo on the plane. Even though that damning voice mail message made me want to run, my heart is telling me I’ve gotten it all wrong. My heart is telling me to stay.

  Just because I don’t trust easily doesn’t mean I shouldn’t believe this woman. If there’s anyone I should trust, it’s Natalie. And if I don’t try to fix this now, I’ll lose her. That’s a chance I can’t take, proof or not.

  I go out on a limb.

  “Nat, I’m sorry,” I say softly, reaching for her. “I’m just a mess right now. But I’m crazy about you, and I don’t want this to end,” I say, and it’s a start. It’s the only start I can manage right now.

  “I didn’t, either.”

  Didn’t.

  “But you do now?” I ask, my voice wavering.

  “I don’t like the way you just talked to me.”

  My heart sinks. Here on the steps of the courthouse, she’s going up, I’m heading down. I reach for her arm, wrap my hand around it. “Is this how it ends?”

  My voice barely sounds like my own.

  Hers is a whisper, too. “You tell me.”

  I want to ask about the voicemail, the call, the lawyer. I want to ask what I promised her. I want to know if I’ve fucked this up beyond repair. Most of all I want to know if there’s a chance of fixing it.

  But before I can speak again, she raises a hand. “I can’t talk to you right now. We can talk later, if you decide you can treat me the way you always have, not the way you just acted. And I really hope you can do that. But right now, I need a break. I’ve done something crazy and probably foolish. So I’m going to go and see Lila about her closet, because that will take my mind off the email you’re about to receive.”

  She marches down the steps and hails a cab that takes her away from me.

  34

  There’s no email.

  I keep checking for whatever she’s sending me, between requesting an Uber and calling Lila to ask if she wants me to head over to work now.

  Her voice is sweet, but firm. “Why don’t you take the afternoon off? I’m with Natalie, and we’ve got a few things to do.”

  In the background, I swear I can hear Natalie cry. The sound of it twists my chest. I wish I could comfort her, but I’m not the one she wants to be with right now.

  “Okay. Take good care of her, please.”

  “Of course. And come back later,” Lila adds, then more softly, “Sometimes a woman just needs a few minutes alone.”

  “Thank you.” Even though my heart is torn by my own stupidity, a brief calm descends on me thanks to Lila’s advice. The woman has always been good to us. She’ll look out for Natalie while I figure out how to sort out the mess I made. I hang up and check my email again. Nothing.

  The whole afternoon looms ahead of me like a giant black hole. I want to work, to hammer, hang, and drill, not roam aimlessly around a city I barely know, all because I’m a pigheaded idiot.

  But as the driver swings onto the Strip on his way to the Bellagio, I realize this isn’t just a city I barely know. This is the city where I started this love affair with Natalie, and it’s the city where I don’t want us to end.

  I lean forward and ask the driver if we can change the destination.

  “Sure thing. Where to?”

  “Give me one minute to find the address,” I say, doing a quick search on my phone.

  I find it, and he enters it in his GPS.

  Ten minutes later, I walk up to a small chapel, looking for a guy in a gold leisure suit. I want to ask Larry if he remembers my wedding. If he can help me figure out where I screwed up. It’s a straw, but it’s the one I’m grasping at.

  Once I enter the chapel, though, and hear the music, I’m whipped back in time to my wedding night, when Elvis crooned of how he couldn’t help falling in love.

  And as that most romantic of romantic songs plays again, the notes somehow unlock the faint words that were tickling the back of my mind a mere hour ago. The drunken blur of my wedding ceremony is no longer a haze. It’s clear, and I can hear everything I said after the vows.

  I stumble into a pew as the memory crashes into me like a tsunami.

  * * *

  I stand at the altar, clasping her hands, looking into her eyes as Elvis soundtracks our ceremony.

  “You’re beautiful, Nat, and every day when I see you at work, I think how much I love coming into the office and working with you. But it’s not just because you’re gorgeous. You make my business better.” I grip her hands harder, holding tight, making sure she knows even in my intoxicated state that everything I say comes from my heart. “You make the business fun, but you also make it really fucking good. Without you, it’s nothing.”

  She shakes her head, but she can’t stop smiling. “That’s not true. You’re so talented.”

  Elvis sings about fools rushing in, and that word—fools—sticks with me. I don’t want to be fooled again. I can’t take that chance.

  “No. It is true. You turned WH around, and I can’t thank you enough. And I’m so fucking lucky that we get to keep working together. You want to, right?”

  She nods, laughing. “Of course. Why? You’re not going to fire me tonight, are you?”

  I sway closer, plant a sloppy kiss on her mouth, and tell her no. “No. No. No. No fucking way am I firing you. But you’ve got to know that work is why we can’t stay married. I’ve had the best time with you, and I want so much more, but we have to get an annulment in the morning.”

  Her eyes are intensely serious even as she hiccups. “Duh. Of course.”

  Then, I thread my fingers more tightly through hers. “This night has been incredible, and a part of me feels just like this song because I kinda can’t help falling in love with you.” Her eyes widen in surprise, and maybe ev
en hope, but I power through with the rest of the unplanned thoughts that I’ve simply got to share now. “But when that happens, Nat, I make mistakes and fuck up, and I screw myself over by being foolish and too trusting. I’ve gotten burned. So don’t let that happen to me. I want us to keep working together. Don’t you?”

  “Yes, God yes.”

  “Then promise me something.”

  “What is it?”

  “Promise me we’ll end this tomorrow. That you’ll divorce me. I’ll probably ask you to stay with me because I’m already crazy about you. I’ll probably ask you a ton of times. I’ll try everything to convince you, but I need you to promise me, no matter how convincing I am, that we’ll end the marriage. Because I can’t mix business and pleasure. It’s my Achilles’ heel, and I need you to help me. Promise me, promise me, promise me,” I say, with a harsh swallow, and then I wait.

  But not for long.

  Her eyes are full of truth as she answers solemnly.

  “I promise, Wyatt. I promise. I promise. And I get it. I do. I really do.”

  * * *

  I drop my forehead into my palm as everything snaps into twenty-twenty hindsight. That’s why she stuck to her guns. Because I asked her to. Hell, I begged her to have my back for me. I made her swear she’d keep to the plan. I even said as much to her once again on the day I ripped up her check.

  I made you a promise, and I goddamn intend to stick to it, whether I had a few beers or not. I’m a man of his word, and I sure as hell expect the people I work with to treat me like it, and to act the same way.

  She held to the promise I asked her to keep. She protected me from me. But now I’m the one breaking other promises to her. Unspoken ones that came in the way we kissed, in the times we shared, in the way we were so good together.

  Gripping the pew in front of me, I stand up, nearly bumping into a man in a gold jumpsuit.