“Sounds good to me,” he said, starting in behind her, even as he checked his phone for a 4G signal. Could he get YouTube up here? “Next Friday sounds like it will be an interesting night indeed.”
Megan sent him a look over her shoulder that had him thinking he’d bitten down on the wrong hook.
“Wait, you wanted me to wait a week?”
Megan shrugged. “That’s when you find out if the show’s renewed, right? And if you’re not renewed, there’s no reason not to show you everything. No one in the group can blame me for letting the cat out of the bag then, so it’ll all work out. And tonight I’ll just hang out with my uncle while I still can. There are worse ways to spend a Friday night.”
“One or two, I guess,” he agreed, giving his niece a little swat as they hit the half-way point to their campsite.
She glanced back at him. “Plus, I’m curious.”
“About what?”
A grin filled her face. “If you’ll find the hashtag before I tell you about it, now that you know it’s out there.”
The billboards had gone up over the weekend, and they were everywhere.
Or at least the billboards of Ash were everywhere.
Jan had assured Grace that there were exactly the same amount of each billboard, but if so, that meant all of the billboards with a shirtless Ash were on Grace’s route.
Lucky her.
Sexy or Sexist?
You decide.
Weekdays at 2:00 p.m.
A different shot of Ash—shirtless, always shirtless—stood next to the words on each of the billboards. One such billboard was right behind the red light that had Grace stopped. Ash was fly fishing, his body impossibly defined. Yes, she knew Ash was fit, but Photoshop had to be involved in the making of that six pack. There was simply no way she sat across a desk from abs that beautiful every day.
Then there were Grace’s billboards, which she hated even more than Ash’s.
Ash’s billboards objectified him, but Grace’s were just… blah. Her in a lace peplum dress while wearing boxing gloves? She wouldn’t be surprised if Women’s Studies classes would be using the ad as an object lesson of ways modern women continued to perpetuate antiquated stereotypes.
From top to bottom, Grace hated the campaign, but that didn’t really matter. What mattered was connection and engagement, and the numbers would tell the story on all that soon enough.
A quick honk from behind Grace drew her attention to the fact that she was staring at Ash’s arms, and not her stop light—which was clearly green.
“Can’t be the first,” she muttered, stepping on the gas.
Two minutes later Grace was parked in front of Phillip’s restaurant.
It had been five days since their breakup, not that Grace was counting. Okay, she had totally been counting. And while she still considered it too soon to see Phillip again, he had asked her to stop by—begged, really. He seemed to think that she was a whole lot more upset than she was.
Weirdly enough, Grace felt guilty about the breakup, although she wasn’t quite sure why. She hadn’t done anything wrong. Not really. She and Phillip just weren’t a fit anymore. It was as simple as that. And the fact that her heart wasn’t bleeding out at the loss told her that she’d known that fact for some time.
Somewhere along the way, she and Phillip had fallen out of love and just kept on going through the motions.
Well, the time for going through the motions was at an end, but that didn’t mean she wanted to leave things bad with him. The two of them had way too much history. If there was a way to smooth things over between them, it was worth an hour of her time. And she’d much prefer to hash through it at his workplace, not hers.
Grace walked through the restaurant doors she’d helped picked out and stepped into the greeting area. Servers rolling silverware glanced her way before giving each other knowing looks. They knew what was up and were steering clear. Smart.
Phillip must have been watching for her, because he immediately stepped out of the kitchen and walked toward her.
“Hey, there,” he said, motioning her toward a booth. “You look great.”
“Thanks.” Grace stepped away, not returning the compliment. Phillip looked good too, but she didn’t want to send mixed signals. She sat in the booth, waiting for Phillip to sit across from her.
“How are you doing?” he asked, his voice too sensitive. She knew all of his tones of voice. He used this one when he was pandering. It irked.
“Okay. Honestly. No need to pull out the velvet gloves on me.”
He looked her in the eye for a moment, then nodded. “You had me worried when you weren’t on the show on Friday. And then yesterday…”
“What about yesterday?” she asked, a little annoyed. Was he critiquing her performance on Monday’s show in the wake of their breakup? Seriously?
“Well, you were there, but your spirit wasn’t,” he said. “You barely put up a fight.”
He totally was. Phillip was critiquing her. He was looking her right in the eye five days after breaking up with her and chastising her for her decline in job performance.
Grace started laughing.
“Did I say something funny?” Phillip asked.
She shook her head, letting it go. “No. I would just like to thank you for your continued listenership. Our show can use all the ratings it can get.”
Phillip nodded, not smiling as his eyes looked over her again. “I know our breakup is still fresh, but I wanted to ask how you’re feeling about everything… about our split.”
She kept it simple. Men liked simple. “I feel good about it.”
He looked a little surprised to hear those words, but he nodded. “Good.” He looked at his hands. “I keep remembering that we had a date scheduled for tonight, then realizing that now we don’t. I’m going to go out tonight, and you won’t be with me.”
Was he pretending to have breakup remorse? If so, Grace had no interest in playing along. “I assume you found a replacement, though.”
Phillip hesitated, then gave a quick nod. “It’s weird, but yes. I have a date.”
Part of Grace felt ill, another part felt relieved. Yet another part of her felt guilty that she felt relieved. Then there was the sliver in her that itched to ask him if his date was with Traci, but she swallowed the question back.
“Phillip?”
“Yeah?”
“Why did you ask me to drive over here?”
He traced the tip of his thumb over his palm for several seconds as he chose his words. “Because I’m going to miss you.”
Grace felt a hitch catch in her throat paired with a flash of anger, but before she could reply, Phillip kept talking.
“That said, I do still think breaking up is the right thing to do. I discussed all my reasons with my therapist before we broke up, because I was worried…”
“Worried about?” she prompted when he fell silent.
Phillip shrugged. “I guess I feel like we lost our spark. Rather than growing closer, we seemed to be drifting apart in every way. You stopped leaning in. You stopped reaching for my hand. Your smiles were replaced with quiet silences, and I started wondering if maybe you had found someone else. I even considered hiring a private investigator, but that phase passed pretty quickly. I knew you weren’t cheating, but I also knew you weren’t with me, if that makes sense.”
So, in other words, it was all her fault.
Grace decided she didn’t care enough to argue the point. Might as well roll with it and get through this conversation.
“I sensed it, too,” she said. “And for what it’s worth, I’m sorry. I’m not sure why I was pulling away, other than to say that if I’m awake, I’m thinking about work.”
“Me, too.”
Grace studied the face she had loved for so long—the dark hair and brows, the tan skin free of stubble, his generous lips and dark eyes. Tall, dark, and handsome. That was Phillip. The first time Grace saw him, she’d heard church bells. Now
those bells were silent. It was time to let him go both privately and publicly. They’d had their time, and they were done. Any time Grace questioned that, all she had to do was imagine that their date for the evening was back on and pay attention to the murky feeling that built up in her stomach.
“I’ll miss you, too,” she said. “I’ll miss your enthusiasm and your cooking. I’ll miss the conversations and…” —she smiled— “the arguments.”
Phillip grinned. “We were good at those up until you started getting paid to have them on that radio show of yours.”
“Nah,” she teased. “I still saved the good stuff for you.”
Phillip shook his head. “I think your cohost has me beat when it comes to getting you fired up in a conversation. I used to listen and think the only reason the man wasn’t dead was because you were too smart to commit homicide on a live broadcast.”
Grace shook her head. “He’s a piece of work. That’s for sure.”
“So are you,” Phillip said, looking deeply into her eyes in the way that used to make her knees weak. Oh, the good old days. “So take him down. No one knows better than I how hard you’ve worked to get where you are, and I don’t want bad timing on a breakup to undo any of that hard work.”
Grace couldn’t stop the smile that came to her lips. He was right. No one understood how hard she’d worked the past three years better than Phillip. He’d been by her side through most of the big steps, cheering her on. The two of them might be broken up, but it was clear he was still cheering for her, which made sense. She was still cheering for him too.
She’d just be doing it from a distance from now on.
He leaned against the backrest and studied her. “You find out this Friday if the show is renewed or not, right?”
She nodded, feeling a pit form in her stomach. “Yeah.”
“And you’re guessing it won’t be?”
She took a deep breath. “Based on the demographic ratings of the syndicated show they’re looking to bring in? No. It’s not likely we’ll be renewed.”
“And with today’s show, that gives you nine more episodes?”
Grace nodded.
Phillip stopped tracing his palm. “Well, if you’re going to go down, I want you to go down on top. I want you to bring the old Grace back and make your management look like fools for cutting you off too soon.”
She shrugged. “Maybe the show has just run its course.” Like us. “Maybe we’re just done.”
Phillip shook his head. “Nuh-uh. You’ve definitely got more fight in you. That Ashton guy has played the same game with you every day for almost two years. He always name drops me right before he backs you into a corner of defending me to prove his position. But he doesn’t have that weapon anymore, and you don’t have any reason not to whip out your arsenal on him. He likes to back you into a corner and flirt because he knows you can’t flirt back. Now you can.”
Grace felt her mouth physically drop open at Phillip’s words. Never in a thousand years would she have thought this was why he wanted her to drop by.
“You’re telling me to flirt with my coworker?” she said, just to make sure she was hearing him correctly.
“No,” Phillip said, wrinkling his nose. “Not flirt. But I do want to see the woman I met three years ago obliterate that idiot. Take the guy out with that Latin touch you always keep under wraps at work.” He reached out and grabbed her hand across the table. She let him. “These past five days, I’ve felt guilty for a lot of things, Grace. I’ve felt guilty for how much I used our together time for business. I’ve felt guilty about how tired I was last Thursday, and how horribly I phrased every single word that came out of my mouth. I felt guilty for how far I’d let things get with other women without saying anything to you—”
“Wait. What?”
“That’s irrelevant,” he said with a small wave.
“Maybe not to you,” she countered, feeling her hackles rise. “But definitely to me.”
“Trust me,” he said, giving her hand a squeeze. “Nothing big happened. The thing I felt most guilty about were all the small sacrifices you’d made for me along the way. The nights you stayed up late and got up early. The dozens of business dinners I took you to where there was next to nothing on the menu you could eat. The etiquette you learned to make me look good in front of my peers. And the way you curbed your own behavior at work to respect me while you were on the air.”
“Phillip, those are all very normal things to do when you’re in a relationship with someone,” Grace said. “There’s no reason to feel guilty for any of that.”
“But I do,” Phillip said. “You landed that radio show because you were a spitfire in the audition. It’s like how I secured my investors by serving my signature dish. Once they knew what I could deliver, they were in. It was the same with you and your bosses. Once they saw what you could deliver in a battle of the sexes radio show, they were all in to have you as a headliner. And for a while, you kept that fire. You remember?”
Of course she did. She brought the fire all right. But over the radio waves, people had perceived a different kind of heat. Rumors had started circulating that she was cheating on Phillip with Ashton.
“It wasn’t until Layla filled in for you on Friday and, frankly, had a great show, that I realized how heavy of an anchor I had been to you,” Phillip said. “I know there may only be nine episodes left, but I’m telling you now that I want you to crush your idiot cohost like a bug. No more soft gloves or penalty boxes. Remind your producers why they hired you, and remind everyone else why they should hire you in the future—because when it comes to a verbal war, there isn’t a battle you can’t win.”
This was the Phillip from the first year of their relationship. This was the type of rallying cry that had transformed her from a young optimist into a young workaholic. Phillip’s drive. His vision. It made her feel like anything was possible if she just pushed harder. Conversations like this were often his version of pillow talk, because he never had his head out of the game. Not even when he snuggled.
Grace pulled her hand out of his before things started getting confusing for either of them. This wasn’t a conversation about getting back together. Grace wasn’t quite sure what it was, but it wasn’t that.
“Do like your cheesy billboard promises and knock him out, Grace,” Phillip said. “Nothing against the guy. Maybe he’s not the jock loser I think he is, but I do know I’m already sick of seeing his cocky face on those billboards every day and then turning on the radio and having to listen to his smug voice pretend to be smarter than you. We both know that he’s not. So take these next nine shows and prove it to everyone—especially your bosses.”
Grace had the sudden urge to kiss Phillip and was grateful for the table between them. It saved her from a truly awkward moment. She cleared her throat instead. “Thank you for the pep talk. I’m headed to record right after this, so I’ll try to keep all that in mind.”
He nodded. “I’ll be listening.”
Well, that was a challenge if she ever heard one.
Phillip stood from the booth. “So… can we do this again in a few months, after we’ve both dated some other people? Maybe we can see if friendship is on the table?”
“That would be nice.” It surprised her that she actually meant the words.
They shook on it, neither of them letting their hands linger. This time it was Phillip who cleared his throat before saying, “All right. I guess we both need to get back to work then.”
“I guess we do,” Grace agreed, but hesitated before walking away. “Phillip?”
“Yeah?”
“This has been the weirdest breakup ever.”
He smiled. “Well, I’m glad I’m number one in your book somewhere.” Then he walked back to the kitchen.
Remote broadcasts were always a little interesting. Since it was a cloudless summer day, Frank had chosen to set them up in the parking lot of their venue to help them draw in traffic. The goal of the day was t
o draw attention to a charity, after all, and the small suite the charity rented in an old business building was hardly suited for a crowd.
For the first hour of the show, Ash and Grace had done their usual chatter while giving away freebies and even scoring a few donations for the charity—probably not much, but it was something. Now they were on the 3:00 long commercial break with news, traffic, and weather and it was time to interact with fans.
Ash focused on the woman in front of him. She was dressed in yoga pants and a T-shirt and was pushing her jogging stroller back and forth with one hand in an effort to keep her baby happy. Ash focused on the kid. That was always the best place to start.
“How old?” he asked, smiling down at the bald baby with a flower headband to that made it clear that—hair or not—she was a girl. “A year?”
The woman beamed. “Ten months.”
“She’s adorable,” Ash said, offering the mom a smile. “And I see she’s riding in style. That’s a serious stroller you have there.”
“She loves it,” the woman said. “I love it. It’s totally worth the money given how much walking we do. She may not look it, but she’s a screamer. I had to circle a block down the street four times before I could come over, otherwise she would have drowned out your radio broadcast.”
Ash looked at the doll-sized baby with new respect. “You’re right. I’d never guess it. But if that’s the case, you definitely deserve something for dropping by. A DVD, maybe? How do you feel about Grey’s Anatomy?”
The mom laughed, a pleasant sound tinged with exhaustion. “I literally can’t remember the last time I watched something for grownups.” She gestured to the stroller. “Little Chelsea demands pretty much all of my attention.”
Ash regarded the blonde little half-sleeping terror. “Do you know why she cries? Is it pain or something else?”
The woman shook her head. “Oh, she mainly just gets frustrated really easily.”
“Ah, I have a niece who was like that. Have you tried teaching Chelsea signs?”
The mom kept pushing the stroller. “People have mentioned it, but no. Not yet.”
The Kiss That Launched 1,000 Gifs Page 9
