by Tessa Bailey
Rosie had been faithful to Dominic since middle school and that wouldn’t be changing any time soon, but she allowed herself the feminine satisfaction of knowing a man had found her attractive. Had she even allowed that simple pleasure for anyone but Dominic? No. No, she didn’t think so. And in the years since Dominic had returned from active duty, she hadn’t gotten that light, bubbly lift from him, either.
Everything between them was dark, lustful, confusing and . . . so far off course, she wasn’t sure their marriage would ever point in the right direction again.
Maybe it was silly, allowing this stranger’s attempts at flirting to bring everything screaming into perspective, but that’s exactly what happened. On a boring Tuesday night that should have been like any other. Suddenly, Rosie wasn’t just standing in her usual spot beneath the fake crystal chandelier while boring piano music piped in over the speakers. She was standing in purgatory. Whose life was this?
Not hers.
Once upon a time, she’d been the straight-A student. A member of the Port Jefferson high school volleyball team—B Squad, but whatever. She’d been an aspiring chef.
Wait. Wrong. Rosie was an aspiring chef. She needed to stop thinking of that dream in the past tense. Something that faded with a long ago wish upon a star. Ever since she and her friends, Bethany and Georgie Castle, had formed the Just Us League, her dreams of opening a restaurant had been rekindled. Transformed from pipe dream to reality. They’d even signed her up for one of those crowdsourcing websites and people had donated. Invested in her dreams. Or at least given her a push to get started.
So why was she still standing there on her aching feet?
Rosie set the perfume bottle down on the Clinique counter and sent the man a wobbly smile. “How long have I been working here?” She laughed under her breath. “Too long.”
The man laughed, seeming grateful that she’d broken the wedding ring tension. “Yeah, I can relate.” He rubbed at the back of his neck. “Well, I guess I should get moving . . .”
He trailed off but made no move to leave. It took Rosie a tick to realize he was gauging her interest level, even though she was married. With a quick intake of breath, she nodded. “Have a nice night.”
Rosie stood there long after the man left, still trapped in that out-of-body feeling. Whose life was this, indeed? In a few minutes, she would clock out from a job she hated and go home to a too-quiet house. A horribly, painfully quiet house where she would orbit around Dominic like they might catch fire if they make eye contact. Where had everything gone wrong?
She didn’t know. But twenty-seven was too young to settle for unhappiness. Discontent. Hell, any age was too old for that. If she’d learned anything since helping form the Just Us League, it was that when a woman made a goal, she could reach it. Step one had been admitting she still wanted to open the restaurant. Step two had been validating that dream by letting the club sample her famous empanadas. Step three was . . . letting go. Running with her dream and facing the daunting possibility of failure.
Rosie swallowed hard. Okay, perhaps she wasn’t quite ready for step three.
Perhaps she needed to correct another, more troubling aspect of her life first.
Dominic.
“I think I’m done,” she whispered, the words swallowed up in elevator music, the sounds of cash drawers being pulled from registers and gates being pulled down at the entrances to Haskel’s. Likewise, gates were coming down around a heart that was broken every time she passed through the living room and didn’t receive so much as a hello, how are you.
I love you.
When was the last time she’d heard those words out of her husband’s mouth?
She couldn’t even remember.
She couldn’t even remember.
Dominic knew about her dream. Knew it had been rekindled. Yet he’d done nothing to encourage her. He let her walk out of the house in cheap pumps every day to go spray people with perfume, even though she gave every indication it made her miserable. If she had more courage, she would tell Zelda where to stick a bottle of Le Squirt Bon Bon. That bravery was missing, though. It had been for way too long.
Maybe Dominic was the reason she couldn’t make the leap to step three of her aspirations. His lack of faith and encouragement—his utter lack of acknowledgment—was holding her back. She’d become content to waste away in this perfume purgatory.
What happened to us? We used to love so hard. We used to be a team.
With a chest full of crushed glass, Rosie leaned over the counter and checked the clock. Ten. She’d made it another day. Her marriage wouldn’t.
About the Author
TESSA BAILEY is originally from Carlsbad, California. The day after high school graduation, she packed her yearbook, ripped jeans, and laptop and drove cross-country to New York City in under four days. Her most valuable life experiences were learned thereafter while waitressing at K-Dees, a Manhattan pub owned by her uncle. Inside those four walls, she met her husband and her best friend and discovered the magic of classic rock, and she managed to put herself through Kingsborough Community College and the English program at Pace University at the same time. Several stunted attempts to enter the workforce as a journalist followed, but romance writing continued to demand her attention. She now lives in Long Island, New York, with her husband and daughter. Although she is severely sleep-deprived, she is incredibly happy to be living her dream of writing about people falling in love.
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Also by Tessa Bailey
THE ACADEMY SERIES
Disorderly Conduct
Indecent Exposure • Disturbing His Peace
BROKE AND BEAUTIFUL SERIES
Chase Me • Need Me • Make Me
ROMANCING THE CLARKSONS
Too Hot to Handle • Too Wild to Tame
Too Hard to Forget • Too Beautiful to Break
MADE IN JERSEY SERIES
Crashed Out • Rough Rhythm
Thrown Down • Worked Up • Wound Tight
CROSSING THE LINE SERIES
Risking It All • Up in Smoke
Boiling Point • Raw Redemption
LINE OF DUTY SERIES
Protecting What’s His • Protecting What’s Theirs (novella)
His Risk to Take • Officer Off Limits
Asking for Trouble • Staking His Claim
SERVE SERIES
Owned by Fate • Exposed by Fate • Driven by Fate
STANDALONE BOOKS
Unfixable • Baiting the Maid of Honor
Off Base • Captivated
Getaway Girl • Runaway Girl
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. References to real people, events, establishments, organizations, or locales are intended only to provide a sense of authenticity, and are used fictitiously. All other characters, and all incidents and dialogue, are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real.
FIX HER UP. Copyright © 2019 by Tessa Bailey. Excerpt from LOVE HER OR LOSE HER © 2019 by Tessa Bailey. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
Cover design and illustration by Colleen Reinhart
FIRST EDITION
Digital Edition JUNE 2019 ISBN: 978-0-06-287284-5
Version 04172019
Print ISBN: 978-0-06-287283-8
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