“It never should have happened.” That went for us getting snowed in, as well as for everything that took place in the cabin while we were snowed in. He didn’t know the details and now I was even more reluctant to share them.
“I hope you’ve learned something from this experience,” Easton said. I made a face at him.
“Learned something? What are you talking about? Some carpe diem shit?”
“Perhaps now you look at relationships with women differently?”
“After a few days snowed in with your girlfriend’s assistant? That was supposed to happen?”
“The experience gave you a lot of time to think. Out there in the woods just taking in the fresh air and nature… unless you spent your time doing something else,” he said. I ignored the suggestion in his voice.
Since waking up this morning with Maggie, I had been thinking about things differently, he wasn’t wrong. I was curious what we could have had if I actually gave it an honest shot. I had been wanting to tell Maggie what I felt, but since leaving the cabin we hadn’t gotten any time alone. I only ever referenced my parents’ relationship when it came to love but they weren’t the only model I had available to me. Easton and Missy were right there. What they had though? I knew I wasn’t ready for all of that; getting married and having a child with someone.
“Let me ask you something. What would you do if you lost Missy?”
“I would do anything to get her back. What happened? What did I do? Whatever the issue was, I would do whatever it took to make it better.”
“What if it didn’t work? What if you couldn’t get her back?” I asked. That one seemed to stump him. He shuffled his feet and looked like he was really thinking hard about it.
“I don’t like this question.”
“Just tell me.”
“You’re talking in hypotheticals. In reality, I would never do anything that would make Missy want to leave. Not on purpose. If I made some sort of horrible mistake, I’d spend all my time making up for it. I would never jeopardize our relationship knowingly.”
“Work with me here, Easton. Something insane happens and she leaves and she doesn’t want to come back under any circumstances. What do you do?”
He thought about it for a while and then he sighed. “Nothing. I’d do nothing. Missy is an integral part of my future and I just don’t see one without her.” Wrong answer. I wasn’t sure what he’d say but that wasn’t it.
“Easton, she’s just one woman. I know you love her, but do you even know whether she would do the same for you?”
“It doesn’t matter whether she would. She’s my world. If I couldn’t have her in my life, then I wouldn’t have a life. I might as well just dig a grave and hop in.”
“Don’t be dramatic.”
“I’m not. You’re not a kid and I don’t want to talk to you like you are one, but you just don’t get it, Toby. Maybe one day you’ll meet the person who makes you feel the way Missy makes me feel. ‘til then, call me crazy but that’s the way it is.”
I felt the hair on the back of my neck stand up. That sounded a lot like something my mother would’ve said about my father since, in the end, it was true. She did die for him. I didn’t like the sound of that. While I felt like Easton was blowing it out of proportion a little bit, I knew that even if it was not true for him, it was true for other people.
What the hell was I thinking? I couldn’t do this.
I thought that I had something real with Maggie and maybe I did but telling her and asking for more? What the hell was wrong with me? I didn’t want to risk that. It didn’t matter the lost potential; whether I was selling us short. I didn’t care. I didn’t want to know what it felt like to want to die for someone. I didn’t want losing someone to mean that my life was over too. I had to stop this. I hadn’t said anything that couldn’t be taken back yet, but I had to cut it all off right here, right now.
Maybe I’d never get to feel what Easton was talking about, but at least I’d never be in that position in case the worst happened.
Shortly, the photographer, his crew, and the women walked back into the room.
“So, are we done here?” Easton asked.
“Yup, you’re all done. You did so well sweetheart,” Missy said, coming up and kissing her fiancé. I heard Easton’s words in my head again and I hoped to God that she wouldn’t leave him so I didn’t have to find out whether he was serious or not. I turned my attention to Maggie. Everyone was occupied, so it wasn’t hard to pull her aside.
“Hey, Maggie, do you have a minute?”
“Do you want something?” she asked.
“Yeah, I don’t think there’s any good way to go about this, but it needs to be said. Could you come to my suite or something? I’d appreciate the privacy.” She looked a little bit confused, but she followed me out and into my suite. I launched directly into my speech so that I didn’t chicken out or get any other ideas now that we were in a private space together.
“Look, I’m going to make this as quick and direct as possible. After everything that happened in the cabin, I realize that my behavior could be sending you mixed signals. That is the last thing I want. I enjoyed our time there. It was great, really. Thank you. But it’s over now. That was a period of our lives that needs to be contained and judged for what it was and nothing more. We have our own lives and I think we should continue living them, separately.”
She looked confused, and then, just for a second, but long enough, she looked hurt.
“You called me in here to tell me that?”
“I didn’t want there to be any kind of confusion. I think you’re a wonderful woman-”
“Wait, wait, wait, are you trying to give me some sort of break up speech? We are not together Toby; I knew that from the beginning. I knew that since I propositioned you the night of Missy’s proposal. You don’t do relationships and frankly, I’m not looking either. I never expected that to change just because we had a couple of days in the cabin together.”
My mouth was hanging open and I knew I looked like an idiot, but for a second, I had no idea what to say. She had beaten me to it and I was stuck. I didn’t like how it felt. It hurt. It sounded like she was just trying to make up for what I had just told her, and I felt like garbage for whatever I was making her feel.
It had to be done though, this was me being kind. Carrying on and letting her think that there was a chance was the crueler option. She didn’t need that from me. She didn’t need to wait around thinking she would get more than just the cabin instead of looking for someone else who was going to give her everything.
“You knew?”
Her face was totally clear now, her eyes almost looked hard, empty.
“I knew.”
18
Maggie
He wasn’t going to see me sweat.
He was not going to see me sweat.
He just fucking blindsided me. I wasn’t sure what to expect when he told me he wanted to talk but that was not it, embarrassingly. My imagination had run wild and I had actually been a little optimistic. Fucking stupid. So stupid.
“I hope you didn’t have different expectations,” I said. My voice wasn’t shaking, good. I didn’t want him to know how much that had fucking hurt.
I was appalled with myself.
How had I ever let myself think that anything meaningful could ever happen between us?
I set the terms for Christ’s sake. I only wanted one night. I didn’t want any complications. I didn’t want to get into a relationship. All it took was having sex a few times to change my mind, but the feeling wasn’t mutual.
“No, no,” he shook his head and cleared his throat. “I didn’t. I just had to make sure that we were on the same page. I know that I wasn’t very consistent while we were in the cabin. I wanted to make sure that I didn’t give you the wrong idea about what would happen once we were out.”
“Well, no worries. I had no expectations going into this and I have no expectations now. Is th
at everything you wanted to say to me?” I said.
He looked a little bit confused for a second and there was a small part of me that thought he was going to change his mind; that wanted him to change his mind.
“Good. Good. I just wanted to talk to you to make sure everything was on the table.”
“Great. What happened in the cabin, stays there. So, are we done here?”
I walked out of Toby’s suite feeling like my legs were going to give out underneath me. Tears were flowing down my face as I let myself into my suite.
“Stupid, so stupid!” I crumpled into the large couch, finally alone.
I couldn’t believe it. What was I thinking? I wanted to blame Toby. What kind of psychopath had sex with a woman and then fell asleep wrapped up in each other’s arms, only to tell her that he didn’t want to be together? I had to blame myself at the same time though because I had allowed it. I allowed it every single time.
I could’ve told him no a million different times. Every time he came on to me, I could’ve pushed him away but I never did. Even outside of that, I shouldn’t have expected the events that took place in the cabin to change the way he felt about relationships. He was a young billionaire living in New York City, why would he want to get tied down with anyone?
What was I thinking? Did I even have what it took to have a relationship? I hadn’t wanted one in the first place. It had been a long time since Paul, but I didn’t think I was ready. I wanted the sex without any of the emotional responsibility and that was what I had gotten. I couldn’t be mad or hurt now that I had gotten what I asked for. Here I was embarrassed because I wasn’t being honest with myself, but it was okay because he put an end to all ambiguity.
This was for the best. It didn’t feel that way though. This was not the way I imagined my first stay at a luxury resort to go. Toby had just broken my heart but I had to go around the rest of our time here like that hadn’t happened. Being around him, just thinking about him would remind me of what I wasn’t getting from him. What I wasn’t getting but irrationally wanted.
I couldn’t do it.
I was going to lose my mind. I was going to have a miserable time pretending that I was okay. I was not okay and staying here was going to make it worse. That would mean that he won but I didn’t care. I wanted to be able to lick my wounds in peace. I wouldn’t be able to stand seeing him here. The important part of this trip was over, I technically didn’t need to be here anymore. That was it. I was out.
I got everything packed and made a call to the airline to change my flight to tonight. I asked the front desk to arrange a car to take me to Denver for the flight. In the car on the way to the airport, I wrote an email to Missy, a text was too immediate, and she would see it too soon.
Hey! By the time you read this, I’m probably going to be in the air. I figured you wouldn’t need me for the rest of the trip since the photoshoot is over. I decided to head back to New York. I’ve had enough of the snow to last a lifetime. Turns out, getting trapped in the cabin messed me up more than I thought. I’ll be okay though; you have a good time with everyone else.
Hopefully, that sounded happy and upbeat enough for her not to try and check on me, or even worse, cut her trip short and come looking for me. It seemed somewhat possible, but I couldn’t come up with a better excuse and I didn’t want to admit the truth. It was too humiliating.
I was back in my apartment late that night. I didn’t do anything except go directly to sleep. The next morning, I was hoping to feel better, but that didn’t happen. I was well-rested, but that was about it. I still felt humiliated for making the assumptions that I had made about Toby and myself and it didn’t help that I wasn’t getting to hang out at the resort anymore. There were spas in the city. If I really wanted the experience, I’d pay for it, and if I was too cheap for that, I would DIY it at home. It was fine.
I was fine. Everything was back to normal, and I was going to live my life like that last seventy-two hours had not taken place.
I went to the kitchen and looked around. I hadn’t been here for a while and like the genius I was given my recent choices, I hadn’t cleaned my refrigerator out before the trip. I braced myself, holding my breath before opening the refrigerator. Everything still looked normal but I knew that a lot of food had gone bad.
Without even sniffing the milk first, I dumped it down the sink. I did the same with the half-eaten container of Greek yogurt. For the food, I grabbed a garbage bag and started filling it with the leftovers that I did not want to investigate, and the contents of the Tupperware that had been in there too long. Noticing that there was more spoiled food in the bag than in the refrigerator, I decided to say goodbye to all of it except the bottled water and cans. What a waste.
In a tiny way that symbolized a new start, didn’t it?
I needed one. I needed to forget that I had ever met Toby before. I wished that I could turn back time so that we had never slept together in the first place. That was what opened the floodgates. My stupid big mouth being horny and jealous the night that my boss got a proposal from her perfect, billionaire boyfriend.
I lugged the bag down the stairs so I could throw it out in the alley dumpster.
So, no more doing stupid stuff like this again, right? No more getting involved with guys and thinking that I could handle any noncommittal relationship. Clearly, I couldn’t. I didn’t want to do it. The actual benefits of a relationship were the intimacy, vulnerability, and comfort you got with someone who wanted to share those things with you. Dick was not that hard to come by and non-committed dick was even easier to find. I was done.
Out in the alley, I tossed the bag of rotten food into the dumpster and dusted my hands off. Walking back, I didn’t notice the man coming up to me until he spoke.
“Maggie? Maggie. It is you.” I stopped in my tracks and looked up. His face was familiar, but for some reason, it didn’t register for several seconds.
“Paul?”
Yes, that was him. That was definitely him. He looked exactly the same, it was a little bit scary. I knew by other people’s standards he was handsome, but after our relationship, I just saw the man I had to run away from when I looked at him.
“Maggie, hey. It’s been a long time.”
“What are you doing here?”
“I was just in the neighborhood,” he said. A lie.
“No way,” I said.
“I…I know. You're right. I wasn’t in the neighborhood. I’m here because I knew that you lived here, and I was hoping to run into you.”
“That’s weird Paul. I’m not comfortable with that.”
“Weird? Is this the way you wanted the first conversation between us to go after, whoa, how long has it been? It's been years. Don’t you want to catch up?” he said. He was being chatty and friendly, but I knew better than to buy that act from him.
“No. I don’t. What are you doing here?” I crossed my arms. His stance changed. Looking anywhere but me, he started to look a little ashamed.
“I needed to see you. I wanted to speak to you lately. I didn’t know the best way to get a hold of you, so I decided to look for you.”
“Yeah, you did. Now if you don’t mind, please don’t come here again.”
“Maggie, please. I just wanted to talk to you. Can I come to your apartment so we can chat?”
“Paul do you not see how strange this is? I don’t want you in my apartment.”
“Okay. Okay, I understand. Well, I brought this I thought you might want to have it back.” He held an envelope out to me. I watched him suspiciously before finally taking it.
“If this is a letter, I’m throwing this in the trash.” He shrugged his shoulders, looking relaxed. His blond hair was tousled and his eyes, blue, were clear, and dare I say friendly. I knew he was the furthest thing from a friend but standing there, he came off as especially non-threatening.
“It’s yours so you can do what you want with it.”
I frowned at him. “This is weird Paul.
Why are you outside my building? What do you want?”
“I know this looks weird and I know that telling me to fuck off should be a natural response to me right now for you. I just wanted to tell you that I’m sorry. I never got to say that when we were together and I know I wasn’t a good boyfriend. It took some time to get that through my thick skull but I know better now.”
I had a defense system in place for Paul now. He had no power over me so he didn’t scare me, but I didn’t know who this new, gentle, self-effacing guy was and what he wanted with me.
“Yeah, and?” I spat.
“And, I want you to know that if you let me, I can show you how different I am.”
“So that what can happen?”
He shrugged. “Whatever you want.”
“I don’t want anything from you.”
Another shrug. “Today’s not the right time to expect a reply from you but I hope you'll want to talk sometime. Have a good day.”
I stood there like an idiot as he disappeared. What the hell. What was he talking about? Who was that man because it wasn’t the Paul I knew.
Talk sometime? Like hell, I wanted to talk to him. I walked up the stairs to my apartment and double-checked after locking the door.
19
Toby
“Come on, it's not that much further now.”
“You said that already,” Maggie said, huffing behind me. I looked over my shoulder. She wasn't that far back, but she had been complaining steadily for the last five minutes. I wasn't lying to her, we were actually close. She just wasn't the hiking type.
“When did you even find the time to locate this place?” she asked me. We hadn't been out here long but being stuck in the cabin every day had gotten boring, not to mention gave me flashbacks, so I had done some exploring. The area immediately around the cabin had been reclaimed from the forest, but around the perimeter, it grew wild.
Admit You Need Me: A Secret Pregnancy Romance (Irresistible Billionaires Book 4) Page 12
