“Your key,” he says, holding out his hand. “Give me your apartment key.”
Releasing a forced breath, I grip the metal of the key until I feel the indentations in my palm.
“The key, Jude,” he says, harder this time. “Take any personal belongings and leave everything else. Including the phone. I’ll be sure to let the doorman know you’re not to set foot in this building again.”
I don’t have Love’s number memorized—it was only ever programmed into the phone he gave me. And if I’m banned from the building, I won’t be able to come back and talk to her in person.
She’ll come home from her trip and I’ll be gone and that will be that.
Slapping the key on the counter, I lock eyes with the revolting excuse for a man standing in front of me.
“You’re pathetic,” I tell him before leaving to grab my guitar—the only thing that truly belongs to me in this apartment.
Everything else was a prop, part of a costume I agreed to wear when I made a deal with the devil himself.
Hunter smirks, like he finds my insult funny.
“I don’t feel bad for you,” he says as I head out. “You knew what you signed up for, and you fell for her anyway.”
How could I not?
Being with her was so effortless, so natural.
I never expected to hit it off with her.
And I never expected her to be everything Hunter said she wasn’t.
Stopping in the doorway, my fist clenches at my side, and I start to say something but stop myself. He’s not worthy of the oxygen it would take to tell him exactly what I think of him one last time.
Turning to leave, I clutch the strap of my guitar case and slam the door behind me. Pausing in front of Love’s door, I wish she were standing right here so I could tell her how sorry I am.
And how much I love her.
Thirty-Nine
Love
* * *
“So weird,” I mumble, checking my Messages app for the hundredth time today.
“What?” Tierney moves her hat out of her eyes and squints toward me.
“I’ve been texting Jude all day and the messages aren’t even showing as read.” I flip the screen of my phone to show her. “First one was sent at eight fifteen this morning. I sent four others throughout the day. It’s been almost eleven hours. This isn’t normal.”
The dusky sky and crashing of the ocean against rocks paints the prettiest backdrop to our last sunset in the Hamptons, but I can’t appreciate any of it because despite the fact I have no business caring about this nonsense, I’m desperate to figure out what the hell is going on with him.
He was hired to make me fall in love with him, and just when I’ve led him to believe he’s on the right path … he pulls away.
“Maybe he changed read receipt settings?” she asks.
“Why would he do that now?”
“Why does it bother you so much?” she asks, reaching for her virgin margarita. “Because it shouldn’t. You two aren’t really together. You’re both pretending.”
“I know.” I exhale, wishing I didn’t care, wishing it didn’t bother me, wishing I knew if he knows that I know.
“Why don’t you go inside and top off your wine,” Tierney says, “and when you come back out here, we can pretend the jackass no longer exists.”
Glancing at my empty wine glass, I peel myself out of the teak lounger, tie my sarong around my waist, and head inside for a refill, only to find the bottle empty. Heading to the wine cellar down the hall, I locate another bottle of Riesling and hunt down the wine opener. By the time I’m finished and my glass is more than half full, I make my way back to the beach.
“Love, I made us some new friends!” Tierney flags me down as I make my way down the stone steps of the patio, toward the cabana we set up on the sand earlier today.
Two masculine forms fill the space beside Tierney’s chair, though I can only see them from the shoulders down … until I get closer.
“Oh, my god, Tierney … ” I fight a smirk and mumble under my breath as soon as their faces come into focus, and once I arrive at our spot, it takes all the strength I have not to ogle and gawk in a way that makes it painfully obvious.
They’re gorgeous.
Tanned, rippled abs.
Thick heads of chocolate hair, both varying degrees of sun-kissed.
Full lips.
Strong jaws.
Big hands ...
“Love, this is Dmitri,” she says, pointing to the man in the yellow board shorts who lifts the beer in his hand and nods. “And this is his brother, Sascha. Guys, this is my best friend, Love. And yes, that’s her real name.”
Sascha is taller than Dmitri by an inch or two, his shoulders broader and his hair a shade darker. His clear blue eyes are fixed on me, lit almost.
“They’re staying two doors down,” she adds. “They just got here today. Told them we’re leaving tomorrow, but they can hang out with us tonight if they want.”
Sometimes I swear she forgets she’s married and pregnant.
“Nice to meet you,” I move my wine to my left hand and offer my right. Dmitri laughs but Sascha comes to my rescue, letting his handshake linger a few beats longer than necessary.
“They’re business partners,” Tierney says. “What do you guys do again?”
“We work in renewable energy,” Sascha says, looking directly at me. There’s a hint of an exotic accent in his voice, Eastern European, perhaps. And he speaks with careful intention, the syllables rolling off his tongue. “What is it you do, Love?”
“I’m in the process of opening a women’s center in Brooklyn,” I say, taking a seat in my lounger.
His eyes track my every move and his full mouth curls at one side. “That’s incredible. What made you want to do that?”
He asks all the questions I don’t feel like answering, but I answer them as best I can anyway in the name of honesty because there isn’t enough of it in this world.
I got divorced …
I came into some money …
I wanted to do something good with it …
Sascha doesn’t bat an eye, instead he keeps the conversation moving full steam ahead, asking where I’m from, where I went to college, and what I do for fun on the weekends.
Every so often I glance at Tierney, who throws me a wink or some side eye with a side of a smile that reeks of “he’s so fucking into you right now!”
Sascha is beautiful in a way that most men aren’t. A skilled conversationalist. An enthusiastic listener. Infinitely curious. And there’s a gentle, unguarded demeanor about him.
But when I look at him, I feel nothing in all the places I should at least be feeling something.
There are no butterflies, no thrumming heart, no head rush.
Dmitri’s phone lights in his hand, and he lifts the screen to his face. A second later, he nudges Sascha.
“Hey, we’re going to meet up with some of our friends downtown,” Sascha says. “You guys want to join us?”
Tierney lifts her palms. “Think I’m going to keep my eight months pregnant ass here, but thanks for the invite. Love, you should go though. If you want.”