That was never going to change.
It’d been three days since Thane had tracked me down in the office, and thankfully he hadn’t tried again. I’d kept to myself, not wanting to talk to anyone about anything.
Which was why having an all-afternoon pow-wow with Donte drained me before I even walked into the conference room.
“Hey, are you okay?” Donte asked, waving his hand in front of my face.
I blinked at him, his deep brown eyes staring at me, his brow furrowed.
“I’m sorry, where were we?” My concentration had been shit. I was lucky I’d been able to accomplish what I had the past few days. I desperately needed to stop spacing out.
He heaved a sigh and sat back. “Have you slept at all this week?”
The puffiness of my red eyes was a dead giveaway there. “Not really.”
“Eaten?”
I shrugged. “Maybe yesterday.”
“How’s Kinsey?”
His rapid-fire questions almost made me dizzy.
“She’s fine.”
“How’s Thane?”
My lips pursed, and I blinked some tears away.
“Okay, there’s the cause. Did you two break up?”
I nodded.
“Was he just in it because you were acting as his assistant? Does he just like to bang women who work for him, then throw them away? Do I need to get a tarp and a shovel?”
I shook my head, unable to even crack a smile at his tarp and shovel comment. “I broke up with him.”
He froze and stared at me. “Why?”
“Because I love him.”
Donte leaned back and narrowed his eyes. “What kind of fool answer is that?”
“I couldn’t take it if he left me.”
“So your logic was to leave him first? That’s crazy talk.” His eyes were wide, and he threw his arms in the air in apparent exasperation. I’d be exasperated with me too.
“I didn’t have a choice,” I tried to stress, but it was closer to a whisper with little strength behind it.
“Of course you did. Not reacting like an idiot is a pretty big choice.”
“You don’t understand.”
He held his hands up. “Oh, no, I’ve never had my heart broken. No clue what that feels like.”
I huffed at him. “He deserves better than me and my baggage.”
“Listen, Roe, and I’m saying this from a place of love. I saw the two of you together more than once. Hell, everyone in the office saw you two together and some even heard.”
Heard? Oh, fuck, no. Please say he doesn’t mean what I think he means.
“That man looks at you like you are the moon and the stars. Why do you think he’d leave you?”
“Because they all leave me. Every man who has ever been in my life has left me, and I couldn’t let it happen again. Not when I feel so much.” A tear slipped out and I wiped it away.
Donte’s lips pressed into a straight line. “Were you happy with him?”
I nodded. “So happy. I’ve never had a man take care of me like that.”
“Then why would you throw him away?”
It was becoming impossible to convince anyone why when the only reason I knew was that he could do better than me.
By Friday, I was a zombie. I could count the number of hours I’d slept in the week since I broke things off with Thane, and they barely hit the double digits. Food? My stomach was in knots and my heart hurt so much that I couldn’t fathom actually eating. Personal hygiene was just enough that I could go into work every day and do my job. Although I seriously contemplated taking some personal time, I also didn’t want to feed into the rumors circulating rapidly through the office.
Thank God it was quitting time and I could grab my daughter and just go home, only I was in for a rude awakening when I arrived at the daycare.
“Kinsey isn’t here, Roe,” Stacia said in surprise when I arrived to pick up Kinsey, her eyes wide in horror.
The blood in my veins turned to ice. “What do you mean she isn’t here?” Did Ryn come and take her? Where was she?
“That man, Thane, came to pick her up. He said you got delayed.”
I blinked at her. “Th-Thane picked her up?”
Stacia nodded. “Oh, my God, Roe, I’m so sorry.”
I shook my head. There was no way Thane would hurt Kinsey, but still, my mind was in overdrive. Why did he pick her up? What was he up to?
“I told him I might be late. He probably just assumed I was and picked her up just in case,” I told her. Because even now, I trusted Thane with Kinsey.
That didn’t mean I wasn’t about to kick his ass.
“Is that true?” she asked. I nodded, and she blew out a breath. “Thank God. I was so afraid.”
“Everything is fine, Stacia. Just a miscommunication,” I assured her. “We’ll see you on Monday morning.”
“Okay, we look forward to it. Have a good weekend.”
“You, too.” I waved at her and headed back out the door.
My jaw clenched as I made my way down the street, pulling up my phone and dialing Thane. It rang, again and again, before his voicemail picked up.
I redialed, and it rang again.
“Answer the phone!” I screamed in frustration as I picked up the pace. The daycare was only a few blocks from my place, but it felt like miles. My heart hammered in my chest, stressed with anxiety.
Roe: Where is she?
I texted him in hopes he would respond that way, and he did almost immediately. Which meant he didn’t answer the phone on purpose.
Thane: With me.
Roe: Where?
Thane: Home.
Considering he didn’t have a key to my house, that meant his house. With each step, my anger grew. He knew how much I loved her, how much I protected her, so why did he go and do something so stupid?
I answered the pounding on my door to a tornado of fury blowing past me.
“Are you out of your fucking mind?” she growled as she whipped through in search of Kinsey.
It was possible, but I didn’t care. She was in my home, a home I was desperate to have her in full time. I knew I was about to get my ass reamed, but I didn’t fucking care.
“We need to talk,” I said as I followed her into the living room.
“The hell we do.” She ran to Kinsey, who was happily playing on the floor.
“She’s fine,” I assured her.
Roe turned to me, her eyes alight with anger and unshed tears. “Why? What the hell were you thinking?”
“I was thinking there was only one way I was going to get you alone.”
She shook her head and packed up the few toys and snacks into Kinsey’s diaper bag. “We have nothing to talk about.” She was vibrating with anger, her fury emitting into the space between us as her head snapped toward me. “Why would you do that to me? Why would you scare me like that?”
I knelt down next to her. “That wasn’t my intent.”
“Just because it wasn’t your intent doesn’t mean it was right.”
“You’re right, but I’ve been miserable this last week.”
She paused, her jaw clenching. “Good.” Her bottom lip trembled, and I knew she didn’t mean it.