“I’m such a fucking idiot,” I murmured to myself.
“Yeah. No argument there,” Ally said. Her teeth were chattering, and she was hugging herself. “You can’t take these things back, you know.”
“The gifts are yours to keep.”
“No, you ass. What you’re saying. You can’t take any of this back. You can’t erase any of this. You’re accusing me of using you. You don’t get to have a bad day and try to hurt me because of it. That’s not what a relationship is. I don’t deserve this.”
I was starting to waver. Starting to doubt my righteous anger. That only made me recommit myself to it. I’d been blinded by sex. It was just sex. Maybe we’d been using each other. Me for her body and her for everything else I could offer her.
What kind of a fucked-up foundation was that?
We were doomed from the beginning.
“You should go,” I told her. “You can get your things tomorrow after I leave for work.”
67
Dominic
It was not a good day. I spent the entire night haunted by Ally’s tearstained face, the hurt in those soft brown eyes, the shake in her hands.
“I don’t know if I can forgive you for this.”
In the light of ugly gray morning, I wasn’t feeling as self-righteous or confident in my decision to protect myself.
My desk phone rang.
“What?”
“What did you do to Ally?” my mother demanded in my ear.
I’d arrived at work only to find my assistant had called in sick and someone had waved a magic wand taking me from Dominic back to Mr. Russo.
“Good morning, Mother. I’m fine. How are you?”
“I’m not happy.”
“Everything is fine. Consider it business as usual.”
“Ally sent me her resignation this morning, effective immediately.”
“Maybe she was just tired of working here,” I said wearily. She didn’t really need this job anymore. Not with the house ready to be put on the market.
“What did you do, Dominic Michael?”
“What makes you think it was me?”
“Because I know you. I know your baggage.”
“Where do you think that baggage came from?” I asked uncharitably.
“Darling, you’re forty-five years old. That excuse stopped working sometime in your early twenties when you became an adult responsible for your own choices.”
The woman had a point. An annoying, infinitesimal one.
“It was a private matter. I didn’t ask her to quit. I would have been willing to continue working together.”
“Dominic, I say this with love. You’re being an unconscionable fool.” She disconnected with a sharp click.
It was official. Every woman in the building, including my own mother, hated my guts.
Nina from advertising had to be physically restrained in the elevator this morning. I got off on the thirty-third floor and took the stairs only to walk straight into Missie the copywriter who took one look at me and burst into tears.
I took my lunch in the cafeteria, and hoards of people turned their backs on me as I walked past their tables. Linus returned my “good afternoon” with a roll of his eyes and a middle finger. Even Buddy couldn’t look me in the eye. Buddy. The nicest human being in the world thought I was Satan. He’d picked up his brown bag lunch the second I pulled out a chair at his table. “Have a nice day,” he whispered as he left.
It was time things were back to normal. Normal was familiar. Comfortable.
I was single again.
My home was my own again.
And I could go back to business as usual.
I stabbed my chicken with a violent jab of the fork and grimly ate my lunch alone.
Christian James, the cocky son of a bitch, strutted into my office like a rooster. Or a peacock. Whichever fowl was more annoying.
He tossed a dark brown garment bag over the back of my visitor’s chair.
“The only reason I’m giving this to you is because it’ll make you feel like shit,” he announced.
“I doubt there’s anything you could do that would make me feel anything,” I said, ignoring him and returning to the stupid fucking article that I couldn’t focus on writing because everything in the world was wrong.
“Big man hiding behind his desk. I guess you’re braver when you’re yelling accusations at a woman half your size,” he snapped.
“Be very careful, James,” I enunciated coldly, forgetting about the document on my monitor.
His laugh was cold, mirthless. “You never deserved her.”
“I’d like to remind you that Label and the Russo family have been one of your most generous backers. That backing can easily be taken away.”
If I’d expected him to back down and apologize, I was mistaken.
“Fuck you, man. That’s your problem. You think everyone is out to use you, to get something out of you. Did it ever occur to you that Ally loved you?”
Loved.
Loved.
Loved.
My heart echoed the word sluggishly.
“Some people are incapable of love.” I was a blasé motherfucker.
“Yeah, and I’m looking at one of them. I can’t believe she cared about you. You really had her fooled, you know? You’re a fucking emotionless iceberg.”
“And you’re the guy who fucked my girlfriend. Congratulations to you both.”
“Stand the fuck up.”
I put my reading glasses back on and went back to looking at my monitor. “Get out of my office, James. I have real work to do.”
“Stand up and make me.”
I had a good thirty pounds on the man. But he was ten years younger. I wasn’t certain he couldn’t beat me to a pulp.
“It was a trade, by the way. I made her what’s in the bag, and she did a little promotion for me. There was no sex, and you’re the dumbest motherfucker on the planet if you believe that she’d do that to you. I don’t know if you’re deflecting your own sins or what—”
“I never so much as looked at another woman,” I growled, yanking off my glasses. This idiot needed to leave my office. Immediately.
“Oh, does it piss you off when someone accuses you of something you didn’t do?”
“Fuck off, James. I’m losing my patience.”
“You’ve lost your damn mind. She’s a great girl, and I’m going to do everything I can to convince her to run in the other direction when you realize what a huge mistake you made and try to crawl back.”
“In the meantime, you can talk her into your own bed,” I said flippantly.
“Okay. My turn!” Faith, Ally’s friend, stormed into my office. She wore hot pink leather leggings and some kind of wooly, white crop sweater. Her hair was pulled up on top of her head in one sleek ponytail.
“I’ve got this, babe,” Christian said, instantly softening.
Faith paused to cup the man’s face in her hand. “I don’t want you to break your gorgeous, talented hands on this steaming piece of shit’s face.”
“Can I help you?” I asked dryly.