Choose Me

by Donya Lynne

  Whatever is bugging Ed obviously doesn’t have to do with the Freedom pitch.

  I check the time then plant my palms on the table. “Okay then.” I close my laptop. “Fellas, I’ve got a date with a new pool table and a floor installer in an hour, and I still have to run by the hardware store on the way home, so are we a go on this?”

  Everyone nods and voices their approval.

  Brent powers down his laptop and reaches for his bag. “The time is now if you want to make an offer. If you wait too long, someone else will. Rumor has it they’re about to go through a change in leadership.”

  “Really?”

  Brent nods. “I think Robert’s about to retire, and remember, we’re not the only ones interested in making an offer.”

  One of our competitors, Star Rider, has shown an interest in the company, too. They would love to nab the Harness technology and overtake Rugged’s market position, which would be catastrophic for Freedom, because Star Rider would dismantle Freedom, keeping only a few key personnel. I refuse to let that happen on both counts. I want to keep Freedom intact—because why try to fix something that isn’t broken?—and improve my company’s position in the process.

  “We’re the best fit,” Mike adds, putting a voice to my thoughts as he closes the Freedom dossier inside his leather portfolio. “Not only are both companies headquartered in the Denver area, both have similar structures and values, and we complement one another. Star Rider would become hostile if Freedom resists, which would get ugly. We could thwart a huge industry nightmare by convincing Freedom to merge with us.”

  “I agree,” Ed adds.

  “Then I’ll make sure to include that in my pitch.” I push away from the table and stand, turning toward my brother. “Make it happen. I want something set up with Robert Clayton next week.”

  Robert runs Freedom, and if the rumors about his pending retirement are true, I want to lock him down before he passes the torch to his successor, most likely his daughter, Kate. It’s not that I have a problem dealing with women, but she’s rumored to be more involved in the day-to-day operations than Robert is, and he’s more like me, a visionary. The odds are better he’ll see the benefits of a merger more than Kate will.

  Brent closes his laptop and starts gathering his files. “Do you want to meet him here or—”

  I shake my head, unbuttoning the cuffs of my shirt. “Dinner. Make it a dinner meeting.” I start rolling up my sleeves. “Any night next week will work. Someplace nice, though. But not too nice. Nothing intimidating.”

  It’s better to make introductions and talk about this sort of thing over good food and drink, which has the power to soften people and make them more amenable to suggestion. Bringing Mr. Clayton to the office will put him on the defensive before I even introduce myself. After all, my office is my turf. I don’t want him to see me as a tyrant out to take his company. I want him to see me as a friend. Neutral ground over a good bottle of wine is key for our first meeting.

  “Consider it done.” Brent pushes his chair under the table.

  Ed and Mike are already heading for the door.

  “You two still coming over tonight to help me finish the basement?” I load my laptop in my leather satchel, being careful not to let any of them see the issue of Swank.

  “That all depends,” Mike says jokingly. “Are you still planning on feeding us?”

  I walk them to the door and clap the back of Mike’s shoulder. “If food is all it’s going to take to guarantee you’re there, then consider dinner on me.”

  Mike laughs. “Then consider me there.”

  I’ve been remodeling, and I’m almost finished. Just one more room to go. As if I have a lot of free time to remodel, but I enjoy taking on different projects around the house. It helps take my mind off other things. And if it’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s idle time.

  My dad always said an idle mind is the devil’s playground, and I’ve often wondered if that played a part in what happened to him.

  I run by the hardware store, pick up painter’s tape, some rope to take out to the corporate cabin in Aspen when I go in the fall, and some cable ties to bundle and organize the slew of extension cords that has amassed in my garage. The guy cashing me out probably thinks I’m a serial killer.

  I arrive home five minutes before the delivery guys drop off the pool table. While they’re setting it up downstairs, the flooring specialist shows up. Now that the basement is finished, I’m turning my attention to the great room on the main level and need to pick out hardwood to replace the carpet. Mike and Ed pop in while I’m deciding between a walnut-colored bamboo flooring sample and one labeled chestnut. They head down and break in the pool table while they wait.

  Let them have their fun now, because once I cue up, they’ll be too busy losing to have any fun.

  Once I’ve tied things up with my flooring guy, I corral my friends, and we spend the next hour moving furniture from the downstairs store room into the newly remodeled basement, aka my man cave, before breaking for dinner when the pizza arrives.

  I grab three beers from the fridge, and we park at the granite kitchen counter and dig in.

  Whatever was bothering Ed earlier is still eating at him. He’s been quiet and moody since he got here. It’s like a huge grey cloud is hanging over him, growing bigger and more ominous by the minute.

  I’m eyeing him suspiciously when he glances up and meets my gaze.

  “Why are you looking at me like that?” His defensiveness takes me aback.

  “You tell me, buddy. You’re the one who’s been walking around like he’s pissed off at the world today.”

  His gaze slides away from mine as he takes another bite of pizza. “Maybe that’s because I am pissed off at the world.”

  I exchange curious glances with Mike, who raises his eyebrows as if to say he has no idea what’s up Ed’s ass but is as curious as I am. Neither of us says anything.

  Ed drops his pizza and wipes his hands on a paper napkin before hauling his beer in for a hardy gulp. As he sets the bottle back on the counter, he looks from me to Mike then sighs as his shoulders droop. “Anabel’s cheating on me.” He says it like he’s confessing sins he no longer has the strength to carry.

  His words stop me cold, and I almost choke on my own saliva.

  Mike was in the process of picking up his beer and almost knocks it over instead. “What?” His head whips around toward Ed.

  Ed shrugs and gives a desolate shake of his head. “She’s cheating on me. Anabel’s having an affair.”

  It feels like my feet have grown roots into the floor. I can’t wrap my mind around this. Ed and Anabel have only been married a year. They’re in love. At least I thought they were.

  “What happened?” I ask. “How do you know she’s cheating?” Maybe this is all just a big misunderstanding. Maybe Ed saw something and misinterpreted it, and Anabel isn’t really cheating at all.

  Ed makes a pained face as if he’s reliving the moment he discovered her affair all over again. “She forgot to log out of her Facebook account last night, and I saw her messages. She and some guy named Jake have been messaging each other. You know . . . sexting. And then they decided to meet, and . . . well, you can imagine the rest.” His jaw clenches as he swipes his hand through his unruly hair.

  I don’t move. I can’t. Because if I move, I might lose the tether-like hold I have on my anger.

  “How long?” Mike asks quietly.

  Ed’s eyes grow dangerously dark. “Three months.” He’s silent for a few seconds, but his silence seems only to feed the mounting tension in the room. “When I confronted her, she told me she wants a divorce. Can you believe that shit?”

  The breath whooshes out of me. A divorce? Anabel is divorcing Ed for this Jake guy? After only a year of marriage? I slowly lower myself onto a nearby barstool. “Jesus, Ed.” It’s all my mind can come up with to say.

  Ed shakes his head and brushes his hand through the air in front of him. “Nah, it’s
okay.” He shrugs tightly, his face twisting into an angry, defensive mask. “I’ll be fine. If she doesn’t want me, fuck her, right? Let him have her if this is the kind of woman she is.” He picks up another slice of pizza, lifts it to his mouth as if he’s going to shove the whole thing in, stops, and then drops the pizza on the paper towel he’s using as a plate. It makes a soft, squishy noise as it hits the counter.

  Ed takes an aggressive step back and points his finger. “She’ll be sorry. She’ll see what a mistake she’s made. In a few months, she’ll be begging me to take her back. But you know what? I won’t. Not now. Not after this. She fucked up. She totally fucked up the best thing she’s ever going to have, and for what? Some jerkoff who’s probably doing a dozen other women?”

  The mood in the house has gone from light to downright gloomy, as if someone has sprayed a grey, misty film over everything.

  I feel awful for Ed. He really loves Anabel, and even though he says he won’t take her back, if she decides one day that she’s made a horrible mistake, I know he will. He loves her that much. But right now, she’s made her decision, and no matter how jacked up her reasons are, Ed’s not the one she wants to be with.

  “I’m sorry, guys,” Ed says. His shoulders stoop as his defensive shield falls. He looks like he’s just competed with the devil in a winner-take-all wrestling match for the salvation of mankind and lost.

  Now that the initial shock is over, anger rises in me again.

  “Why are you sorry?” My hands briefly clench on the counter. “You’re not the one being unfaithful.”

  “Yeah,” Mike adds, leaning toward Ed as if he wants to make sure Ed hears him loud and clear. “You’ve got nothing to be sorry for, Ed. You’ve done nothing wrong.”

  Ed glances from me to Mike. “I don’t want to be a downer, man. You’re getting married next month, and the last thing you need to hear right now is how my marriage is falling apart. I don’t want to ruin your big day.”

  Mike recoils, lowering his chin. “You’re not ruining anything. Don’t even worry about that.”

  Fury clouds my thoughts. I’m so angry at Anabel for what she’s done. Ed’s a good guy. Like me, he abhors infidelity. Maybe he’d been a hound dog when he was younger, but he never slept with another man’s wife or girlfriend, and when he was in a relationship, his eye never strayed. Anabel’s crazy to leave him and run off with this Jake guy.

  “Do you need a place to stay?” I ask. “I’ve got plenty of room here if you need to hang with me for a while.” I don’t want Ed alone to dwell on his heartbreak. I know all too well how easy it is to do something stupid when you’re left to marinate in your own mental sewage.

  Ed releases a heavy exhale that sounds like reluctant acceptance combined with confusion. “I don’t know. Maybe . . . yeah, I could use a place to crash for a few days.” He scrubs his palms down his face then drops onto a barstool. “I don’t know if she’s moving out or what her plans are, but even if she does, I’m not sure I could stay in that house. At least not right now. Too many reminders, you know?”

  I know all about reminders. It’s one reason I bought this house and haven’t talked to my mother in almost twenty years.

  “Crash here as long as you need, buddy. You can use the basement bedroom if you want. You’ll have your own kitchen down there.”

  Ed nods. “Thanks, Grey. I appreciate it.”

  After how Ed and his family were there for me when I was a kid and needed a place to stay, offering my home to him is the least I can do.

  Nothing more is said about Anabel, and we finish eating then get back to moving furniture out of the great room so I can start painting. I don’t care if paint drips onto the carpet, since I’m replacing it, so we leave that for the flooring guys to take care of next week.

  “Jake,” Mike says with a snort a half-hour later as he and I grab opposite ends of the couch. “Sounds like a pussy name to me.”

  I knew we wouldn’t be able to go the rest of the night without revisiting the newborn elephant in the room. And leave it to Mike to bring it up in a way that breaks the tension.

  “A big fat pussy name,” I add with a grin.

  Ed lifts the coffee table, one corner of his mouth turned up. “A super pussy name.”

  Mike and I chuckle as we heft the couch, which is heavier than it looks, and shuffle-walk to the basement stairs. Now that we’ve cleared the store room of all the basement furniture, we’re going to fill it back up with everything from the great room.

  As we head back upstairs for another load, Ed dusts off his hands and says, “Do you want to hear why she’s leaving me for this guy? The reason she gave me?”

  “Sure, why not?” I make a beeline for the brown leather wing chair that matches the couch Mike and I just lugged downstairs.

  Ed rolls his eyes. “She says he makes her feel young. Like she’s a teenager again or some shit.”

  I rest my hands on the back of the chair, catching my breath. “Well, shit, man. You used to make her feel that way.” I huff and straighten. “And who the hell wants to feel like a teenager again?” I know I don’t. Those were the rottenest years of my life.

  “I know, right?” Ed gives us an exaggerated nod. “Is that crazy or what?”

  I lift the chair. “I’m telling you right now, Ed, you’re not the problem. She is.” I start for the stairs again. Both Mike and Ed follow, carrying another chair and an end table. “Don’t get me wrong, I like Anabel. Or at least I used to. I thought she was sweet. Maybe she still is. Maybe she’s just confused. Maybe she didn’t intentionally mean to hurt you, but whatever her reasons, if she’s going to throw away your relationship for a guy just because he makes her feel like a teenager again then she’s never going to be happy. She can’t hold onto the past forever. Sooner or later, she has to grow up and face the reality that getting older is the natural course of life.” I reach the bottom of the stairs and turn for the store room. “I mean, come on, how long will it be before she grows bored with this Jake guy and finds someone else who makes her feel young. Or worse yet, bounces back to you in hopes you’ll take her back.” I blow out a resigned sigh as I set the chair down. “If you’re not careful, Ed, she’ll play both you and this Jake guy off each other and string you along as she tries to decide what to do.”

  Ed shakes his head. “I won’t let that happen.”

  He says that now, but I see the brief glint of hope spark inside his eyes.

  I hope he doesn’t have any crazy ideas about taking Anabel back if she returns, begging for his forgiveness.

  But if that happens, and Ed gives her another chance, only to be hurt when she pulls this shit again, I’ll be here for him.

  He was there for me when I needed someone, and that makes us tight.

  So yeah, I’ve got Ed’s back.

  “Let’s finish this up,” I say, gesturing toward the stairs leading back to the main floor. “I’ve got to work on the Freedom proposal tonight.” If Robert Clayton really is about to step down, I need to make sure my pitch is rock solid.

  I need to convince Robert he needs my company as badly as I want his before he passes the torch.

  Chapter 4

  Friday

  Katherine

  The kids haven’t been gone twenty-four hours, and I already miss them. The house was almost too quiet last night. By the end of summer, I’ll be used to it, but right now it’s a little unnerving.

  I’ll be honest, though, part of me wants to take off my shoes, open all the windows, and sit cross-legged in the middle of the living room floor with my eyes closed. Just sit there and listen to the birds sing and the wind blow through the trees.

  When you have two preteen children, you forget what silence is. Whether it’s Christian’s blaring music, Rose’s whiny protests about how unfair it is that her friends can color their hair yellow and violet when she can’t, both of them arguing with me for “just ten more minutes,” when I want them to shut off the PS4 and go to bed, or their thunderous footf
alls thumping down the stairs when they’re running late for the school bus, there’s a lot of noise to go around when the kids are home.

  I’ll welcome the cacophony when they return in August, all tanned skin and sun-bleached hair from days on the beach. Rose will be depressed after being forced to leave whatever boy she’s developed a summer crush on, so I’ll have to deal with that fallout the way I have to at the end of every summer, and Christian’s hair will be a longer, bushier mess than it already is, so I’ll have to rush him in for a haircut before school starts, but it’ll be nice to have them back for another ten months before I have to send them off with their dad again.

  In the meantime, I have two months to fill. Two months I’ve ritualized into what my best friend, Jess, and my sister, Charity, call the manhunt.

  How Phil learned about the manhunt, I have no idea, but now that he has, it’s no wonder he thinks I’m slutting myself around when the kids are gone.

  If I go through with it, this will be the fifth summer I’ve engaged in the manhunt, which I prefer to call my summer fling. That sounds a lot less whorish than manhunt. Either way, I’m not sure I want to go down that road again this year. Not because of what Phil said, but because I don’t feel like I’m getting what I was hoping to from my summer romances.

  Aside from these summer flings, I don’t date. I feel too guilty to date. Thanks to my job, I don’t see my kids as much I like, so I should be there for them when I’m not reviewing sales figures and helping my father make deals, not traipsing off with a boy toy.

  These summer romances are all I’ve got of a sex life, though, so I really should be more excited than I am about being on my own until August. I haven’t had sex in over ten months, and if I don’t take advantage of my child-free time while I’ve got it, it’s going to be another year before I can.

  I think my problem is that the guy last year wasn’t all that great. And the three before him weren’t much better. Four flings, four duds. With those odds, I’m not filled with a lot of optimism that this year will be any different, so why put myself through the torture?