by Jessica Wood
“Well, actually…to be honest, I don’t know him that well.”
Her comment surprised me. “What do you mean?”
“Well to me, he was always my boss, and the limited interactions I’d had with him outside of the workplace, you were always there. So come to think of it, I’d never really had too many real conversations with him that went beyond surface-level niceties.”
“How did you know I loved him, then?” I thought back to my first conversation with Anna after my coma when she had described how amazing my relationship had been with Connor.
“Hmmm. Well, I guess because you guys were always together. For lack of a better word, you were both workaholics. When I first met you, I knew you were still struggling with the loss of your mom, so outside of your long hours at work, you’d always wanted to go out and party. You didn’t seem to want to be alone. But when you started dating Connor, you seemed to eat, live, and breathe Brady Global, Inc. Besides the occasional times we met up and went out, all your time seemed to be spent with Connor or on work—and usually those two together.”
“So you’re saying, you thought I was happy and in love because I had devoted all my time into Connor and his company?”
“Well…if you put it that way, it doesn’t sound like a great relationship after all.” She paused before adding, “But you did seem happy. Sometimes I wondered if you felt lost after losing your mom, and Connor gave you purpose. His dedication to his company became your own, and in some way, it seemed to be what you needed at the time.”
I thought about Anna’s words and felt confused again. I had been the one who had changed since my coma. The one thing that had bonded me and Connor was no longer there. I had no desire to work as much as Connor did. I wanted to live my life and explore the world around me.
“What do you think I should do, Anna?”
“Well, that depends on how you feel now. Tell me how you feel about Connor and Ethan. What does your gut tell you?”
“Well, I still think Connor is caring, patient, and generous. But his biggest flaw is his devotion to his company. In the last week or so, I’ve realized that with Connor, I feel like I will always be second best to his company. Anytime he needed to choose between me and Brady Global, I’d always been the loser.”
“And with Ethan?”
“It’s completely different when I’m with Ethan. I feel like when he’s there with me, he’s really there with me, and present at that moment. The way he looks at me makes me feel like I’m the only thing that matters. But I also haven’t known Ethan for that long. What if what we have is just an infatuation that will die out after a few months?”
“Liv, I think you already know your answer. Just follow your heart. It will never lead you astray. Connor and Ethan sound like they’re completely different guys. Even though you had a great, rewarding relationship with Connor, and in some ways, that feels comfortable to you, don’t miss out on the rare chance of having a real, can’t-live-without-each-other love because you’re scared of it and it feels less certain and secure.”
I mulled over Anna’s advice and realized she was right. Life wasn’t about playing it safe. It was about following one’s heart. And my heart was telling me that I had to end things with Connor.
CHAPTER TEN
Even though it had only been a day since my birthday, I’d felt as if my whole world had changed within the last twenty-four hours.
Connor had called me late morning to tell me that he would be home around eight o’clock in the evening. Our conversation was short and strained. After I had lied to him about spending my birthday with Anna, I made an excuse so I could quickly end the call. I felt awful lying to him, but I also didn’t want to tell him anything else over the phone. I knew the right thing to do was to tell him in person. He deserved at least that.
A little after seven, I sent Ethan a text.
Me: Hi. He’ll be back in an hour. I’m going to tell him it’s over.
Ethan: What are you going to tell him? Are you going to mention me?
Me: No, I won’t. I don’t want to hurt him any more than I have to.
Ethan: Okay, that makes sense. Do you want me to stop by? I can wait outside if you need a ride.
Me: Thanks, but I’m okay. I don’t want to run the risk of him seeing you. Besides, I’ll be staying with Anna.
Ethan: Let me know if you need me. I’ll be here waiting…with plenty of eggs. ;)
Me: Okay I will, weirdo. LOL. :)
***
As I heard the front door open, I knew it could only be Connor. I had excused Bill and Debra for the rest of the night, and asked them to not be around the house for the rest of the evening. I knew that Connor would be devastated and I didn’t want his employees to be around to see him at his most vulnerable.
“Honey?” I heard his voice from downstairs.
“I’m up here in the reading room,” I yelled.
A feeling of dread washed over me as I heard his footsteps coming up the spiral staircase. I took a few deep breaths to try to slow down the violent beating of my heart against my chest. I closed my eyes and mentally ran through the things I wanted to say to him.
“Hey, gorgeous.” Connor walked into the room, still in his business suit.
I forced a small smile and stood up from the lounger. “Hi.”
“Happy birthday, baby. I’m so sorry I couldn’t get back yesterday.” He flashed me an apologetic smile and handed me a small, red, Cartier shopping bag. “Open it. I think you’ll like it.”
I stared at the shopping bag and didn’t move forward to take it from him.
As if he didn’t notice my lack of movement, he smiled and reached inside the small bag. “It’s the Cartier watch you’d been eyeing for a while.” He pulled out a square red box and opened it to show me the stunning gold watch inside.
“Connor, you shouldn’t have.” I frowned, realizing this was going to be more difficult than I had anticipated.
He sighed. “I know you’re probably still upset with me.” His voice was sweet and smooth. He walked over to me and pulled me in for a hug. My body was limp against his embrace and I didn’t hug him back.
“Connor…” I began. Then when he leaned down and tried to kiss me, I placed both hands against his chest to stop him, and took a step back. “Connor,” I said with more forcefulness than before. “We need to talk.” My voice was calm and serious.
“What is it, baby?”
I met his troubled gaze and felt a pang of guilt shoot through me. “Can we sit down and talk?” I motioned to the large couch in the room.
“Is something wrong? Please don’t be mad about yesterday. I really didn’t have a choice. This is a multi-billion dollar deal, and if all goes well, it’s going to take Brady Global to the next level.”
I shook my head slowly. “No, I’m not mad at you.” I looked at him and felt my face grow hot with anxiety. “Connor, first I want to thank you for everything you’ve done for me, especially during the last two months after my accident. I know I will never be able to repay you for all your care, patience, and love you’ve shown me.”
He reached for my hand, and I knew he could feel how cold they were against his. “What’s this all about, Liv?”
I forced myself to look him straight in the eyes. “Connor, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking lately, and I think I’ve changed since my accident. I’m not the woman you fell in love with. I’m not the woman who was once completely devoted to Brady Global and had gladly worked long hours alongside of you for the company.” A few tears fell down my cheeks and I quickly brushed them aside. “I don’t know where that person is, and I don’t know if she’ll ever return. But…” I gazed intently into his eyes, hoping he could see how difficult this was for me. “But I don’t think we should get married.”
“I don’t understand.” His voice came out with a rushed urgency as he searched my face for an explanation. “So you want to cancel our engagement? Baby, I understand you need more time to adjust. W
e can just have a long engagement. We don’t need to cancel it just so that we can date and get engaged again at a later date when you’re ready.”
“No, that’s not it.” I frowned, realizing he didn’t understand what I wanted. I drew in a deep breath. “What I meant was, I don’t think we should be together anymore. I don’t think we’re compatible.”
His face twisted with a mixture of pain and anger. “Where is this coming from?” His voice was louder than before.
“Connor, it’s not you, it’s me.” I cringed at how cliché my words were. “I’m the one who’s changed, not you. And as much as I had hoped we would work it out and rekindle the love that we had before the accident, I don’t think that will happen. I don’t think we want the same things in life.”
“So that’s it? You’re just going to give up so easily on us and leave me?” His words were cold and exact. “I didn’t give up on you when you were in the coma. The doctors didn’t know when you’d wake up, but I stuck around by your side through it all. My love for you never wavered.”
His words were painful to hear and I found myself drowning with guilt.
“I’m really sorry, Connor. This isn’t easy for me. If truth be told, I had been thinking about us for some time now, trying to convince myself that I could make it work between us. But after everything that has happened during the past two weeks, I realized something. You’ll never be in love with the current me. You’re in love with the me before the accident, the person who was passionate about Brady Global and had consumed herself in her work there. You two fell in love as a result of that shared passion. But, I’m not her, and even if I regain my memories, I don’t think I’ll ever be her again.”
I took off the emerald, diamond necklace from around my neck and removed the engagement ring from my ring finger. “I’m so sorry, Connor.” I placed both items on the coffee table in front of us and got up from the couch. “Like I said, I’m so thankful for everything you’ve done for me. I really didn’t mean to hurt you or make you upset. I just wanted to be honest with you sooner rather than later.” I took a few more steps toward the reading room door. “I should go. I’ve already moved my things to Anna’s and—”
“You just want to be honest with me?” He spat out the words vehemently. His brows drew together in an angry frown as he clenched his jaw. He stood up from the couch and towered menacingly over me. “Do you think I’m a fucking fool?” His voice was like venom and his eyes blazed with fury.
As I shrank back in fear and felt panic spread through my body, I wondered what he had meant by his question.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Do you really think I don’t know?”
“I…what are you talking about?”
“Stop playing dumb, Liv. I know all about Ethan.”
A chill ran down my back as I froze, paralyzed in place.
“Do you really think anything can escape my notice? I know you didn’t spend your birthday with Anna. I know you were with that fucker the entire time.”
Shock rippled through my system and a part of me wanted to ask him how he knew.
“You want to know what else I know?” A muscle twitched angrily against his clenched jaw. His narrowed eyes were stone cold and all remnants of love and warmth that had once been there were gone. “I know you went sky diving with that guy. I know you let him finger bang you last night. And I know you would have let him fuck you if he hadn’t said no.”
My mind raced with everything Connor was telling me. “H-how do you know all this? Did you have me followed?” I accused as I looked at him in disbelief.
“So you do admit that you’ve been cheating on me?” A resentful smirk appeared across his face.
“Connor, I didn’t plan on any of this to happen. I never wanted to hurt you. It just happened.” My face twisted in anguish, knowing that there was nothing I could say to make what I had done with Ethan okay.
“Nothing just happens.” He then walked to the coffee table and picked up the emerald, diamond pendant. “You want to know how I know everything you’ve done behind my back?” He dangled the pendant in front of me.
“What’s that got to do with it?” I frowned at him in confusion.
“So I wasn’t completely truthful with you about this pendant.” He looked at the pendant and then at me with a wide grin. “You see, when I had it custom-made, I also had a few extra features added to it. It has a GPS tracker as well as an audio and video transmitter.”
My mouth dropped open, and at that moment, I was more shocked than frightened. “So you watched and listened to me the whole time I’ve been wearing that?” I stared at him, in utter disbelief that he had been spying on me this entire time.
But something else bothered me about this, and it was a thought I couldn’t shake off. “But why? Why did you go through this much trouble to track my every movement? I thought we loved each other? Why didn’t you trust me?” I searched his stone-cold face for answers.
“That’s not important,” he said dismissively. “What’s important is the fact that you did in fact cheat on me.”
I wasn’t sure why, but I suddenly felt a strong urge to get away from him. “You’re right, Connor. I did cheat on you, and you didn’t deserve that. While I don’t regret what I’ve done with Ethan, I do regret doing them while we were still engaged. You can choose not to believe me, but I’m telling you the truth when I say that I do feel awful about how things happened. I do feel awful that I’ve hurt you in the process. That’s why I talked to you today. I didn’t want to keep doing things behind your back. With everything that’s happened between us, and between me and Ethan, I’ve realized that our relationship isn’t working. That’s why I think we should just be friends.”
“Fuck friends! I’m not going to let you do this to me!” His voice roared like thunder, causing me to flinch. “You’re not going to leave me like she did.”
“She?” I asked softly. I felt my body tense up as I started to fear for my safety.
“Cindy. You’re not going to leave like Cindy did.” There was a crazed frenzy in Connor’s hazel eyes that I’d never seen before.
“I’m not,” I tried to reason with him. “Cindy died from cancer. This is different.”
He snorted with laughter. “She didn’t die from cancer.”
My breath caught in my lungs. “But why did you tell me that, then?” A part of me was afraid to know the answer.
“She had cancer but when she went into remission, she left me and made up some bullshit reason—something about being too controlling. So to me, she died when she walked out on me and left me and Scooter behind.”
“Connor, I’m sorry.” I looked at him with pained eyes. “I didn’t know about Cindy—you know that. I really don’t want to hurt you, but…I can’t stay when the feelings aren’t there.”
I walked toward the door to leave, but he moved in front of me. He glowered at me, and his left eye twitched in anger as he narrowed his gaze at me. “Did you not fucking hear me? You’re not leaving me!”
He suddenly grabbed my wrist and yanked me closer toward him. Then a flashback hit me more violently than any of the others I’d experienced before.
Anna laughed at something I had just said. “Liv, you’ll have to tell Connor that story. Maybe that’ll sway him to having the rustic farm and outdoor-themed wedding that you want instead of having it at that stuffy ballroom he wants it at.”
I giggled. “Yeah, I know, right? You know, sometimes I think he’s so formal and rigid about things.” I leaned in and said in a whisper, “Do you know he almost always wears a suit? Even on the weekend when we’re working from home, he’ll have a suit on. If I didn’t have access to his closet, I swear I’d think he didn’t even own a single pair of jeans.”
Anna laughed again and then looked around. “Speaking of the devil, where did he go?”
My eyes swept the room, but Anna was right, there was no sign of him in the reception hall.
“I’ll go look for him.” I smiled as I put my drink down on one of the tables.
Anna narrowed her eyes at me and smirked. “Wait a minute, is he in one of the private rooms waiting for you to get there so you guys can have a quickie?”
“You and your dirty mind.” I laughed as I rolled my eyes. “Like I said, Connor’s too formal for that kind of stuff. We’ve rarely had sex outside of the bedroom.”
She gasped in outrage. “God, that sounds awful.”
I laughed. “You’re so ridiculous. Okay, let me go find him. I’ll be back.”
As I walked around the circular perimeter of the museum, I passed by a series of closed offices. It was then that I thought I heard some movement inside one of the offices. I reached for the doorknob and it turned in my hand. When I opened the door, I gasped in horror at what I saw.
It was Connor. His back was turned to me, but I knew it was him. He was on the floor, leaning over someone else. My eyes grew wide as I saw a thick pool of dark red liquid expand around them.
“What have you done, Connor?” My voice came out in a broken whisper.
His head whipped around at me, and it was clear from the shocked expression on his face, that he didn’t hear me open the door.
“Shut the door, Liv!” he demanded as he got up quickly. There was a threatening edge to his voice that was new to me.
I obeyed and closed the door behind me. My eyes turned back to the body on the floor. It was a middle-aged man who I didn’t recognize. There was a large red stain on his white shirt where the knife was still protruding out of.
“Did you…did you kill him?” I ran to the body and checked for any signs that he may still be alive.
There was no pulse. He wasn’t breathing. He was dead.
“It was self-defense.” There was an agitation in Connor’s voice as he paced around the room. Then he leaned down over the body and pulled the knife from the man’s chest. He wiped it clean against the man’s pants and wrapped a towel around it.
“Connor, what happened?” I got up from the floor and looked at him. He was my fiancé, but at that moment, the person I saw staring back at me was a stranger.