by Bella Forro
Good, I thought unkindly. He should be worried. Everything that had been going on here was unacceptable. I should have stepped in as soon as I had realized what was happening. I shouldn’t have let Victoria cloud my decision making the way I had.
But, dammit, I had. And there was nothing I could do about that now other than start to make amends.
“Where’s Victoria?” I asked abruptly. I didn’t have anything pleasant to say to him. I wasn’t interested in chitchat. What I wanted to know was where my girlfriend was hiding.
And how soon I could get her back.
Paul dragged his hands across the fronts of his pants, and I was more disgusted with him than I’d ever been. I wasn’t even sure why I was wasting my time with him. Everyone knew he could barely keep the department together and Victoria had been taking on more than her role called for at the company to make up for his inabilities.
“Victoria, ah,” he said, as though he weren’t sure exactly who I was talking about.
I leaned in close to him, feeling the tension across my shoulders, the urge to hit something. “Watts. You may know her as the only member on your team capable of producing quality work.”
“Yes, yes,” the man stammered, and I saw him begin to shake. “She asked for some personal time, sir. I’m not sure where she is, but I don’t expect her back for a few weeks.”
That brought me up short. A few weeks. There were a lot of problems with that, not the least of which was that I didn’t think the department would be able to handle a few weeks Victoria-free. “Are you kidding?” I demanded, suddenly wondering if I had somehow misjudged how serious things had been when Victoria had walked out the door.
Not that I had meant to equate her with Amy, but I had thought I might be able to make it up to her, change her mind. I thought I would have that opportunity.
I should have known better when she blocked my number, and I kept getting that automated voice telling me Victoria’s phone was no longer in service.
It should have occurred to me that Victoria would be like Amy. That was the whole damn reason I’d loved her in the first place.
“You’re on probation,” I snapped at Paul, aware I wasn’t following protocol, aware I was causing a scene, and unable to stop myself from continuing. “I’ll have someone in to assist the department this afternoon.” I’d call in a few favors, but God knew I had enough of them out there to redeem. I’d let this go on much too long as it was.
“You,” I said, turning to the girl I’d first seen Victoria walk into that conference room with. “You have her number, don’t you?”
“I do, sir,” she murmured, covering her shock well. “Would you like me to give it to you?”
I shook my head no. As though having her number was something I might need. “I need you to give her a call.”
“Yes, sir,” she said, reaching for her cell phone in the top drawer of her desk.
If she called me sir one more time I thought I was going to lose my mind. Though I was also pretty sure I was well on my way there already.
“She’s not answering…” she muttered, and I could see the fear creeping into her eyes.
I had to get out of there. I couldn’t stand another minute with these people.
“Thanks, anyway,” I said, and turned on my heel, walking out of the building, no closer to finding Victoria.
And feeling a hell of a lot worse.
Chapter 27
Victoria
It had taken us a while to get out of the city. Not that that was surprising.
And then we’d headed south, our cruise set to take off from Mexico, our passports burning holes in our pockets, our plan to catch a commuter flight from Florida.
When it was all said and done, after we’d dropped off the money at all the various charities I’d wanted to hit, we’d only made it three hundred miles.
But they were three hundred beautiful miles, and as we passed each mile, I felt like another little load was lifted off of my shoulders. I was certain that if we just kept going I was going to be able to escape all the drama that was wrapped up with Mark.
We’d stopped at a roadside motel, something right out of a horror movie, and I made sure to slide the chain lock into place and prop a chair under the doorknob.
For good measure, I checked the walls for anything that might look like a camera.
Overzealous? Probably, but I was willing to go the extra mile for the time being. My search turned up nothing, though, and I had to acknowledge that other than being dingy and in dire need of a makeover, nothing about the room seemed unusual.
Then, I lay back on the little double bed I had claimed as my own, the quilt some kind of scratchy polyester that smelled like stale cigarettes. It was a no smoking room, of course, but obviously, this was the kind of place where rules were made to be broken.
Which meant it was fitting in quite well with the rest of my life. I had always been such a rule-follower. I had always expected my life to reflect that.
But these last few weeks had ripped that right out from underneath me.
Cassie was sitting on her own bed, flipping through a collection of menus that had been left on the bedside table.
“Take out or dine in?” she asked.
It was all the same to me. Both were totally depressing. We could eat here, in this crappy little room, where all I could think about was the incredible opulence of the last hotel room I’d had the pleasure of staying in with Mark, as well as the hours of incredible, indecent activity we’d spent there.
Or we could head out to some subpar mom and pop restaurant with paper tablecloths and over processed foods.
It was enough to make you not hungry at all.
“Take out, I guess,” I said, kicking my shoes off and listening to them clatter to the floor. “Maybe I should take what money I have and sink it into a restaurant. A little culinary delight that people will wait months for their reservations and they’ll expect the wine to cost three times as much as their plate…”
“Please, Victoria,” Cassie interrupted. “We both know you don’t cook. Like, even a little bit.”
I rolled over on the bed, propping my chin up in my hands. “I know. But I’ve always wanted to be a restaurant owner. I could just hire out the actual cooks. The businesses that fail are the ones run by chefs anyway. You need someone with a background in business to make it succeed. And that’s at least one thing I do have.”
Cassie snorted. “I’m not sure having one disastrous relationship with a man, even if he was Mark Pierce, calls for restructuring your entire life. Even if you want to leave your job at Pierce and Jones, which I don’t even think you need to do, there are a hundred other companies you could go work for. You could even go nonprofit. Feel all good about yourself, and stuff.”
“Maybe,” I agreed because I didn’t want to have more of the conversation with her. But I wasn’t sure she was right. What if one disastrous relationship with a man like Mark Pierce was exactly the kind of thing that called for restructuring my whole life? Wasn’t that was I was already doing? In my own way?
“Besides, what if you guys end up back together? I mean, I know you have some things against Pretty Woman and everything since that vacation you guys took with Mark’s friends, but it happened in the movie, too. And then look! Richard Gere showed up. He never stopped loving her —”
“That’s not going to happen, Victoria. It’s just not. Plus, I was the one who told Mark I didn’t want to be with him. That I didn’t even like him, let alone love him, and I only wanted to be with him for his money. No one comes back from that.”
I didn’t meet her eyes at first, but when I did, she was giving me the mother of all withering looks “You really think he believed you?” Cassie asked. “I mean, really? Don’t you think it was obvious to him that none of those things were true? I mean, the man would have to be totally blind and stupid to believe that.”
I kicked my feet on the bed, listening to the sound of the squeaking spr
ings, the promise of an uncomfortable night’s sleep. We were going to wake up anything but well-rested, I was sure of it. “I’m positive, Cassie. Don’t you think I made it very clear that I meant those things? I wasn’t nice about it.”
“Fine,” she sniped. “Forget I said anything at all and tell me what you want to order. We’re doing Chinese.”
It was fine with me, and I told her I would take whatever house special included a spicy chicken dish and spring rolls.
And when she finished telephoning the order in, we sat in silence, neither of us eager to speak.
I spent a lot of time thinking about what Cassie had said, and then feeling bad that I’d snapped at her. I knew she was only trying to be helpful, but I just wasn’t in the mood to hear about all the ways I had messed this one up for myself.
We hadn’t said much since the night before. We’d just found something to watch on television, and let that fill the quiet between us. We’d eaten our cardboard-tasting Chinese food and turned out the lights, ready to have the dark engulf us so we could pretend we were sleeping instead of harboring anger at each other.
Like I’d predicted, the motel beds were anything but comfortable, but we were able to get a few hours of sleep, and in the morning I was feeling badly enough about the night before that I finally apologized to Cassie.
I was putting our bags into the trunk of her old Accord. “Hey, Cass?” I asked, trying for nonchalance instead of desperation. “I’m really sorry about yesterday. You were right and I was a jerk.”
Cassie put an arm around my shoulder and gave me a little squeeze. “Don’t worry about it, Victoria. I know this has been incredibly difficult and I’m not going to hold any of it against you…for long.” She gave me her trademark, sassy wink, and gave me a little nudge.
I felt a little wave of relief. If Cassie was already back to joking around, I was in the clear. And I didn’t know what I would do without her, right now. Everything would be ten times worse if I didn’t have her to lean on.
We climbed back into the car, ready for another long day of driving in front of us.
It was on to the next part of our adventure — neither one of us was going to miss this motel.
We had four hours under our belt, the sun out in full force, and I was the first to admit I was getting drowsy. And I wasn’t the one driving.
“Ready for lunch?” I asked, readjusting my sunglasses. “I think I saw a sign for a steakhouse a few miles back. Maybe it’s coming up?”
“Sounds good,” Cassie said noncommittally, squinting against the light.
Neither one of us were big meat and potato eaters, but it seemed the best option in a sea of Bojangles and Arby’s.
It was just off the exit, lit up like an old time truck stop, Mom & Pop on the billboard out front.
American authenticity at its finest.
I stretched and waited for Cassie to climb out of the car as well, then we ambled into the dim restaurant.
I knew they were the owners immediately, a little old man and woman sitting right behind the front desk, the woman with her glasses on, working on a crossword puzzle, the man frowning over a stack of receipts.
“Good afternoon, girls,” the woman said brightly, putting aside her puzzle. “Can I get you a table? Just the two of you?”
“Just the two of us,” Cassie said as I pulled my sunglasses off and arranged them on top of my head.
She dropped us off at our table, handing us both menus, and gave us a smile.
There was something about her that suddenly, painfully, reminded me of that time I had met Mark’s Aunt Alice, who had made me feel like I was a person who mattered, and not one more disappointment.
I felt the sting of tears, immediately caught back in that moment, immediately caught back up in everything I had lost.
Chapter 29
Mark
I took another lap around my office.
I’d done almost nothing but move through my office since I’d returned from my search for Victoria.
I’d tried to settle back into my work, but every time I sat down, I started thinking about her again, and the itch to do something, to try and find her, was too strong to ignore.
Of course, there was nothing I actually could do, so I settled for pacing the room instead.
It wasn’t a perfect solution, but at least it was something.
I’d glowered at everyone I came across, and so far, my tactic at reducing actual visitors or requests had been a success. I had yet to even have a call come through, though the blinking light on my phone indicated that I had more than one message waiting for me in my inbox.
They could go on waiting there. I’d get to it when I got to it.
I picked up my cellphone and searched through my recent calls. I was going to need a lot more than a little R & R to distract me from the depressing reality that had somehow become my life.
I let the phone ring.
“Hey, Jim,” I said when he picked up, “How are things?”
He launched right into something about a home improvement project and a deadline at work.
That was what I needed. A distraction. Something I could focus on entirely, instead of revisiting Victoria over and over again. I had some unfinished business with them anyway.
And maybe I could be one step closer to repairing the damage I had done to our relationship.
“I was wondering if you and Marie wanted to meet for dinner tonight. La Toque Bleue said they could get me in whenever I called.” Another one of the perks of being me, I supposed.
Again with all of the people looking to make nice with me so it would turn around and benefit them.
But it was the hot new spot to go, and I thought he would want to try it out, be willing to go even if it wasn’t convenient for him.
I wasn’t disappointed. Not that I was truly surprised — I could count on one hand the number of times I’d been turned down. And I knew they were still feeling bad about the weekend we’d spent together. Jim had mentioned it the last time we’d talked on the phone together. Apparently, it had been just as bad as Victoria had told me it was.
Dammit, I should have believed her then, instead of telling her it was all in her mind, dismissing it so quickly.
“You want to go ahead and give the others a call, let them know what’s up, and I’ll make sure we have a reservation in the books. Let’s say, seven?”
I thought about telling him I was too busy to do the legwork of inviting our friends, that I was embroiled in a new project and setting up for a presentation, but I didn’t think I could be convincing.
Instead, I let him agree to make the calls without offering any excuses for why I didn’t want to do it, and after a quick phone call to the restaurant, I returned to pacing my office, stopping by the window every so often to look at the city down below, and wonder if Victoria was somewhere nearby. If she was thinking about me like I was thinking about her.
I was the first to arrive at La Toque Bleue.
I had made the reservations, after all, and I wanted to save myself from that awkward moment of walking through the door alone into a room full of couples. I’d arranged to have the back room to ourselves because I wanted to deal with as few people as possible and because I knew that would be what my friends expected.
Like my father, they were nothing if not consistent in what they felt they deserved and should be gifted with.
I was on my second drink when Jim and Marie arrived, just looking for a new way to ease the angst that was gnawing at me.
Marie leaned over to press a kiss to my cheek and say hello, and I remembered that of the three, she had been the kindest to Victoria. I wasn’t sure if that was really saying that much.
I took a hefty sip of my drink instead.
If she was wondering where Victoria was, she didn’t ask.
The others trickled in shortly afterward, Rebecca, beautiful as always, with that sharp edge she wasn’t afraid to use against people. And Phil, oblivious to al
l the ways Rebecca hurt people because he was so smitten by her beauty and her devotion to him. Simple Jane, who didn’t seem capable of knowing when someone was being intentionally cruel, and Dan, whose only requirements in choosing a mate were that she be pretty to look at and uninterested in stealing his limelight.
Seeing them all together like that had me wondering if maybe I needed to revisit how I chose my friends. Maybe it was time for a massive overhaul of my personal network. Did I really have the time and energy for these people?
There was an awkward silence when the waitress came to take their orders, and everyone seemed to be looking at me expectantly.
At the empty chair beside me.
I should have had the wait staff take it. I should have made it as clear as day that Victoria wasn’t coming, and that we weren’t going to expect her.
Possibly ever.
“What?” I heard myself snap, the heat rising in me.
“Victoria…?” Jane began, and of course, it would be Jane because it wouldn’t have occurred to her that it was something that didn’t need to be pointed out to me.
“Victoria,” I said, silencing her with my booming voice. “Won’t be joining us. Now. Or ever. People like you — including you — made her feel unwelcome. Made her feel like a burden.”
I felt myself standing, suddenly towering over everyone else at the table. “I can’t do this with you. I am so greatly disappointed that you are the people I called my friends. I’m sorry, but I deserve something more. And Victoria did, too.”
I left them sitting there in total silence, their mouths hanging open, as though they couldn’t believe I would say that to them. As though they couldn’t believe I would choose not to be affiliated with people like them.
And I walked away.
And it was, by far, the best thing I had ever done with them as a group.
I made it up the street to a bar I wouldn’t usually look twice at, but I needed something that would hit me hard, take my mind off of everything.
I needed something that was going to quiet the panic I couldn’t seem to shake.