The Deal Breaker

by Cat Carmine

  Now, for the first time, I’m the one breaking our deal. The unspoken one, the one that said we ran this company full-speed ahead and damn the consequences.

  “Wes, I’m ordering you to fire her.”

  I raise my eyebrows. “Excuse me?”

  “You heard me.”

  “The last time I checked we were equal partners in this business. I don’t believe you can order me to do anything.”

  Levi scoffs. “That’s in name only, Wes. You and I both know that. This business was built on my knowledge, my experience, my contacts. Let’s not fool ourselves.”

  My gut is clenching and I have the nearly insurmountable urge to slug him. “Why partner with me at all then?” I can’t resist asking.

  He shrugs. “I enjoy your … youthful enthusiasm. You’ve always been committed to the cause, I’ll give you that. But now I’m wondering if maybe I’ve been wrong about that.”

  My rage is simmering beneath the surface, but barely. Levi, on the other hand, looks like he’s enjoying this. Why have I never noticed before that this man is practically a sociopath? He seems to be taking genuine pleasure in the situation with Maria, and in twisting me up about it.

  I’ve never seen it before, but now it couldn’t be more clear. I’ve been trying to follow in Levi’s footsteps, trying to become more like him. Levi doesn’t have attachments to other people, he doesn’t get emotionally invested. That’s what I wanted. I wanted to be aloof, alone. Where nothing would ever hurt and nothing would ever remind me of the things I’d lost. My mom. Rori.

  Rori.

  Having her back in my life has torn down those walls I spent years building. Suddenly, getting emotionally invested doesn’t seem like such a bad thing.

  In fact, it feels a little bit like ... the thing I’ve been missing all along.

  I look up at Levi. His grey eyes are steely, and I can tell that he’s testing me right now. To see whether I’ll push back about Maria, or whether I’ll roll over for him. I weigh my options, but the decision itself takes only a split second to make.

  “Leave it to me,” I tell him with a resigned sigh. “I’ll take care of it.”

  Levi nods, satisfied. He leaves my office and I slam the laptop closed. I can’t bear to watch the video again. I have the damn thing memorized now.

  Instead I reach for my phone.

  Twenty minutes later, I’m meeting Tyler at Veneer, a hot little dive bar in Manhattan. We used to come in a lot when we first moved to the city, but I haven’t been here in a couple of years now. It’s a pretty mellow place, with a mixed crowd and great 80s alternative rock blaring out the speakers. Exactly the kind of laid-back place I’m in the mood for right now.

  Tyler is already there and I slide into the booth across from him. I catch the bartender’s eye and gesture towards Tyler’s drink. A minute later, I’m sipping the foam off a frosty amber ale of my own. I clink my glass against Tyler’s.

  “Thanks for meeting me in the middle of the day,” I say, after I’ve had a couple of good swallows of the beer. “I really had to get out of there.”

  “Hey, no worries. When you’re rich and fun-employed, you can do whatever you want with your time.” Tyler grins. “So what’s up? Troubles at the top of the food chain?”

  I let out a long breath and tell him about Levi wanting to fire someone who, by all accounts, was a great employee.

  When I’m done, Tyler looks serious.

  “What are you going to do? Fire her?”

  “Fuck no,” I huff. “I told him to leave it with me, but that was so I could buy myself some time. What I really need to do is figure out how to deal with Levi, not Maria.”

  “Levi Goldman.” Tyler shakes his head. “Say no more. I still don’t understand why you’ve stuck by that guy for so long. Everyone knows he’s toxic.”

  Tyler’s assessment takes me by surprise.

  “Oh? I didn’t know you knew him very well.”

  “Oh yeah. He used to be a member at Kinsmen. Until he got himself kicked out.”

  I snort. “What for?”

  Tyler shrugs. “General assholery. And you know, that place tolerates a fair bit of rich boy antics. Levi took it to a whole other level. I don’t know the whole story but I always suspected he crossed the wrong guy there. This was years ago, though. I only got the gossip second-hand, through my dad.”

  “Huh.” I guess I always knew Levi was a bit on the arrogant side, but I didn’t realize it was bad enough to get him kicked out of the Kinsmen. I shake my head.

  “Wish I would have known that about, oh, eight years ago.” I grin ruefully.

  Tyler grins back. “Sorry, man. By the time I heard about it, you’d already started GoldLake. Figured there was no point in bringing it up. And hey, the guy could have changed.”

  “I don’t think he has,” I say, taking another drink from the glass in front of me.

  “That sucks.” Tyler nods.

  “Yeah.” I look up suddenly. “How do you do it?”

  “Do what?”

  “Stay normal. I mean, you grew up with a fuck ton of money. Your father is Malcolm Grant, for Christ’s sake. And yet, you’re a good guy. Down to earth. You haven’t let it go to your head.”

  Tyler chuckles. “Well, I’m sure my father would like it if I was a little less ‘down to earth’ — or in his words, a complete fuck-up.”

  “Shit. Sorry, man.”

  He waves off my apology. “Don’t worry about it. That’s my issue. But I don’t know the answer to your question, really. Where is this coming from?”

  I shrug. “Just thinking about stuff lately. My life now is … well, it’s nothing like what I could have pictured when I was a kid. I didn’t know money like this existed. Sometimes I wonder if I’ve become too singularly focused on it. I don’t want to end up like Levi, you know?”

  I expect Tyler to crack a joke, but instead he sips his beer thoughtfully.

  “That happens,” he admits. “And I guess that’s what happened to my father. Maybe that’s why I’ve always rebelled against that life. I’ve always been happier being the party boy than the good son.”

  “Huh.” Even though Tyler and I have been friends for over ten years now, I don’t think we’ve ever really had a conversation like this before. I’ve never thought about him being conflicted about his family’s money. I know he likes the playboy life, but I never imagined it was a reaction to the way he grew up. I guess there’s always more to people than you realize.

  Tyler sips his beer again. “Look, I don’t know much about how you grew up. You’ve always been cagey about that part of your life, and I totally respect that. But you can’t let the past eat your present, you know? It’ll completely consume you, if you let it. At the risk of sounding like a total cheeseball, today is all we have. That’s how I try to live my life.”

  We’re both quiet for a minute.

  “You know, you’re a hell of a lot smarter than you look, Grant.”

  Tyler grins. “I’ll take that as a compliment. Now onto more cheerful topics.” He sets his beer down on the sticky table with a loud thunk. “How’s that new lady friend of yours? Rori.”

  My face falls. Tyler winces.

  “Shit, man. Sorry. Should I take it it’s not going well?”

  “You could say that.”

  “What happened? Do you want to talk about it?”

  “No.” I sip my beer.

  “No problem.”

  There’s a moment of silence and then I crack my knuckles.

  “It’s just, it comes back to what we were just talking about. I think I put my business before her, in a way that was — well, let’s just say it was pretty bad. And now she’s rightfully pissed at me. And I don’t even know why I did it, because she’s a hundred times more important to me than GoldLake, but now I don’t know how to fix it and it’s killing me.” I stop and finally take a breath. It feels surprisingly good to get that out.

  Tyler looks sympathetic.

  “Shi
t, man. That’s heavy. I don’t know what to tell you. If she’s more important to you than GoldLake, well, that says to me that you’re head over heels for this girl. Now you gotta make her see that.”

  “I know, but how do I do that?”

  “You have to go deep. It has to hurt, you know?” Tyler’s grey eyes are serious. “It’s not a real apology if it doesn’t cost you something. And I don’t mean in the financial sense.”

  “Damn.” I shake my head. His words really resonate. “Seriously, man, when did you get so smart?”

  Tyler laughs. “I guess it was all that time I spent partying in Europe after college. All those old philosophers rubbed off on me.”

  I groan. “Sure. Let’s go with that.”

  But Tyler’s words have lodged something loose inside me. I know now what I have to do. I have to be honest with Rori. I have to tell her everything, even the things I never wanted her to know. The things I was so ashamed of for so long. I have to let her see all of it.

  Tyler’s wrong about one thing, though. Because if I’m going to do this right, it’s going to cost me financially too. It might just cost me everything.

  But when it comes to Rori, no price is too high.

  Thirty-Nine

  “Okay, sister dearest, it’s Sunday night. You’ve been in bed all weekend. It’s time to spend at least a couple of hours sitting upright and eating some vegetables.”

  Emma tears off my blankets, leaving me sprawled on my bed in my Christmas tree pajamas, which were the only ones I could find Friday night, when I put them on. Yes, I’ve been wearing the same pajamas since Friday, when I crawled home from the office and got into bed. I’ve been here since then, binge-watching sitcoms and trying to make myself forget about Wes.

  Emma thrusts a clear plastic tumbler into my hand. It’s filled with some kind of sludgy green liquid.

  “What the hell is this, Em?”

  “Green smoothie. I figured I probably wouldn’t be able to get you to eat any actual vegetables, but maybe I could disguise them for you.”

  “They aren’t exactly disguised.” I tilt the drink and watch the green goop slide along the walls of the tumbler.

  “You won’t taste them, I promise. Drink up.”

  I take a hesitant sip and surprisingly, she’s right. It tastes like a regular fruit smoothie.

  “I told you,” Emma says smugly. She grabs my pillow and strips the case off, then grabs the sheet underneath me and tugs on it. I go rolling off the side of the bed.

  “Jesus, Emma!” I barely manage to hold on to my drink.

  “Sorry, but these sheets probably stink. Wouldn’t you rather go to bed tonight in nice fresh ones?”

  I grunt, which Emma takes as a yes. She smirks as she gathers the sheets into a ball.

  “Now you’re going to have a shower, put on clean pajamas, and I’m going to make up your bed. Tomorrow is Monday and you know what Mondays are?”

  “Terrible?”

  “Har har. No. They’re the best time for a fresh start. And that’s exactly what you need.”

  I take another sip of the green drink and glare at her. “A fresh start is a little easier said than done, you know.”

  “I know that.” Emma rolls her eyes. “But even if it’s hard, it’s going to be impossible if you don’t at least try.”

  Touché. I throw back more of the juice and fake a grimace. I refuse to let her know that it’s actually freaking delicious.

  “Yeah, yeah.” She shoos me out of the room. “Go get in the shower before I have to call in the hazmat teams.”

  I stumble into the bathroom and peel off the pajamas — which admittedly are a bit gross at this point — and climb into the shower. Much as I hate to admit it, Emma is right. I feel better when I get out. More like myself, at least. Less like a rank beast.

  When I come out of the bathroom, I find Emma has made up my bed with fresh clean sheets, in the palest of yellows. They’re hers, I realize, and my heart swells a little at the idea of my sister taking care of me in this way.

  “Thanks Emma,” I say, throwing back the last of the smoothie, which I’d left on my bureau.

  “Of course,” she says. “You’d do the same for me.”

  “Except the difference is, I’d never need to.”

  Emma’s lips purse into a smile. “I’m not perfect, you know.”

  “Sure.”

  She studies her nails for a minute — lilac this week, and not a chip on them, of course.

  “You know that book I’ve been working on?”

  “Yeah?”

  She pauses again, then looks up at me. “The proposal’s been rejected by six publishers so far.”

  “Shit, Emma, I’m sorry. I didn’t know. Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I didn’t want anyone to know. I guess it makes me feel like a failure.”

  “You’re not a failure at all! You’re putting yourself out there. That’s amazing. Someone will bite on it eventually. Did you know at least eighty percent of authors get rejected more than ten times before they get accepted?” I mean, I don’t actually know that for a fact, but it feels like something I’ve read somewhere.

  Emma forces a smile. “Thanks. I’m trying to be positive and hope it’ll happen eventually, but it’s getting a bit discouraging.”

  I wrap my arms around her in a spontaneous hug. She stiffens for a minute, then hugs me back.

  “I think you’re awesome,” I tell her. “And your book is going to be awesome and you just need to wait until the right awesome publisher finds it. You’ll find the right match for you, I know it.”

  Emma smiles, sniffling a little.

  “Thanks. That’s sweet of you to say. And look, the same thing is true for you. Some day you’re going to meet the right match, and Wes Lake is going to seem like nothing but a distant memory.”

  Instantly, my good mood plummets. Wes. I know Emma means well, but the thought of meeting someone else is about as appealing as the thought of eating tainted chicken. I don’t want to meet someone else. I want him to not be an asshole. I want to not have been wrong about him.

  But since that’s not going to happen, I guess Emma is right. I have to look to the future. I don’t feel like dating right now, but I’m sure some day I will. Someday, just like Emma said, I’ll meet someone else and it’ll be like Wes never even happened.

  So why does that thought make me feel even worse?

  “Thanks,” I manage. “I’m sure you’re right.”

  “Of course I am,” Emma teases. “I get paid to be right, remember?”

  I roll my eyes, but we’re interrupted by my phone, which blares angrily from my bedside table. For a second, my heart skips a beat. I have the strangest idea that it might be Wes. If he called right now, I would talk to him, I decide. Call it a moment of weakness, but I’d hear him out.

  Except when I pick up the phone, I see it isn’t Wes but Celia.

  “Hello?”

  “Wow, could you be any less enthusiastic?”

  “Sorry,” I laugh. “I thought you might be someone else.”

  “Ah.” I clearly don’t have to say anymore. “Sorry, sweetie. I guess you two still haven’t worked things out then, huh?”

  “No. And I don’t think we will.”

  “Well. Never lose hope.”

  “A little late for that. Now what the hell are you calling me for? Aren’t you in Hawaii?”

  “Yes, but I wanted to see how you were doing.”

  “You’re on your honeymoon. You aren’t supposed to be thinking about me.”

  “Oh, come on. You’re my best friend, and you’re hurting. Of course I’ve been thinking about you.”

  “Well, I hope not at any … critical … moments,” I tease.

  Celia giggles. “No, I confess I haven’t exactly been thinking about you a hundred percent of the time.”

  “Good. So how’s Hawaii?”

  “Oh my God, Rori, it’s amazing. You have to come here some time. Maybe we can do
a girls’ trip. It’s the most beautiful place I’ve ever been.”

  “That’s awesome, Cee. I’m glad you guys are having fun.”

  “That reminds me,” she says. I can hear her hesitating over something.

  “What?”

  “Can you send me Wes’s mailing address when you get a minute? No rush, just sometime before we get back.”

  “Wes? Why?”

  “Look, I know you’re not talking to him, but my mother would kill me if I didn’t send him a thank-you card for the amazing wedding gift he got us.”

  “He got you a gift? But I put his name on my card.”

  “I know, but I guess he wanted to do something on his own. He booked us this unbelievable helicopter tour of the islands. We went practically right inside this volcano. Jace almost shit his pants.” She dissolves into giggles. “It was the best part of the honeymoon so far. Well, aside from, you know…”

  “Yeah, yeah,” I say, but my mind is racing. Wes got them a gift? That’s really … sweet. And thoughtful.

  And exactly like the Wes I wanted to believe he was.

  “When did he do this?”

  “Huh?”

  “When did you get the gift? Did he do it after we got in this fight? Or before?”

  “Oh, before. I had the email confirmation the day of the wedding. He got our booking information from our Loft & Barn registry.”

  “Huh.”

  “What, Rori?”

  “Nothing.”

  “That wasn’t nothing.”

  “No, it’s just … I don’t know. That’s twice now that I’ve found out he’s gone and done something amazing without me even knowing. He also spent fifty thousand dollars buying me a dinky little keychain from an animal rescue group. That money is going to completely change their operations for at least a year. It’s beyond generous. It’s …”

  “It’s Wes,” she finishes.

  I don’t say anything for a minute. Then…

  “Maybe. Yeah.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  I straighten up. “Nothing. This doesn’t really change anything. It’s sweet, but it doesn’t negate what he did.”

  “Rori …”

  “No, Celia, I mean it. I’m done with Wes Lake.”