I slammed on the brakes and my car skidded to a halt on the rain-slick concrete outside of her apartment building. I left the car running and shoved the door open, startling the poor, unsuspecting valet as I took the stairs into the building two at a time.
“Mr. Lockhart,” Lola’s doorman sputtered in surprise when I pushed through the glass doors and headed straight for the elevator. “Good evening. Is Ms. Abbatelli expecting you?”
“She is, Maury,” I continued, not breaking stride as the lie slipped easily off my tongue.
“O-oh. Okay then,” he stuttered as I frantically jabbed at the Up button, willing the elevator to come. I jumped in as soon as the doors opened and pressed the button for her floor. My anxiety-riddled body refused to stop, even in the close confines of the lift, so I paced from side to side until the ding alerted me that I’d reached my destination.
I sprinted down the hall and began pounding on her front door like a madman until it finally opened. And the sight that greeted me from across the threshold made my blood run cold.
“Who the fuck are you?” I ground out, clenching my hands into fists so tight my fingernails cut into the skin of my palms. It was either that or tackle the motherfucker who’d just answered Lola’s door to the ground and beat him senseless.
The unknown man crossed his arms over his puffed-out chest and scowled. “You’ve got a lot of fucking nerve showing up here. I suggest you leave before I mess up that pretty face of yours.”
I clenched my jaw so tight a sharp pain shot through it. “You could try,” I hissed menacingly. I didn’t know who this guy was or what the fuck he was doing in Lola’s apartment, but I was hoping he’d make the first move so I could happily break every bone in his face. I’d been itching for a fight for days. I needed something, someone, to take out all the aggression and anger I’d had pent-up since Lola walked away from me.
“You’re a cocky fuck, aren’t you?” he chuckled humorlessly. “I can see why she was initially drawn to you.”
That comment gave me pause, but only for a moment. “Since you seem to know who I am, maybe you wouldn’t mind telling me who the hell you are and why you’re in my girlfriend’s apartment?”
“Girlfriend?” His head dropped back with a roar of laughter. “I don’t think so, buddy.”
I took a threatening step closer to him. “Listen, you son of a—”
“What’s going on?”
I jerked to a stop at the sound of Lola’s voice, and the both of us turned in the direction of her voice. At the sight of her in nothing but a thin, flimsy robe with her hair wet from a recent shower, I lost my mind.
“Motherfucker!” I growled and then lunged, burying my fist in the asshole’s face.
I had to hand it to the guy — he rebounded quickly, landing a jab to my stomach. I vaguely heard Lola yelling at us to stop through the blood pounding in my ears, as the unknown bastard and I continued to fight, taking each other down to the ground.
“Goddamn it!” I snarled in pain when he slammed his elbow into my ribs. I returned with a solid shot to his kidneys, temporarily gaining the upper hand so I could roll the asshole off me.
“You…” Punch. “Better…” Punch. “Not…” Punch. “Have fucking…” Punch. “Touched her!”
The sound of a deafening air horn forced us to stop fighting and cover our ears. When I looked up, Lola was standing there, fury painted across her face, with a goddamned air canister in her hand.
“What the fuck, Lola?” the guy gritted out as we both struggled to our feet. “Where the fuck did you get that?”
She shot him a murderous glare while answering, “Mom bought it for me when I went off to college. She thought it would deter rapists.”
Wait….
The guy put his fingers to his rapidly swelling cheekbone and winced. “Leave it to Mom to overreact.”
“Well it turned out to be pretty handy, didn’t it?” she snapped, putting her hands on her hips.
“Wait a second. Your mom…?” I interrupted, looking at the guy. He looked just as bad off as I felt, but as I studied him closer — beneath the swelling — I began to note the obvious similarities to him and Lola.
“This is my brother, asshole!” Lola spit. “Who the hell did you think he was?”
Well shit.
Grayson
“SHIT,” I HISSED. Her brother? Well that was just fucking perfect.
“Dominic Abbatelli.” He held out his hand. The bizarreness of the situation wasn’t lost on me as we quickly shook hands. “Nice to meet you. You’ve got a pretty decent right hook for a pretty boy.”
“Jesus Christ.” I lifted my hand to rake it through my hair but thought better of it when the motion sent a stab of pain through my sore ribs.
“What are you doing here?” Lola asked, the venom in her voice drawing my attention back to her.
“I needed to talk to you,” I answered quickly.
The sarcastic nature of her laugh, and the fact that it was completely devoid of all humor, twisted my stomach into knots. “And you thought attacking my brother would be a good way of getting my attention? Are you kidding me?”
“I didn’t know he was your brother! I thought—”
“What?” she cut in. “You thought what? That I was hooking up with someone else? Wow, talk about being a hypocrite, Grayson. I’m not the cheater here. That would be you.”
“Lola, please.” I took a step toward her, and at her retreat, Dominic’s hand came up to stop me.
“Close enough, my friend. I’m pretty sure my sister doesn’t want you anywhere near her right now.”
“Look, those pictures… they aren’t what you think. I swear.” I pleaded with my words as my eyes implored her to see the truth. There was no one else but her. “We were just having a friendly lunch, that’s it.”
There wasn’t a trace of emotion in her voice as she said, “That’s not what it looked like to me.”
“That’s all it was! We talked about you the whole time!”
Her hard facade cracked just then and I caught a glimpse of pain in her eyes. Her brother’s hand was unrelenting as I pushed at it, desperate to get to her and hold her and make it better somehow.
“Was that before or after you shoved your tongue down her throat?” she asked acerbically.
“Fuck!” I shouted, the pain in my body no longer a concern as I raked my hands through my hair. “That isn’t what happened! Lola… fuck, baby, you have to believe me. She wanted to apologize for how she acted. She felt bad for being a bitch and came to make it right.”
She crossed her arms over her stomach like she was trying to hold herself up. “Funny how she comes to you to apologize for treating me poorly.”
“It’s the truth, I swear.”
For three seconds — three lousy seconds — I thought I’d finally busted through that goddamned wall of hers. Lola’s eyes flashed with something that gave me hope, and she pulled that full bottom lip of hers between her teeth and bit down.
Then it was all gone. My lungs deflated as those shutters slammed down and her face blanked. “I don’t believe you.”
That was it. Four words and suddenly my chest felt like it was full of cement.
“Lola—”
“No!” She stepped back, holding herself even tighter as wet hit her eyes, slicing me open. “No. I’ve allowed too many men in my life to make a fool of me, and I’m not doing it again. Never again. It’s time for you to leave.”
My jaw ticked as the sound of my pulse thrummed in my ears violently. “I’m not—”
“You need to go,” Dominic interrupted, stepping in front of me and blocking my vision of the only woman I wanted.
Christ, how had things gotten so messed up?
I wanted to argue with him, fight again until she was finally forced to hear me, believe me. But the look on his face had me swallowing back all my instincts. His expression was one of sympathy mixed with determination. I knew he felt for me, but he also had to take his s
ister’s back.
I let out a ragged breath, hating the fact that I was, once again, letting her get away. But I told myself it wasn’t going to be for long. I’d eventually get her back. I just had to give her time.
“We’re not finished,” I said, my voice jagged and raw. “This isn’t over.”
“You’re wrong,” she said on a broken whisper. Then she turned and disappeared down the hall. But not before I saw two tears break free and spill down her cheeks. Walking away from her just then was the hardest fucking thing I’d ever done, but for her peace of mind, it had to be done.
I gave Dominic an abrupt nod and headed for the door, telling myself that this was only temporary, that I’d eventually get her back.
It was the only way I could put one foot in front of the other.
Lola
A WEEK HAD passed since I kicked Grayson out of my apartment, and I’d spent the next several days acting like he didn’t exist. I still felt like shit on the inside, but I was determined not to let it show. I pasted a smile on my face and acted as if everything was right in the world of Lola Abbatelli. It was all for show: teasing with Bob as I headed through the lobby each morning, having lunch with my girls like I always did, offering advice to our lovelorn callers as though my own love life wasn’t an abysmal joke. But if there was one thing I was good at, it was pretending.
I pretended that the stares from everyone on my floor were all in my imagination, like they weren’t all whispering and speculating about what went down between Grayson and me. I pretended that I wasn’t missing him every single second of each passing day. I deserved a freaking Academy Award for the performance I was putting on.
Or so I thought.
Apparently, I hadn’t been holding it together as well as I thought if the looks Sophia and Daphne were shooting me from across the studio were anything to go by. It was like they were on tenterhooks, just waiting for me to explode as the caller on the line droned on and on about her lying, cheating scum of a boyfriend. Truthfully, she hadn’t actually said he was cheating, but I was intuitive like that. I could just tell. And no, it didn’t have anything to do with my own lying, cheating scum of a fake boyfriend that made me think that way. I wasn’t jaded at all.
At all.
I was merely observant.
Ignoring their concerned stares, I leaned back in my swivel chair and squeezed the hell out of the stress ball in my hands as the caller prattled on about how much she loved her loser boyfriend and didn’t want to break up with him. It took everything in me to suppress the desire to roll my eyes.
“Well, Carla, from everything you just told us, I believe the only way for you to know for sure is to come right out and ask him.” Dear, sweet Daphne, always the calm, collected voice of reason.
I kind of hated her in that moment.
“You really think so?” Carla asked.
Daphne opened her mouth to respond but I cut her off. I couldn’t listen idly by while she led the poor girl down a path of heartbreak.
“Actually, Carla, while I typically agree with my co-hosts on most everything, I have to speak up on this. I think you’d be better off kicking this jerk’s ass to the curb.”
“Wh-what?” Carla stuttered.
“What are you doing?” Sophia hissed, covering her mic with her hand and shooting lasers from her eyes.
“Yeah,” I pressed on. I was on a roll. If my two best friends couldn’t speak the truth, then I would. It was up to me to save poor Carla from herself. “Cut your losses and get the hell out of there. It’s for the best, trust me. Just because he hasn’t cheated with this ‘friend’ of his yet doesn’t mean he isn’t going to.” I used finger quotes on the word “friend” because it was bullshit. Men and women were never just friends.
“B-b-but—”
“It’s a scientific fact that men and women can’t be strictly friends—”
“No, it’s not,” Daphne chimed in. “There’s literally no science about that at all.”
“Well there should be,” I continued, ignoring her and Sophia as they glared furiously. “There are only two categories a man and woman can fall into. They’re either having sex, or are about to have sex. From what you’ve said, your boyfriend and this friend he supposedly grew up with fall into the second category. It’s only a matter of time before they’re bumping uglies in the bathroom of a diner while you sit at the table, unsuspectingly sipping on your cappuccino, thinking your life is perfect, only to be stuck with the check because they were taking too long and you got tired of waiting so you stupidly paid for both their meals.”
“That’s… uh… that’s very specific,” Carla muttered through the line.
“Yeah, it is. And I’m telling you now, don’t be that girl. Don’t be the idiot who pays for those two assholes to eat. You’re better than that, Carla.”
The end of my rant was met with total silence from Carla for several seconds as my co-hosts looked on, their jaws hanging open in shock. Finally, Caller Carla began to sputter, “I… this is… I can’t… uh… I’m just… I think I’m… I have to go.”
The line dropped before anyone could say a word, and a bewildered Jerry knocked on the glass to give us the signal to wrap things up.
Sophia went about closing the show, and I took that as my opportunity to bail out of the studio. Unfortunately, Daphne ran out after me, calling my name.
“What on earth was that?” she yelped, catching my arm and pulling me to a stop.
“What are you talking about? I was just giving the caller advice like always.”
Her eyes bugged out. “Sweetheart, that wasn’t advice. That was a freaking train wreck. I think it’s safe to say you’ve officially gone off the deep end.”
I let out an indelicate snort and waved her off. “I’m totally fine. Never been better. All good here.”
Her hand on my elbow slid down and she grabbed my hand, giving it a squeeze. “You’re not, honey. Sophia and I have given you space to try and work it out on your own, but you’re spiraling. We’re here for you, Lola, whenever you decide to talk to us. But in the meantime, I think I have something that’ll cheer you up.”
She smiled brightly and, using her hold on my hand, began pulling me down the hall in a different direction from my desk.
“What’s going on? I asked. “Where are we going?”
I followed after her as she practically skipped through the corridors before coming to a stop in front of a door with our names on the front of it. Daphne threw the door open with a flourish with an excited “Ta da! It’s our new office! They moved us in here during the show!”
“Isn’t this the shit?” Sophia chirped from her place behind her new desk. “Now we don’t have to whisper when we want to talk shit about our coworkers!”
The room was bigger than Sam’s office. It had been utilized as a small conference space for as long as I’d worked at KTSW, so three desks and all our personal effects fit inside with plenty of room to spare.
“Who did this?” I asked as I set my purse on my desk where all my Harry Potter memorabilia had been neatly organized for me.
“The call came from the big man downstairs.” The three of us looked to where Sam was standing in the doorway, leaning against the frame with a cup of coffee in his hand and a smirk on his face.
“Why would he do that?” I asked. “None of the other program hosts have their own offices.”
Sam’s smirk widened as he slid his eyes in my direction. “Who knew pretending to bang the owner’s son would get you an office instead of a cubicle? You should have posed as his arm candy a long time ago.”
Red coated my vision as I narrowed my eyes into angry slits. I normally would’ve brushed off what was most likely meant to be a harmless comment, but my life had been one long, terrifying roller-coaster ride for the past month — one with all the drops that made it feel like your stomach was lodged in your throat and you were seconds from pissing your pants. So instead of ignoring him, I took personal offense. All i
t took was that one comment to make me lose the tenuous hold on my sanity that I’d been clinging to.
And just like that, I snapped.
“THIS FEELS LIKE déjà vu,” Daphne murmured from the corner of her mouth as Grayson, Nolan, and the Human Resources director took their seats.
It was the following morning after I’d temporarily lost my mind, and I found myself sitting at the all-too-familiar conference room table with my best friends on either side of me as I glared at the man across from me. The only silver lining I could think to put on the shit-show that had become my life was the fact that Sam looked like hell. His nose was clearly broken, and two angry purple bruises sat underneath his eyes. I had to find the positive in the situation, because there was no freaking way I was keeping my job after this.
A small, sinister smile pulled at my lips at the sight of those shiners. Serves you right, bastard, I thought as Stephanie from HR cleared her throat. “Lola,” she said on a beleaguered sigh. “You can’t go around punching people in the face.”
“He deserved it.” It certainly wasn’t the most mature response, but sometimes adulating was just too hard. I scowled at Sam, trying my best to melt his stupid face off with my eyes; anything to keep from looking at the man at the head of the table who made my stomach flutter and my heart race.
“Unfortunately, ‘he deserved it’ isn’t an argument that’s going to help your case. Violence in the workplace is strictly prohibited. It’s a breach of contract and grounds for immediate termination.”
“That’s bullshit!” Sophia shouted.
“But he started it!” Daphne cried.
“Now just wait a minute,” Nolan said over everyone else. “We don’t have the full story. Let’s not be hasty.”
“Hasty!” Sam spit. “She punched me in the face and broke my goddamned nose!”
Seducing Lola Page 19