“Yes. I was his girlfriend,” I said in a small voice, all emotion gone from my body. But Tracy had enough for the both of us. She hopped over and yanked me into a tight hug. My face smacked into her generous chest and her perfume assaulted my senses.
“Oh, man! This is perfect. A love story. Second chances, childhood love, all that goooooooood stuff.” Tracy rocked me back and forth as I fought to get free.
“Let me go!” My muffled cries were released, and Tracy pushed me out so I was at arm’s length from her. She was taller than me by several inches, and with her four-inch pumps, she towered at almost Nicolas’s height. Her smiling face, shining with excitement and vigor, shimmered down.
“This is another chance. It’s destiny!” she said.
I shrugged her hands off me, and this time she let me go. I sunk back into the chair and Tracy plopped down in a seat by my side. I was breathing hard, my vision was sparkling and every muscle of my body was on edge. Tracy, finally calm, regarded me with concern and finally settled down.
She reached over and placed a hand on my knee.
“Hey,” she said, her voice filled with concern. “Hey, I’m sorry I got carried away.”
“It’s okay,” I said flatly.
“Was it a bad breakup? Would it be weird to see him?”
“It wasn’t a bad breakup. We came to an understanding.” My old friend, Gut-Wrenching Guilt, returned. The separation wasn’t amicable, and we certainly didn’t truly understand it. However, I didn’t want to go into it with Tracy.
I didn’t want to go into it with anyone, ever.
I mentally kicked those old thoughts back into their cave and shackled the doors tight.
“And you never saw him again afterwards?”
I sucked in a deep breath. There didn’t seem to be enough air in the room. I was strangled by the memories. “Not really. I went to school in Chicago, and he graduated from Michigan and moved to New York. We both rarely went back to St. Haven.” I shrugged in what I hoped was a nonchalant manner. “Then I went overseas and our paths never crossed. End of story.”
Intentionally. All of this had been intentional.
“So it wouldn’t be too terrible to see him again, right?”
The memory of the end, those final few months, was too painful to go into. I refused to sink into old ways. I refused to spiral.
I wound a strand of hair around my index finger and twirled it around, pulling softly.
“It would be … strange, Tracy. It’d be strange,” I said in almost a whisper. I was still processing the chain of events that had led me to now, into the reality of seeing the ghost of my past. Because just like the boogeyman, Alistair haunted my dreams, my nights. The thought of him scared me on a deeply vulnerable level. A level I refused to acknowledge.
Tracy remained silent for a moment as I nervously drummed my fingers against the arms of the chair. This conversation was undoing me. I shouldn’t have said yes—I shouldn’t have taken the job. I should go back to Gordon and say no.
“You can say no,” Tracy said.
“What?” My head snapped up and my manic movements stilled.
Her voice was filled with regret and worry. “I mean, is this wise, Florence? Maybe you shouldn’t take it. It sounds like bad news. You’re obviously spooked. You don’t need this job.”
“I don’t,” I intoned, agreeing.
“You’ve done bigger stories with bigger people. A profile on a businessman is hardly breaking new ground,” Tracy pointed out.
“True. True.” I nodded gently as my voice listed off. I stared at the wall, my mind growing blank amidst the storm of thoughts between my ears and the roiling emotions exploding between my ribs.
Alistair … if I passed up on this chance to see him, would I regret it?
Was there anything but regret when it came to him?
Tracy shifted her chair closer to me until our knees touched, then reached out and softly pushed back my hair that was falling into my face. In a gentle voice, she asked, “Is he just an ex-boyfriend?”
Tracy, with her wild hair and deep eyes, so innocent and trusting. Her want, her desire, her very need for love was refreshing yet wholly depressing because I knew I’d never know that hunger again.
I’d never love as I’d loved before. I’d never be the same girl. I was no longer nice, no longer happy.
A part of me had died that day, and it would never come back.
“No,” I whispered. “No, he was more. But it’s over now and I can never go back.”
Tracy nodded and then slipped me into a deep hug.
“I’m sorry,” she breathed softly into my ear.
I nodded, words failing me, unshed tears denied.
Chapter 4
I kneeled on the edge of my bed, staring at the piles before me. Clothes everywhere and nothing to wear. I groaned audibly and fell face-forward into a stack of silk blouses.
“I give up,” I mumbled into the folds. I was never going to find an appropriate cocktail-dress-slash-gown for tonight’s … thing. Alistair’s curt assistant had informed over the phone, in a condescending tone, that I needed to be in black tie formal.
I glanced up into the mirror adjacent to the bed. My reflection lay there, frozen, the backdrop a mess of low-intensity panic.
“Alistair.” I whispered his name aloud.
The sound filled the empty room, and that numbing throbbing in my chest began again in earnest.
It truly had been a long while.
Whenever I went home, people avoided bringing him up, and I steered clear of anyone would might talk about him. He was a hot topic in our little municipality. Townie who’d made it big. He was a specter, always around the corner, the memories on everyone’s tongue. But they dared not share those with me.
I considered my form in the mirror. I was wearing a camisole and boy shorts and was sprawled, arms askew, over what must have been every piece of clothing from my suitcase. I took in my arms, my neck, my legs dangling off the bed. I rolled over so I could properly face the mirror.
I had changed in my twenties. My hips had grown fuller, and my hair was shorter than I’d kept it in high school. I pressed a finger against my cheeks, pushing them in. I had gained some weight over the years—not enough to concern me, but enough to be noticeable. I had been thin in high school, and my cheekbones back then had been as harshly prominent as Nicolas’s, but now my face was a bit more filled out, softer in contrast to the angles of my youth.
I sat upright and stared into my eyes of my reflection. I supposed those hadn’t changed. I had intense blue eyes that always drew plenty of comments. My irises were a light shade, but rimmed in a deep violet, the strong striations that surrounded my pupil just highlighting the variance.
Alistair had never told me I had beautiful eyes. I wrinkled my brow. Now that I thought of it, I didn’t think he’d ever told me he found me beautiful.
But I knew how he felt about me, something that was indescribable.
And he wasn’t just handsome to me. He was the ultimate. He was the only.
I got on my knees and inched towards the mirror. My brown hair just grazed my shoulders, and besides the eyes and my generous lips, I supposed I couldn’t see anything especially remarkable. I brushed a strand of hair from my cheek and turned my head to the side. I knew I wasn’t heinous looking, but suddenly a pang of self-doubt slammed into me.
I had been good-looking enough to win Blueberry Queen of the Year or whatever back in small-town America St. Haven, Michigan, but here in New York City, next to all the willowy blonde socialites of the Upper East Side and the starving hipster models stacked up four deep in Greenwich Village, I didn’t stand a chance. Hesitancy gnawed at my core.
My hips were too wide. My ass was too big. I was too short. My legs were long in proportion to my body, but I stood a foot shorter than the glamazons that ruled this town. My waist was narrow and trim, but I wasn’t a size double zero.
Thought after wild thought raced th
rough my brain. Alistair probably had a girlfriend. He wasn’t married, I knew that much based on the sparse media reports I’d found of him online. Somehow the thought of some perfect specimen of a woman dangling off his arm angered me.
Alistair was no longer mine. Perhaps we had never been each other’s and were just forced together in our small town. Still, I loathed the idea of him settling down with some vapid fool of a woman.
I shook my head and then stood up quickly to walk to my closet. Alistair deserved better than the shallow gold diggers who were probably breaking down his door, but it was his business who he mixed with. Whomever he dated, if he dated, was none of my concern. My arm shot out angrily to push aside the tiny selection hanging in my too-big closet. If Alistair wanted to dumb himself down, if he found what he was looking for in some towering model, then good for him.
Good for him.
My actions became harsher, more frenetic as I shoved every hanger in front of me from left to right and then back again. I spun around on my heel and glared at the clothing mountain sitting on my bed, mocking me with its mess, screaming that it held nothing I needed.
I snatched at a pair of jeans and yanked them on. Forget it. I was going shopping.
* * *
As I exited the taxi, I decided to myself that living in New York City definitely had its perks. After two hours of shopping my way down Fifth Avenue, I’d found a modestly priced floor-length gown that made me feel like a queen.
I paid the driver and turned around to see where I was in Midtown. The address was on Fifty-Seventh Street, a swanky thoroughfare that cut through the most expensive commercial real estate in the city. Hell, probably the country. The world. A shining tower stretched above me, and throngs of people crowded the sidewalk in front of it. Spotlights threw light back and forth, and there was a long red carpet leading up to an ornate entrance hall with a large lit sign proclaiming proudly, “New York City Community Children’s Hospital Family House.”
I sucked in a breath, readjusted my clutch under my arm, and muttered, “Well, now or never.”
My gown swished around my ankles as I clicked towards the crowd. Despite the nervous butterflies in my stomach, I threw my head back to project an air of confidence. The dress was flattering, a rich silk maroon with gorgeous draping that clung to my curves and a V-neck that exposed the right amount of sexy. The lower half of my back was bare, but a chiffon cape billowed from my shoulders and down my arms to keep it covered and modest.
It was ridiculous, walking up the red carpet with the other guests while the press yelled out and took pictures. I pushed past the crowd, the flashbulbs blinding me as I fought to get to the door to meet with my point of contact.
She wasn’t hard to miss. Her voice over the phone had been stern as she’d told me she’d be waiting for me at the front door at 5:45 sharp and I wasn’t to be late. Now a blonde woman in a perfectly tailored black suit and tall pumps stood by the door, talking to a frazzled man in a waiter’s outfit. She clutched a portfolio and an iPad against her chest, her back straight enough for a protractor to read. Bold red color lined her thin lips, which were pressed in irritation and disapproval. She was young and definitely gorgeous, in an evil European Barbie Robot kind of way.
I inched over and caught the tail end of the conversation. Her voice was laced with a strong German accent.
“—completely unacceptable, we are highly displeased with the delay, the speeches begin in forty-five minutes and—”
The woman’s attention snapped over to me. Her light eyebrows assumed a harsher angle as she gave me an expression that said, “What the hell do you want?”
I held up my NYPD press pass. The pass was overkill for this fundraiser, but now that I was faced with the Berlin Wall I was glad I’d brought it.
“Florence Reynolds, New York Journal,” I stated simply.
Her eyes darted between my card and my face, and she gave a short nod. She directed her attention to the unfortunate slob who appeared to be two seconds’ worth of telling off away from pissing himself. “Get it done,” she snapped with finality.
The man nodded quickly and ducked back into the building, grateful to get away.
The woman’s attention popped back to me, and I straightened.
“Hello.” European Barbie Robot extended her hand and I met it. She gripped my hand with a force that threatened to crush my bones into dust. “I am Gertrude Werner, Mr. Blair’s personal assistant.” Her sharp eyes flickered up and down my form. “I suppose that’s acceptable.”
I straightened up even more and threw my chin back a fraction, then gave her a saccharine smile.
“It’s lovely to meet you, Gertrude,” I said, using her given name. “It seems we will be working together quite closely for the next month.”
Gertrude’s lips thinned even more, if possible. We stared at each other for a second, and then she said shortly, “Walk with me. We can talk while we go to the ballroom.”
And then with a spin of her heel, she stomped over the threshold and disappeared down the hallway. I hastened to follow, cursing my own shoes. She was on taller ones—how did she walk?
I caught up and sucked in shallow breaths so as to not appear winded. Gertrude didn’t even glance back; she continued on with long strides down a plush carpet-lined hallway. It appeared to be a traditional brownstone-style lobby, but with a gleam and sparkle that only came with remodel.
Our heels clicked as we transferred from carpet to tile and at that point, Gertrude turned to me with a frown. “You look very familiar. Have we met before? Do you specialize in business news? Worked for the Wall Street Journal?”
“Unlikely. I’ve been stationed overseas until just recently. I’ve always been based in New York, but I’m the Journal’s main profiler in the Asia-Pacific region.”
“Hm.” Gertrude barely hid her snide expression.
I couldn’t care less.
We traveled the rest of the way in silence.
We finally arrived at our destination, a private elevator, and Gertrude tapped a card against the reader. The car slid down silently, and after we boarded, she hit a button and the doors closed.
As soon as we lurched up, Gertrude faced me with her hands on her hips and said, “I don’t like journalists.”
I arched an eyebrow and she took a step towards me, continuing, “This is a terrible idea and no good can come from it. Mr. Blair is far too busy as it is and doesn’t have time to play 60 Minutes with you.”
“I assure you, I’m not here to play.” I kept my voice steady. “Your company contacted my publication for this profile, so take your grievances up with whoever decided this on your end.”
Her expression communicated that she had already taken up her grievances with someone on her end, very much so, and was searching for another outlet in me.
Her eyes narrowed in suspicion. “Blair Properties works within a highly competitive business environment, and Mr. Blair has the utmost respect for our clients’ privacy, as well as our own. We have neither the need nor the desire for your presence. The article would do nothing positive or constructive for the short-term or long-term goals of the company.” Gertrude spoke quickly, delivering her diatribe with crisp, bitter German-laced syllables. “If you’re hunting for a sordid tell-all, or some nasty drama, you will find yourself severely disappointed.”
I let out a loud sigh. I’d run across my fair share of employees who would try to force a complimentary fluff piece with either flattery or hostility. It seemed Gertrude was of the latter variety, although she appeared not to even enjoy the idea of the article, period.
You and me both, sister.
Then, just to mess with her, I reached into my clutch and extracted my notepad and a pen. I flipped open to a fresh page and began scribbling something down.
“What are you doing?” Her voice was harsh.
“Oh, you know, just taking notes.” I looked up with an exasperated expression. “Everything is always on the record—you know t
hat, of course.”
Her lips thinned enough to disappear.
We mercifully reached the top floor shortly after our charming exchange. Gertrude stomped out before the doors even opened properly, and I trotted up behind, a small smile playing upon my own lips.
The top floor held a huge ballroom and must have been built with fundraisers and dinner galas in mind. A large stage dominated one side of the room, crystal chandeliers glittered above on the high ceilings, and at least forty large banquet tables were spread out in front of us.
The room was currently empty except for the staff setting up stemware and plates. Gertrude charged towards a group of waiters huddled near the kitchen door, half of whom scattered as they spotted her approach. After giving clipped directions and raising her voice, she returned to me and brusquely shoved a program in my hand.
“You are at table thirty-two,” she barked. “Mr. Blair is busy meeting with the hospital director, so you are to wait here until dinner starts. Introductions will occur after dinner.”
And before I could answer, she stormed off towards a set of panel doors, yanked them open, and disappeared.
* * *
I wandered about the edge of the room as I waited for the rest of the guests to trickle in. I nursed a glass of red wine from the bar and paced around in aimless circles before settling down at my table.
The people at my table were all random donors whose names escaped me as soon as I shook their hands. I was seated next to an embarrassingly obvious gold digger and her elderly husband. She introduced herself and spent several minutes working her massive cleavage back into her low-cut dress. The husband ogled freely.
At 6:30 sharp, the lights dimmed slightly and the hum of conversations quieted to a hush. A short, dumpy yet kind-looking man took the stage with both arms raised in greeting. Applause rang out and cheers sounded. The man was ecstatic as he climbed up to stand behind the podium, and the room gradually fell silent. The sound of his breath on the microphone echoed through the room.
“Good evening, everyone,” his fatherly voice spoke. “Welcome, welcome, welcome to the New York City Community Children’s Hospital Family House!”
The Beginning of Always Page 5