Manage Me: A Vagabond Romance

by J. D. Fox

  I quickly went into my office and shut the door behind me. Nothing made sense. Had she told him she was open to a conversation, and he'd taken that as a sign that the wedding bells could start ringing again?

  A knock sounded at the door, and Wendy came in. "Hey, so I overheard that conversation. Is there a reservation for the private dining room I don't know about?"

  I thought fast. He'd be able to see whether the room was being used or not from the main dining room. "You're married, right Wendy?"

  She looked at me, confused. "Yeah, my wife and I have been married for five years. What does that have to do with anything?"

  "You're going to bring her here tomorrow night and have a private dinner in there. It'll be on the house, but something is wrong with that guy, and I don't want him having dinner with Dakota in the private room, so I had to make something up. It doesn't have to be a long dinner, it just has to look like the room is occupied."

  "Wait...is he Dakota's ex, or something?"

  "Yeah, and I'm getting a really bad feeling about this whole thing. I know it sounds crazy, but please help me out with this."

  "Hey, if helping Dakota means being able to take my wife out to a fancy dinner, then I'd help her every day." She grinned, and then it faded. "Do you want me to keep an eye out? I can alert the staff."

  "I don't think you need to do that, but at the very least if you and I know what's happening, that should be enough."

  "No problem, Ryan. It'll be okay." She patted my shoulder as she left the office.

  The urge to run up to her hotel room and wrap my arms around her was overwhelming as I sat in my office and tried to think it through. She hadn't reached out to me since that morning, but I just had to trust that she was figuring things out for herself.

  I buried myself in work as Wendy returned to the front counter to help guests. Soon I was being pulled in a million directions and able to briefly forget about Dakota and this emotional mess that was going on inside of me.

  The hotel had to be run, and I had to work long into the night to make that happen. Staying busy had always been a useful distraction, though. I worked at the desk, I worked in the restaurant, I worked with the maintenance team. I helped in every department to ensure the hundreds of guests we had stayed happy and would talk about what a great experience they'd had at our resort.

  When the day ended, I crawled into the cot that we had put up in the back office. I tried to quiet the worry I felt over Dakota. I thought of her beautiful smile, the way she looked deep into my soul when we were together. I tried to be calm and sleep, but it was hard as I thought of how much I already missed having her next to me.

  Chapter 24

  Dakota

  "I can't believe this is happening," I continued to say as Lauren, and I talked well into the evening.

  "You do seem to have a wild life."

  "Ryan hasn't reached out at all. I really think I should try to call him or text him or something. He has to know that I don't want to be with Cody. I mean, I told him all about it when we had dinner. He heard me say it to Cody's face. Do you think he's angry that I didn't explain the situation with Cody more?"

  "Dakota, you need to calm down. This is just one day when Ryan's been up to his ears in work. Let's just relax and watch a movie and stop worrying about all these boys and their issues."

  Lauren was right. I had to stop worrying about what Ryan thought of all this. Sooner or later we'd get a chance to talk and then I could clarify everything. As much as I wanted to run around the hotel trying to find Ryan and explain everything, I knew he was incredibly busy with the retreat and didn't want to add more stress to him.

  As for Cody, I didn't want to see or talk to him again. I'd told him what I needed to tell him and I was done. If I had to stay in my room to avoid him for the next day or so I would do that.

  I really had hoped that Ryan would come back to the room that night, though. I knew if we had the chance to talk things through then we could calm down together. But it was nearly midnight when Lauren and I put our movie in, and there hadn't been a sign of him.

  "I don't think he's going to stay here tonight. Should I bring his things downstairs to the front desk?" I worried.

  "No, he knows where his things are. Give him space; that's all you can do."

  "I'm not good at waiting around and giving people space. Did you forget that I actually quit my job instead of just talking to my boss on a different day when my emotions had calmed down? Or that I broke up with Cody on a whim without thinking it through at all. Space and waiting around aren't things that I'm good at."

  "That was different. You were pushed to those things."

  "Fair enough."

  Lauren laughed and then turned to me as if she was about to say something profound and meaningful. As close as we'd been before, we'd gotten even closer on this trip. Even with all our time apart, when we were together, our conversations were deep and meaningful. I waited patiently for her wisdom.

  "Screw boys. They suck. You're awesome. Now let's watch the movie."

  "Okay then," I laughed.

  Then I spent the next two hours pretending to watch the movie while I continued to focus on everything else that was going on around me. How had my life gotten even more complicated than before?

  The uneasiness of the situation with Ryan was what worried me most. Cody would figure it out that I wasn't interested in dealing with him. Eventually, he'd have to leave the hotel when his work retreat was over, and I could move on from whatever it was that he thought was going to happen by surprising me. But Ryan might not forgive me, and I didn't know how I would cope with that.

  "Are you watching the movie at all," Lauren asked, wrapping her arm around me.

  "Yeah, sure, I'm watching."

  "Then why do you look so sad when Will Farrell does that with his face?"

  "Sorry, I'm worried about Ryan. I'm just going to send him a quick text make sure he's doing alright."

  As I grabbed for my phone off the table Lauren hit it out of my hand, and it flew across the room, shattering. I hurried over to see what the damage was and it wouldn't even turn on. It was officially destroyed.

  "Sorry," Lauren said, waiting for me to explode with anger.

  I wanted to yell at her, but before I could, I just burst into laughter. After all, the best way to keep me from overthinking his lack of text messages was to prevent me from getting any text messages.

  "I guess this is a sign that I shouldn't me messaging him," I said through my tears.

  "Yep, I guess it is."

  The two of us were laughing so hard I could barely catch my breath. Life had been giving me so many twists lately, and I had to just go with it. Fighting against myself wasn't working. It was time to go with the flow.

  I fell back into the couch with Lauren, and we both fell asleep on the couch before the end. It was like I was back in college without a real worry in the world. It was a relief for just that moment in time.

  By morning, though, my anxiety back was in full force. I had no way of contacting Ryan, but at least he knew where I was and could call me in the hotel room if he wanted to talk. Feeling out of control and overwhelmed by the situation I just wanted to get out of the room and go for a walk. The fear of running into Cody was too strong, though, so I went to take a bath.

  When someone knocked on the door, I heard Lauren wake up and go answer it. She talked to the person for a minute and then came and knocked on the bathroom door.

  "Come in," I announced.

  "It was a note from downstairs. You're invited to dinner in the restaurant tonight."

  Relief flooded through me. At least Ryan hadn't written me off completely.

  "Really? Okay, I feel so much better. I think Ryan and I need to have a real, in-depth discussion about this."

  "Oh, so you think it's from Ryan? Good. The kid left before I could ask who the note was from."

  Then it dawned on me that the invitation might not have been from Ryan at all. I d
idn't even think about Cody doing something like that. I'd explicitly told him I didn't want to talk to him, and even he wasn't so dense that he'd try to invite me to dinner.

  "No, it's got to be from Ryan. Cody doesn't know what room I'm in, and Ryan and I had dinner there the other night. He must have tried to reach me via text, but someone broke my phone, and he probably can't break away from work. He's a notes person."

  "You're probably right. I don't think even Cody is so stupid that he didn't get the clue when you told him you didn't want to talk to him. So, what are you going to wear?"

  "I should probably dress up nice, right? But last time I dressed up and then had to come up and change because we went for a walk. So maybe nice, but casual enough for a walk if we do that again."

  "I'm going to go visit with a friend that I made the other day. I'll bring some food back for lunch, and you can stay here and chill. Then we can get you looking fabulous for your date. Is that okay?"

  "Who's the new friend?"

  "Just this really cool guy from Seattle who works as a music engineer."

  "What about Jacob?"

  "He's been really distant, and I don't feel like moping after him like a kicked puppy when there are many other handsome fish in the NorCal sea."

  "Wow, okay then. Can I be like you when I grow up?"

  "Yes, you can. Now I'm going to let you finish, and I'll be back for lunch," Lauren said, heading out of the room.

  I did really wish I could be more like Lauren. She was good at disconnecting from relationships until they built up into something stronger. In comparison, I was already attached to Ryan and had only known him for a few weeks. My heart just didn't work that way. If I was sleeping with someone, then I was connected to them.

  Even in college, I'd been emotionally attached to any guy I dated. There'd been no way for me to go slow, no natural build up; I was either fantasizing about marriage or I didn't care at all, and those were the only options.

  After a morning of journaling and working through my feelings about this whole situation I was happy to see Lauren and the food she brought with her. I missed Ryan, and was getting pleasant butterflies about seeing him again."

  "How are you feeling about dinner?" Lauren asked.

  "Excited and nervous. I mean, if he didn't want to see or talk to me I don't think he would have planned a dinner at the same romantic spot we went to the other night. So I'm positive about that. I'm also nervous, though. I have no idea what he thinks about the Cody situation. I mean, there's no reason why I would've wanted to meet him, and he must know that."

  "That's exactly what you need to say, then."

  "I'll try. But this new version of Ryan really does make me nervous. He's so amazing at his work, and he's crazy wealthy. I don't know that I'm the level of woman a guy like that dates."

  "Oh, no, you did not just say that. You are an amazing, hardworking woman who any guy would be lucky to go out with. You're brilliant, and you were making your way in the finance world around a bunch of dudes. And he knows all that. He's told you all that."

  "I'm sure Ryan has dated very powerful women before, I'm nothing special."

  "You're right. I don't know what I was thinking. You should probably just go find Cody and see if he will take you back. Clearly, that's the sort of guy you should be dating," she rolled her eyes at me, and I reached over and punched her in the arm.

  "Okay, I get it. I'll try to stop being so negative."

  "Ryan is the same guy you were seeing in San Francisco, and you are the same girl. All this other stuff is just noise. You have to forget about the noise and just be the two of you. Then you can move forward and see what exactly this is between you guys."

  "When did you get so smart?"

  "Born that way. But I do know your heart gets in the way, and it's hard to forget about what your heart wants. For your dinner tonight I want you to think as logically as possible. Don't let your emotions interfere with what you're trying to say."

  "I'll do my best. Now, jeans or dress?"

  Chapter 25

  Dakota

  Walking down to dinner, I was incredibly nervous. All I could think about was what Ryan was going to say about being hit over the head with Cody's presence.

  The interesting thing about all this was that I really did not have feelings for Cody anymore. The way he treated me in the midst of my needing him so badly had shown me who he was and opened my eyes to the issues we were having. I was grateful that I'd had such a clear sign and was able to leave him. If things hadn't exploded the way they did it was possible I would have stayed with Cody and married him despite our problem; a thought that was mortifying to me now.

  "Hi, I'm Dakota. I'm supposed to meet someone for dinner?" I said to the hostess.

  "Oh, yes, I'll take you to your table," the young woman said, and eagerly had me follow her. She looked more nervous than I did. Maybe she was one of the new people that Ryan had hired the previous day? I could only imagine how hard it would be to start a new job and to be as busy as the restaurant was that night.

  Instead of leading me to the back room, though, she sat me at a table in the main dining room, overlooking the bay. There was something wrong, here: Ryan wouldn't have let me arrive before him that wasn't the type of guy he was. There was no way he would have let me sit in there waiting for him while he was late, but, then I considered that it was really busy and he might have been caught up with all his work. I did my best to stay calm, but my gut was telling me something was wrong.

  "Thank you for coming," I heard Cody say, and his words sent a shiver down my spine. "I knew we could talk in a civilized manner."

  "Cody. I should have known that an unsigned invitation was from you." I got up to leave. "I told you I didn't want to talk to you."

  He grabbed my arm to prevent me from leaving. His fingers locked tightly around me, and he pulled me back toward him.

  "Dakota, I would like to talk. If you just stay for dinner, I will leave you alone after this. I've done a lot of learning and growing over the last few weeks, and I'd appreciate you giving me the chance to apologize so we can both move on feeling better about the time we spent together."

  I didn't want to sit down to a meal with Cody. I wanted to talk to Ryan and was feeling disgustingly manipulated. His words seemed genuine enough, though, and the last thing I wanted to do was create a big scene when there was nothing to cause a scene over. Perhaps talking things through would give us both the closure we needed? At the very least it would give Cody the closure he needed, so he wasn't tracking me down and trying to talk to me wherever I went.

  "I'll stay for dinner, and that's it. You have to promise there won't be any more tracking me down or trying to trick me into seeing you," I said, and pulled my arm away from him.

  "Yes. I'm sorry. I was so desperate to see you and explain to you how sorry I am. That's all. I didn't mean to freak you out, or anything like that."

  "Fine, then we can have a meal, and it will be our goodbye meal, understood? And you have to tell me how you found out I was at this resort," I said again trying to be as firm as possible without being rude to him.

  "Yes, Dakota. I really am sorry for scaring you. I asked my assistant to see if she could figure out where you were. I'm not sure how she found out, but I'm glad she did."

  His answer didn't jive at all. There was more to it, and I knew it, but at this point, I didn't want to keep pushing him about it. I decided to let it go for the time being so we could move on with this conversation, and I could be rid of him forever.

  "So, you want to apologize?" I asked as the waitress brought us our salads.

  "Yes, but let's just eat and relax for a minute. You're not in a hurry, are you? If this is our last meal together, I'd like to enjoy it."

  "Fine, let's eat," I said and tried to hide how annoyed I was to be stuck with Cody.

  We sat in silence, eating our salads. Every now and again Cody looked up and smiled at me. I didn't have anything left to say to him.
I was over this whole thing. I ate my salad, drank my water, and I waited for the main course to come.

  As soon as our steak arrived, I started cutting mine and eating it with gusto. The faster I finished my meal I figured, the faster Cody would finally start talking and this would be over. Yet, he still didn't talk at all. We ate our main course in silence, and when the waitress came and took our plates away, I had finally had enough.

  "Cody, what do you want to say?" I snapped. "You need to say it so we can move on."

  "Don't talk to me like that," he snapped back at me.

  "Don't talk to you like what? You're the one holding me, hostage, here, saying you have something you want to tell me and then not saying anything at all. It's over. We are not getting back together, and I'm sorry if that hurts you, but it's over."

  "Oh, you're sorry?" he put his silverware down and leaned in toward me. His hands were folded up under his chin, and his eyes were wide as he stared menacingly. "I don't think you even know what sorry is. You aren't moving on. Do you know how much I have on you? I could destroy you, Dakota."

  I looked at him, confused. "Are you fucking insane? What have I ever done that you could blackmail me over?"

  "Don't talk to me like that!" People started to look around at the sound of his voice.

  "I'm done," I said and stood up so quickly that my chair fell over.

  Cody stood up just as fast, knocking his chair with one of the waters. He grabbed for my wrist and dug his fingernails into my wrist. Silently I thanked whatever higher power was out there that we weren't in the private room.

  I ripped my wrist out of his hand, his nails leaving scratches in my skin. Cody was standing in front of the door that led to the lobby, so I turned and went out the glass doors that led to the pool. I intended to walk around to the front of the building but then quickly found myself running when I realized that Cody was behind me.