“Wow. That’s unbelievable,” she said when I was finally done.
“I know. I wouldn’t believe it unless he’d sat there in front of me and told me the whole thing.”
“So he’s investigating the company? How do you feel about that?”
“It’s fucking crazy. I’m actually pissed off about it, because I know the Board went behind my back, and maybe behind Dad’s. I have no idea why they thought they could do this without telling us this.”
Sloane’s hand paused for a second as she played with my hair. “Are you sure your dad doesn’t know?”
“No, no. If he knew he’d tell me. Dad isn’t that good of a liar.” But honestly, I wasn’t sure about anything right now. My world had flipped upside down. If the sky was green tomorrow, I wouldn’t be surprised.
“But he told you his real name.”
“But he lied to me about everything else. And that girl, my God, you should have seen her.”
“But it’s not like he cheated on you like Royce. He was just doing his job. It’s not like he meant to fall in love with you. It’s actually kind of ironic, if you think about it.” It wasn’t ironic, not really. I didn’t know what it was, but ironic wasn’t the word that I would use.
“Or maybe it’s more tragic than ironic,” Sloane said.
“Sloane?”
“Yeah?”
“Stop talking, please.” She did and started humming. That didn’t help because it just reminded me of Lucah, so I asked her to stop doing that too. I knew I was being a pain in the ass, but I didn’t care. Then she turned on the television and Mystic Pizza was playing.
“Julia Roberts’ hair is ridic in this movie,” Sloane said.
“Yeah, it is,” I said in agreement.
~*~*~
I had literally no idea what was going to happen when I went into work the next morning. I considered calling in sick, but there was no way I was going to do that. If I stayed home, then I would just mope. I wanted to be out and have something else occupy my mind other than Lucah. Only problem was that I didn’t know if I would see Lucah at work. He’d tried to call me last night, but I’d ignored him.
To tell the absolute truth, I had no idea how I felt. It was like I had too many emotions and my body had gone into some sort of shock because it was overwhelmed. I hoped it was on vacation somewhere nice. A tropical island would be great.
I pulled myself together on the T and tried to act as normal as I could when I exited the elevator and walked toward my desk.
There he was, pastry bag and cup of coffee waiting for me. I walked right past it, into my office and shut the door. I hadn’t eaten this morning, but I didn’t feel like it. I hadn’t eaten last night either. This was one of those times when eating your feelings wasn’t going to work.
My phone rang and I checked the caller ID before I picked up. It was Lucah and I didn’t answer. Instead, I turned my computer on and started answering emails.
My phone rang again. Nope. Wasn’t answering him. He couldn’t harass me in the office, not without blowing his cover, so that was another good reason to be in the office.
Then he started blowing up my cell phone, so I put it on silent and kept working.
Ten minutes later, there was a knock on my door.
“Who is it?” I said. I didn’t want to ignore it if it was someone important.
“It’s me,” Lucah said. He couldn’t really beg me to open the door without arousing suspicion as to why he would be begging me to open my door.
“I’m busy,” I said and waited to hear him move away from the door. Then something slid under the door. I waited until I was sure he was back at his desk before I got up to retrieve the note. I couldn’t read it right now, so I shoved it in my purse. I’d read it on my lunch break. If I could handle it.
I hunkered down in my office the entire day, leaving only to retrieve coffee and pee. I avoided eye contact and small talk with everyone. No one really seemed to notice, except Mrs. Andrews.
“How are you, dear?” She ambushed me in the break room, so I had no escape. There was only one way out and she was blocking it. Once again, I wished for a sinkhole, or maybe a secret portal to open up and suck me into another dimension. A dimension where the man I loved hadn’t done what he did.
The absolutely insane thing was that I knew I was being horrible to him about it. I knew he had secrets. He’d told me. I’d said I accepted it. And then, when he’d been forced to tell me about it, I’d gotten mad at him. I was mad at the situation and I was taking it out on him. Besides, if Dad knew, then Mrs. Andrews had to know. So she might have been lying to me as well. Something I couldn’t comprehend.