“—wanted to show the place to you without Sally so we could actually talk about the possibilities without it getting all over town,” said Brody.
“As always, I value your discretion. It’s a unique and interesting space with lots of possibilities. The location is prime and would fit in perfectly with the rest of the conference facilities I want to put in up the block. Of course all the old stuff would need gutting and modernizing. The carpet and seats are worn out. We’d want to install a state-of-the-art projector system for presentations up here and update all this backstage space with all the nice behind-the-scenes amenities that help conferences run flawlessly. Unseen efficiency.”
With every word, Tyler felt like vomiting.
“This was a marvelous idea,” continued Gerald. “There simply wasn’t the commercia
l space anywhere else in the downtown area, and with the zoning restrictions, we couldn’t actually build anything to suit. This will enable us to expand the conference facilities to not only rival the Alluvian but outstrip them. And that means profits, my boy. You’ll be long gone by that point, of course. As soon as things wind up here, I want you in Portland to deal with the retrofitting of the hotel I acquired last month. I sent you the specs already. The construction team is already in place, and their projections just aren’t going to work for my schedule. I need your particular brand of management to get the ball rolling.”
“Thanks Gerald.” Brody’s voice sounded far away. “Your faith means a lot to me, and the hotel is an amazing opportunity—”
Tyler couldn’t stay another minute. Fighting tears, she slipped silently back the way she’d come, walking away from the man who’d shattered all illusions that he’d be making a life with her.
~*~
The faint hum of the shower greeted Tyler as she stepped through the front door. She was grateful for the brief reprieve, for the chance to find her composure before facing Brody. Rehearsal had taken so much out of her with all that effort to try and appear normal when she was so raw. Piper hadn’t bought it. Neither had her father. But she’d managed to put them both off, claiming exhaustion from juggling work and rehearsals. It wasn’t a total lie.
Bringing Ollie to the bedroom as she usually did felt too much like fighting in front of the child, so instead she settled him on his bed in the living room with a rawhide chew before moving back to the bedroom to wait. The comparison was foolish and irrational. But she wasn’t feeling particularly logical at the moment.
Brody emerged from the bathroom in a towel and a cloud of steam. “Hey, I can’t find my stuff, have you seen—”
“It’s here,” said Tyler. She picked up the duffel from the closet behind her and heaved it onto the bed.
He looked from the bag back to her.
Her heart pounded a vicious, relentless rhythm in her chest, until she felt like she would explode with the force of it. She needed cold, needed calm to get through this. Walking to the chair in the corner, she imagined a layer of ice coating her from head to toe, freezing out the hot burn of pain that had been lodged beneath her breastbone since she’d opened that envelope.
Brody remained standing in the bathroom doorway, dripping onto the carpet as he held the towel loosely around his hips. His expression hadn’t settled into anything yet—still somewhere between I don’t understand what’s going on and everything is clearly not okay.
“You’re dripping,” said Tyler.
He moved to the bag, peered inside. “You packed.”
“I did.”
“Are we going somewhere?”
“No.”
Saying nothing, Brody pulled out clothes. When he dropped the towel to put them on, she looked away, then glanced back under her lashes. She hated that she had to look. But this was the last time she was going to see him outside of rehearsal, and she needed to memorize the lean, muscular lines of his body.
“Tell me,” he said, shrugging into a t-shirt.
Tyler had spent the afternoon working out this speech, struggling to find the best way to present this so as not to start a fight. She couldn’t handle a fight. She was too close to breaking.
“I thought I could do this,” she said quietly. “I thought I could pick back up where we left off. But we aren’t twenty-one anymore. We’re different people than we were when you left. Different people who want different things, who are in two different places in their lives.”
“What are you saying?”
“It’s done. I’m done.” The words came out with more of an edge than she intended, but it fit with the coolheaded calm she was trying to project.
Brody flinched, his eyes narrowing at the tone. “You want me to move out.”
He’d barely moved in. But then, he hadn’t really moved in. He’d been living out a bag like the guest that neither of them acknowledged he was.
How nicely that fit with her new understanding of him.
“I think that would be best.” God, it hurt her to say it, but rationally, what other choice was there? It didn’t matter that him leaving was the worst possible thing, that it was exactly what she didn’t want. She had to be the one to end this. It had to be on her terms. She couldn’t just wait for him to destroy her again, not in front of the whole damned town, where she’d be the object of everyone’s well-intended compassion. Again. Of the two of them, she was staying. She was the one who had to live with this.