31.
ELIZABETH
Barbara met me in the hallway, and I glanced down at my still silenced phone. Another text message from Daniel had appeared during lunch with Ben, but I hadn’t read it until now.
You’re not ignoring me again, are you? You know how well that worked the first time. Call me when you get a chance. I’m not desperate, I swear. Okay, maybe i’m a little desperate.
Knowing that Daniel tended to do rash things, like show up at my office unannounced, I decided it would be in my best interest to send him a quick text message, so he wouldn’t do something crazy, like come down here. The last thing I needed today was for Daniel to be here once this screwed up workday ended. I mentally noted how differently I had felt about him mere hours ago.
I’m slammed with meetings all day. Won’t be out of here before seven. Call you then.
As I turned off my screen, Barbara whispered, “Kate called again. She says it’s important that she speak with you sometime today. To be honest, she sounds fucking nuts.”
I sucked in a breath as we entered my office. “What the hell? If she calls again, just tell her I’m in a meeting until six, and I’ll call her after.”
She nodded. “I will. How was lunch with Ben?”
“Idiotic and overdramatic.” I gave her a quick glance before grabbing a folder from my desk.
“Bob wants to take the Vancouver call in his office,” she directed.
I nodded. “Sounds good. See you in about an hour.”
****
The call with Vancouver had gone well, and I’d forced myself to remain focused by taking notes I didn’t need. I’d had all the location scouting and stage information already, but I’d needed to concentrate to ensure that my mind wouldn’t drift away to thoughts of Daniel. What had happened this morning could never happen again—ever.
After sending Barbara home for the night, I closed my office door and stared at Kate’s number. I guessed the only way to figure out just what she wanted was to call her and ask, just like I’d done with her brother earlier.
The phone rang three times before Kate answered. “Hello?” She sounded out of breath and barely audible.
“Hey, Kate, it’s Elizabeth.” My tone reeked of confusion and unknowing.
She started crying at the sound of my voice. “Hi, Elizabeth.” Her voice shook. “It’s been a long time.” She sniffed and sucked in a few shaky breaths.
Good Lord, what have I gotten myself into?
“What’s going on, Kate? Are you okay?”
“No. No, I’m not okay. I’m not okay at all.”
I threw my head back and pinched the bridge of my nose. I did not have time for whatever theatrics were about to occur. Bracing myself, I asked the million-dollar question, “Kate, are you going to tell me what’s wrong, or do I have to guess?”
“It’s Daniel.” She sobbed into the receiver.
“What about him?”
“You can’t have him, Elizabeth. I love him. I’ve been in love with him for years. Then, he meets you, and he just up and dumps me.” Her voice rattled as her excitement grew. “No warning, no nothing. I hadn’t seen it coming at all. One day, we were together, and the next, he never wanted to see me again.”
Holding my breath, I waited for her thoughts to finish. When I was fairly certain she was done, I almost didn’t know how to respond. On one hand, I felt awful that Kate was hurting, but on the other, I didn’t owe her a damn thing.
“Are you there, Elizabeth? Did you hear me?”
“I heard you. I just don’t know what you expect me to say,” I replied honestly.
She sniffed again. “I don’t know either. I guess I just assumed since we used to be friends that you would care more about my feelings, but that was probably stupid and naive of me.”
“It wasn’t stupid,” I breathed out, not necessarily believing my choice of words.
We had barely been friends. She was the little sister of my then boyfriend, and since we’d lived on campus at our college, it wasn’t like I’d spent that much time with her or even seen her that often. Then again, it wasn’t as if I hadn’t considered her a friend at the time.
“Then, you’ll do it?” she asked, her tone sounding more upbeat than it had just two seconds prior.
“Do what exactly?” I had zero clue as to what she was referring to.
“Stop seeing Daniel. You’ll break up with him?”
“Uh…” I paused, unsure of how to respond.
“You won’t. You don’t care about how I feel. I can’t eat. I can’t sleep. I haven’t been able to function since he left me,” she wailed.
I squeezed my eyes closed with the sheer force of the drama, wishing this were all a bad dream. I reopened my eyes and blinked, but I wasn’t in my comfortable bed at home. Cradling the phone between my ear and shoulder with Kate’s crying echoing into it, I realized this was a nightmare I couldn’t wake up from.
“Kate, look, I’m really sorry that you’re hurting, but I don’t see how this has anything to do with me.”
“You’re joking, right? This has everything to do with you! Everything!” she screamed.
I wondered how the fuck Daniel had ever put up with this crap—let alone, how I’d gotten somehow involved in it.
“This is something you should be talking to Daniel about, not me.”
“He won’t take my calls. He refuses to speak to me!”
“I don’t know what you want me to say.”
“Get him to talk to me! Please? Tell him to hear me out. He owes me at least that much. I wasted two years of my life, for Christ’s sake!”
“I’m really not comfortable with that. Like I said, I’m sorry you’re hurting, but this isn’t my problem.” My head started to ache.
“Don’t you have a heart? I know you do. I realize that it’s been a long time, but I know what kind of person you once were. You used to care about other people, Elizabeth and I’m sure you still do. The old you wouldn’t want to see me hurting like this. You’d want to fix it. I refuse to believe that you’ve changed that drastically,” she stopped speaking and I stayed silent, listening to the sound of her breathing before she started up again. “I know my brother hurt you. You didn’t deserve it, but neither do I. I know you can relate to how betrayed I’m feeling.”
The idea of her comparing whatever she’d had with Daniel to my relationship with her brother caused me to bristle in my chair. “You’re right about a lot of things, but I don’t think that your situation with Daniel was anything like my situation with Ben.”
“Maybe not exactly, but I was still invested in what we had, and I love him. I love him, Elizabeth. Can you say the same? Do you love him?”
I shrank back in response to her question, not that she could see it. Did I love Daniel? No, not yet, but I knew the potential was there.
“Do you love him like I love him?” she asked again.
“That’s not really your business,” I said with little conviction.
“If you don’t love him, if you really don’t love him the way I love him, then please let him go. Please send him back to me. I’m begging you, Elizabeth. I just need to talk to him, so he can see…”
She started sobbing again into the phone, and my heart softened as I heard her genuine pain and longing for a man who would never love her back. Her pain started to weigh heavily on me, and I had to break our connection before I caved.
“I wish you the best, Kate. I truly do. But please don’t call my place of employment for things like this in the future. It isn’t appropriate. You need to take this whole affair up with Daniel and leave me out of it. I do not want to be involved. Good night, and good luck.” I ended the call without giving her a chance to say another word. My head was spinning, my resolve was breaking, and my heart was aching for the girl I used to know.