Chapter 22

Alice

I tapped my fingers against the balcony table, my eyes on the city spread out below. The evening was getting on, but the air was still pleasantly mild. I cast an eye into the living room and spotted Hunter plopped in front of his video game, his eyes locked onto the screen. With a flick of my wrist, I checked my watch. Connor was running late for our interview, and I couldn’t help but let a tinge of anxiety spread out from my gut.

Before I could wonder just where he was, the elevator doors opened up and out stepped Connor. I watched through the glass doors as Hunter sprang up from his seat and threw his arms around his dad’s legs. Goddamn, it was cute. I couldn’t believe what an affection I’d been developing for that little guy, but here I was, pretty much in love with the kid.

“Sorry I’m running late,” he said, stepping through the balcony doors and taking a seat across from me. “They’ve got us training some new nurses who’re transferring. Everything takes twice as long when you have someone standing over your shoulder, you know?”

The words came out in a rush, and almost sounded rehearsed. For a moment, I thought there might’ve been something he wasn’t telling me. But I let the issue pass.

“So,” he said, sitting back in his chair and folding his hands on his lap. “Last interview, huh?”

“Yep,” I said. “You eager to be done with all of this?”

He looked away for a moment, clearly giving the matter some thought.

“I don’t know,” he said. “It’s been strange to go through my past like this, but it hasn’t been without its moments.”

He flashed me a smile, and I knew just what he meant.

“So,” I said. “I’ve saved the most important topic for last.”

“Oh?” asked Connor, raising an eyebrow, clearly intrigued.

“That’s right.”

I pointed toward the apartment, in the direction of Hunter.

“Ah,” said Connor. “You want to know the story behind that little dude.”

“Sure do,” I said. “And can’t help but notice how cagey you’ve been on the subject of his mother.”

He tensed a bit.

“There really isn’t that much to tell.”

“You always say that,” I said. “Then it ends up not being the case—not even a little.”

“OK,” he said. “Then I’ll let you get right to it.”

I went through the usual process of getting my computer set up. Then, with a tap of my finger on the trackpad, I began.

“Hunter’s mother,” I said. “Tell me all about her.”

Connor looked away for a moment.

“Her name was Kendra,” he said.

“Oh—I like where this is going. When there’s a girl named Kendra involved, you know it’s going to be good.”

Connor smirked.

“This was back when I was still doing my residency. I was fresh out of med school and ready to make my mark on the world. And this was when I was still in the middle of my wild streak.”

“I’ve heard whispers about the legendary med school days of Connor Rex,” I said.

“That so?” he asked.

“I do my research.”

“Well, the less you know about them, the better. I wasn’t quite the cad I was in high school—the rigors of med school worked a lot of that out of me—but I was definitely full of myself. I kicked ass in med school, finishing at the top of my class. So, that first year some of the boys from my graduating class and I got pretty tight, and we decided to let New York just how hard us doctors could party.”

I leaned forward, eager to hear what was next.

“And there were more than a few girls who were ready to jump at the chance to hook a doctor right at the start of his career. Kendra was one of them.”

“Tell me what she was like.”

“Wild.”

The word shot out of Connor’s mouth without a second of hesitation.

“Go on.”

“She was a party girl through and through. Basically, the kind of girl I was all about in high school. She was tall, blonde, and with a body that left her never in want of attention from men. To call what we had a ‘whirlwind’ would be putting it very lightly. She and I fell for each other hard and fast. And after a month we were already talking about getting married.”

“Damn,” I said. “No screwing around for you two.”

I’d be lying if I said that I wasn’t feeling more than a little jealous right about now.

“No kidding. After a particularly crazy weekend, we made the decision to get married on a total whim. So, we flew off to Vegas and did the deed.”

“Just like that?”

“Just like that.”

“And how did the wild and untamed Connor Rex handle married life?”

He smirked.

“You’re already thinking I was the bad one, huh?”

“Can’t say it’d be a bad guess,” I said, returning the expression. “Speaking from experience, after all.”

He flashed me a good-natured smile and went on.

“Believe it or not, I was ready to settle down. The little foray back into the party world wore thin very quickly. And, for god knows what reason, I thought Kendra was on the same page.”

“But no?”

“But no. She was still begging me to go out and get wild every night, to continue our lives just as they’d been before we got married, only this time with a big ring on her finger and a doctor husband on her arm that she could show off to all her girlfriends.”

“Then she got pregnant?”

“Yep. And I was certain that this would be the thing to get her to calm down. And she did, for a time—there’s only so much partying you can do when you can’t drink and you’ve got a big baby belly.”

He looked away again, a big, proud smile spreading across his face.

“Then Hunter came along.”

He glanced up, watching Hunter for a few moments through the balcony door.

“From that moment on, as soon as I held him in my arms for the first time, I knew that he was the thing my life had been missing. As soon as you’ve got that first kid, your life stops being about you—you’re just not important anymore. The moment I laid eyes on that guy everything else just disappeared. Suddenly, all of the things I’d convinced myself were important were blown away like burnt paper in the wind. All that mattered was making sure that he had a good life, that he wouldn’t have to want for anything.”

My heart grew warm listening to him talk. There was love behind every one of Connor’s words, and as much as I may have found myself wondering just how much Connor had truly changed, how sincere he was these days, there wasn’t the slightest bit of doubt about the love he had for his son.

“And what about Kendra?” I asked. “Was she as on board as you were?”

“At first, yeah. There was a little stretch there when I was certain that she and I had crossed some sort of threshold, that we’d both put our crazy years behind us and were ready to take on the next phase of our lives.”

“But that didn’t end up being the case.”

“You got it,” he said. “It was about a year into it, around when Hunter didn’t need his mother to be around at all hours of the day. She started going out more, hanging out with those same friends of hers that she’d been partying with. At first, I was fine with it—we had the money for nannies, and I figured she deserved to blow off some steam after going through the stress of pregnancy.

“The first night she came home trashed, however, I knew that things weren’t going to be so simple.”

“Yikes,” I said.

Connor nodded.

“And it just got worse. She’d spend more and more time out with her friends, leaving Hunter with nannies and being out of touch for nights at a time. As much as it pained me to admit it, I began to realize that Kendra wasn’t finding the life of a stay-at-home mother particularly satisfying. But it didn’t end there: She seemed to being finding the life of a wife and mother unsatisfying, period.”

“Then what happened?”

“I was in more denial than I’m letting on. Months went by like this, with her staying out later and later, being less and less present for Hunter. And I just kept telling myself that she’d snap out of it, that she’d work through whatever post-pregnancy issues she was dealing with and become the mother I’d hope she could be.

“One night, however, I came home to find neither Hunter or Kendra there. I gave her a call, and she let me know that she was ‘out on the town,’ and that she’d be back before too long. I demanded that she bring Hunter home now and that we have a conversation about all of this as soon as possible. We had it out on the phone, and she hung up. A couple hours later, I received another call. I was expecting Kendra, but instead, it was the NYPD. They’d pulled her over down in Sunnyside. Turns out she was driving drunk with Hunter in the backseat.”

“Jesus,” I said, sitting back and shaking my head.

“I was furious. I bailed her out and brought her home but she was totally unapologetic. Went on and on about how I was sucking the life out of her, how I made her start this life that she never really wanted, and so on and so on. I told her that she needed to sleep off her booze and think about what it was that she really wanted. I guess she did, because when I woke up that next morning she was gone. She’d packed a suitcase and took off. Left a note on the counter that said nothing but ‘it’s over.’”

“Then what?”

“I filed for divorce and that was that. I only saw her here and there in court. She told the judge she was fine with relinquishing custody. Last I heard she was seeing some Greek millionaire’s son. I guess all she really wanted was a man with money who’d bankroll her party lifestyle.”

“What a shame,” I said. “And Hunter…that poor kid’s growing up without a mother.”

“I’m lucky that I can afford Eliza and the rest of the help, but man, it’s not the same thing. Kid needs someone in his life who I’m not paying by the hour.”

I let the words hang in the air for a few moments.

“And that’s it,” I said, reaching forward and giving the trackpad a tap.

“That’s it?” asked Connor.

“Yep. Unless you’ve got some secret life as an international spy or something you’d care to share.”

“Hmm, well, I have been making a little extra money selling prescription pads to the kids at the private middle school down the block. It’s only a hundred or so extra bucks a month, but it’s really about the thrill of it, you know?”

I let out a laugh and reached forward to give Connor a playful slap on the forearm and giving the muscle a nice, hard squeeze. Damn, he was solid.

“Seriously, though,” he said. “This has been fun. Not just the interview, but having you around. It’s been good to see you.”

Sadness took hold of me at these words. With the interview done and Connor’s promotion assured, that was the end of our arrangement. I realized at that moment how much I didn’t want our time together to end.

“I’d say it’s been more than just fun,” I said, leaning forward and flashing him a sensual gaze.

“Maybe we’ll have to bid each other a proper goodbye,” he said.

Before anything else could happen, however, I heard the low vibration of a phone buzzing. A quizzical expression crossed Connor’s face as he slipped his phone out of his pocket. The confusion only seemed to deepen as he looked over the screen.

“Something up?” I asked, now curious.

“Just…um, someone from work.”

He shook his head and quickly tucked his phone back into his pocket.

“Anyway, I should get some dinner going for the little dude. Don’t forget about the goodbye party they’re throwing for me tomorrow night. Would be unseemly if my dearest fiancée wasn’t there.”

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

Connor stepped back into the apartment, leaving me alone. Confused feelings flashed through me as I sat there, my face illuminated by the glow of my computer. I was conflicted and sad and frustrated and I didn’t know why.

But then it hit me: I wished it wasn’t a lie. I wished that I actually was Connor’s fiancée, that this whole pretend scenario was true. I wanted to be Mrs. Connor Rex.

I slumped back in my seat, the weight of my realization pulling me down.

Shit, I thought. Now what the hell am I going to do?