Rowan

My phone lights on my desk at the exact moment my boss knocks at my office door. I silence the call and flip the phone over, screen-side down.

“Spencer,” I say, now that he’s given me the all clear to call him by his first name. “Hi.”

He takes the empty seat on the other side of my desk, and he doesn’t smile, though I’m learning he doesn’t tend to smile a lot in general. He’s very serious most of the time, his sense of humor dryer than the Sahara. But he’s nice and passionate about the work we do here.

I suppose that’s all that matters.

“Just wanted to let you know, I’m impressed with the work you’ve done this week.” His lips flatten, as if he’s about to drop some kind of bombshell on me. I’m waiting for him to add a disclaimer to his compliment.

“Thank you.”

“Anyway, I wasn’t planning on sending you out until next month, but Kathryn’s been sick all week, and I need a second set of hands when I check on our Detroit contract. You up for it?”

“Really? Um. Yeah. Of course.” I nod, hiding my shock and hoping he sees my enthusiasm as genuine. I wasn’t expecting to leave town so soon, but I welcome this.

It’s going to be a relief, a reprieve.

Maybe now, for the first time all week, out of sight will equal out of mind.

I need to get him out of my mind.

It’s the only way I’ll be able to forget him, to forget what we had, and to forget that what we had wasn’t even real.

I haven’t seen Keir all week and yet everywhere I go, there he is.

Not in the literal sense.

It’s like a PR campaign threw up all over the city. With Baltimore being so close to DC and several Maryland residents commuting to the city for work, his campaign seems to be bleeding in this direction.

His face is on billboards. His name in headlines. His pictures in the news.

I can’t escape him.

“Anyway, we leave tomorrow evening,” Spencer says on his way out. “I’ll have my assistant put Kathryn’s ticket in your name and give you all the details.”

“Perfect.”

* * *

I leave work that evening and catch the Metro to Hannah’s dorm in Georgetown. When I arrive, her goth roommate, Willow, answers the door sans-black lipstick for the first time since I’ve known her.

The place smells like sandalwood incense with a hint of marijuana. It’s a good thing our parents are too busy to come visit. My mother would lose her shit if she knew they were footing the bill for all of this.

Willow leaves for the cafeteria, and I sprawl out on Hannah’s extra-long bed, kicking my heels off for the first time all day. Pressing my cheek against her cool pillow, I ramble on about my new job, the upcoming trip to Detroit, the weather, Adeline being back in town, our mother’s impending book tour … anything but Keir.

I already talked her ear off into the wee hours of the morning Sunday night.

There’s nothing more I can say.

“Why are you being so boring?” Hannah makes a face. “The weather? Rowan, seriously? You never talk about the weather. What are we, eighty-seven?”

“I’m allowed to talk about the weather. It’s fall and it’s beautiful outside.”

My sister rolls her eyes. “Maybe we should talk about what’s really on your mind.”

“And what’s that?”

“Keir.” She stands, arms crossed as she leans against her desk. The fact that she’s peering down her nose at me is exaggerated by her supermodel height. “Are you going to forgive him or what?”

Sitting up, I waste no time before offering a resounding, “No.”

“I guess I just don’t understand,” she says. “You were both pretending to be people you weren’t, but it’s only okay when you do it?”

“I didn’t have nefarious intentions. I wasn’t using him.”

“Okay, but you still lied to him. You were still pretending to like him. And he was pretending to like you. And then you both started liking each other for real.”

“So he says.” I exhale, picking at a loose thread on her comforter. “He’s told so many lies, it’s impossible to know what’s true anymore.”

“You should give him another chance.” Hannah tilts her head, her expression a rare shade of serious.

“Absolutely not.” I shoot her a look. “And besides, I kicked him out on Sunday and I haven’t heard from him since. He’s obviously moving on.”

“Rowan.” She grits my name before rolling her eyes. “He’s probably just giving you space. How many times is a guy supposed to keep trying to get a hold of you? He blew up your phone all day Sunday and when he went to you, you bit his head off and sent him packing. You probably freaked him out, and he’s probably waiting for you to cool down so you can have a rational conversation.”

She has a point, but I sit here, mulling, stewing.

“I understand what you’re saying,” I say a minute later. “But I’m still not over it. Until you’ve been betrayed like this …”

“I know. It sucks. It’s awful. You were blindsided,” Hannah says. “But you loved him. You told me that yourself. And he told you he loved you. Are you just going to bury yourself in your work for the rest of your life because relationships are hard work?”

“What we had was a lie, not a relationship.”

“Maybe at first …”

Burying my face in my hands, I breathe deep and allow myself to silently accept the fact that as angry as I am, as devastated as I am … I still miss him.

And I still love him.

Maybe I shouldn’t. But I do. And I have no idea how to stop, how to shut it off, but I have to try.

He chose power and his career before he ever chose me.

Those are his first loves. His only loves.

And like Mary Kate said, politicians are incapable of making promises they can keep.