Chapter Ten
Monday morning couldn’t come quickly enough. Gayle had spent the weekend huddled under a blanket, reliving the huge mistake of Friday night’s adventure even while her mind wouldn’t let go of the memory of the kid from the construction lift outside her yoga studio—he’d been at the dance club, of all the places in the city he might’ve materialized. It confounded her, which was nothing compared to her confusion about how calm and protected he’d made her feel for a split second.
When Evelyn had pulled her away, she’d been half inclined to throw herself at him, to beg him to put his arm around her again. Or, worse, to touch her shoulder the way he had after re-fastening her necklace.
Dear God, but she was a sap. She should’ve just let the drunk guy she’d been making out with do what he’d wanted. That would’ve driven all thoughts of being a sexually whole woman again right out of her brain, and how. But the second he’d reached between her legs and actually touched her, it seemed a negative electric shock had flown through her body. She’d wanted to throw up, frankly. But instead she’d slapped his stupid face.
Ugh. She hated herself by the time Monday morning finally arrived. But thankfully she had a long, challenging week ahead—just the thing for forgetting how she’d behaved Friday night. She’d barely even been able to talk to Evelyn on Saturday, she’d been so mortified by herself.
“Honey, please do not worry,” her friend had reassured her, repeatedly. “It was your first outing. We’ll do it better next time.”
“Trust me, Evelyn. There will never be a next time. I’m not cut out for…”
“Fun? A life? Please, Gayle.”
“I don’t know. I was…it was…I don’t know anymore. But thank God you were there, especially when I lost my damn necklace.”
“Yes, well…”
Gayle had snapped to, recalling that Evelyn had her own issues going on at the moment. “So, have you talked to him?”
“Of course. The damn man was home when I got there.”
“Home? I thought he was in Denver.”
“He turned around and came back.” Evelyn had sighed and Gayle had sensed a thick curl of jealous smoke enter her consciousness. “Silly man. But we kissed and made up.”
“Good,” Gayle had said, not wanting to hear anymore lest she say something rude and inappropriate. “I’m glad for you both. Gonna go now, hon. Enjoy your weekend.” She’d hung up without letting the other woman say anything else and sat for a long time, the phone pressed to her forehead, her jaw clenched in an effort not to scream.
But finally, Monday morning arrived, as it always did. She rose at five, ran six miles in the already warm morning through her old neighborhood, showered and grabbed coffee. Realizing she’d be sitting at her desk a solid hour before most people even got up, she smiled at herself in the rearview mirror. But it was a grim smile.
So what? I’m entitled. I tried to act like a regular person and go out for drinks and dancing and almost lost my mind. Obviously, I am no longer a regular person.
She jammed the car into reverse, then squealed her way down the quiet road toward the only thing she knew how to do anymore—work.
By the weekly nine-thirty a.m. all-hands sales meeting, she’d gotten so many things ticked off her to-do list, she figured she should make a point to be in the office by seven every day. “I emailed you my latest spreadsheet with corrections,” she said to her assistant with a quick smile. “Would you tidy it up for me, so I can present it at Thursday’s management lunch?”
“Sure thing,” the woman said. “Oh, and Gayle…”
She turned, her mind already on the meeting ahead, since she’d be announcing the breweries getting slashed from her book for good. “Hmm?” She checked her tablet distractedly.
“Someone sent this for you.” Gayle looked at the woman, who was pointing to a huge bouquet of summer flowers on the table between a set of chairs where people sat when they were waiting to see her. “Here’s the card. Your door was closed when they got delivered so…” The woman’s voice trailed away. Gayle frowned and took the square envelope with her name fake hand-written on it. She glanced at the woman—Susan, God damn it. Her name is Susan—before ripping it open and staring at the words a few seconds before they settled into her brain.
Dear Gayle, I swear I’m not a stalker, but I would love to buy you a coffee, or a beer, or a water sometime and talk. I hope you don’t take this the wrong way. I will see you soon. Noah (a.k.a. Yoga Window Guy)
Once she’d read the words for a sixth time, her mind accepted what she’d known the second she saw the flowers. Noah, the cute, young, construction worker guy-slash-hero-from-the-nightclub, was not going away anytime soon. To her surprise, she was smiling by the time she tucked the note into her leather portfolio, which currently housed the bad news for a fair number of breweries in their market. When she met Susan’s eyes, the other woman was smiling too. Gayle’s face flushed hot and she tried not to run out of her office door toward the conference room.
Taking a deep breath to center herself and get straight in her head that today was about work, not a ridiculous flirtation with some…kid who knew how to call a florist, she pushed open the door and walked into the half-filled room. She’d always run great meetings—efficient, to the point, useful for anyone who attended and this one had been required for all sales and warehouse staff. She saw the IT people had set up the screen with one of her favorite motivational quotes from Estée Lauder— “I didn’t get there by wishing for it or hoping for it, but by working for it”—displayed in large red font. Gayle met the gazes of each man and woman waiting for her and took her seat.
She immediately spotted three people were missing, which aggravated her, but there were still three minutes to go before the official start. A few people asked after her weekend. A few others asked how she was settling back into life in Michigan. Most people averted their gazes. It was amazing how being the object of such ongoing sympathy after tragedy changed the way people treated her—as if she had a contagious disease, or as if her bad luck in life would rub off on them if they got too friendly.
But it was all fine and dandy with her. She wasn’t here to make buddies. There was work to be done and she’d been hired to do it. Ben ducked into the room and sat at the far end of the table, after giving her a small wave. The other three missing staff—two sales people and the warehouse manager—finally honored the rest of them with their presences. Gayle swallowed the urge to snap at them and glanced down at the chart she’d prepared for the AV portion of the meeting. A corner of the card from the flowers caught her eye. She touched it, marveling at her ability to let it distract her from these crucial next sixty minutes.
When the conference room door shut behind the last tardy staffer, she looked up and beamed at the room. “Well, guys, you’ve done it.” She waited, letting it sink in. Almost everyone smiled at her blankly. “No, really. You have. You’ve done it. You’ve set a record for July sales of craft beer.” She touched her screen and the TV screen changed to a chart reflecting the last three years’ worth of sales. It did, indeed, show a significant spike in sales from the previous one and a huge jump from two years ago. She gave a slow clap and waited until the room joined her.
The conference room door opened, sending a puff of air-conditioned air into her face. She frowned when someone stepped into the room. “Oh, sorry, Gayle,” Ben said. “I had Susan add something last minute to the agenda for this morning. It’s my bad. Come on in, Noah.”
Gayle’s heart actually stopped beating for about a half second. At least, that was what it felt like when she watched the man who’d made her almost break her ankle, who’d pulled her out of her yoga class for reasons she still couldn’t parse and who’d rescued her from her ignominious return to a social life on Friday night, look right at her with a half-smile and a shrug of ‘I told you I’d see you soon.’
Her hand went to her throat. But she’d left Ethan’s ring draped on its chain on the corner of the mirror over her dresser earlier, figuring she could make it through a workday without worrying it to death. She wanted it now so badly it hurt. The young man’s compelling brown gaze hadn’t left hers. They were staring at each other like a pair of star-crossed lovers for so long someone had to clear their throat to break up the moment. Gayle flinched at the sound and her gaze flew to Ben, who was looking around the room in confusion.
“Right,” she said, before swallowing hard. “Okay. So…Ben. What did you add?” She glanced down at her tablet and saw the addition now. It was something she probably should have noted before walking in here, since the addition had the name Noah Stokes, new brand ambassador for Fitzgerald Brewing Company, right on it. “Ah, I see.” She smiled in Noah’s general direction without looking at him. “So, let’s continue, shall we?” Her voice was high, tight, tense-sounding—weak. And nothing pissed her off more than appearing to be weak.
She frowned at Ben, who shrugged and looked down at his agenda. She frowned at him—at Noah—who smiled, which made a shiver shoot down her spine. She tried to convince herself that it was embarrassment over how they’d last met. But it wasn’t and she damn well knew it.
Her portion of the meeting ended after exactly forty minutes in near total silence. She’d dropped some serious bombshells on them in this second round of cuts. A few of the more competent sales people had complained and she’d listened, stating, “If you have a serious argument in favor of keeping an account, make an appointment with my assistant in the next two weeks and make your pitch for them. Please include actual sales numbers and your personal projections for how we can turn them around.” She’d met every pair of eyes around the table. “I will consider your well-structured arguments. But not a bunch of bullshit about breweries who give you freebies or treat you like royalty just because.” Gayle rarely cursed in the office, so when she did, people sat up and paid attention.
“All right, then, Ben. Would you like to introduce your guest?” The weird squeakiness was back. She cleared her throat again and smiled in Noah’s general direction once more.
“I’ll let him introduce himself,” Ben said with a dismissive wave.
Noah rose to his feet. Gayle kept her gaze fixed on the tablet in front of her even though the temptation to stare at him—to take him in from the top of his dark blond hair down his model-perfect body—was one of the hardest things she’d ever had to resist. “Hi, everyone. I’m Noah and I’ll be working with you on behalf of Fitzgerald Brewing. I’m hoping to set a few ride-along days with some of you today.”
Gayle watched the five women who were suitably dazzled by him begin to flip their hair and attempt other eye-catching, mating-dance rituals. Her face reddened and her throat closed up so tight she couldn’t breathe for a few seconds.
He said a few more things, but she couldn’t hear him for the loud ringing in her ears. Finally, the woman sitting next to her, who’d been making goo-goo eyes at the handsome young man as he moved easily around the room, nudged her leg. When Gayle frowned, the woman nodded in the direction of the table which held a full complement of silent people, all of them staring at her, waiting for her to dismiss them. Noah was also sitting, also looking at her, one eyebrow raised in a way that shot her right back the Godawful moment in the yoga studio.
“Right, okay, so. Let’s get to it, shall we?” She stood fast and practically ran out of the room and down the hall to the relative safety of her office. Once she got there, after what felt like about an hour’s worth of walking, she shut the glass door and leaned back against it, eyes closed, sweat drenching the back of her blouse.
What had just happened? Why did this man keep reappearing in her life? She touched her neck, but the ring still wasn’t there. Her fingertips felt ice-cold against the heat of her skin. A phone rang. But it wasn’t the one on her desk, or the one in her pocket. It was another one. One from nearly three years ago. The voice on the other end came from a stranger. A stranger telling her the news while she drove home from the office, her mind already on the things she needed to pack. Already looking forward to being reunited with her family, even if it meant an unwanted trip to Disney World.
A sharp rap on the glass behind her made her yelp and jump away from it as if it had burned her. “Um, give me a minute,” she called out in the same tight voice she’d been using in the meeting. She stumbled over her own feet, approaching her desk. After putting her tablet and portfolio down, she sucked in a long breath, sipped her cold coffee, then turned to face the door. “Come in.” She had one hand on the glass top, the other one gripping her phone.
The door opened slowly, revealing the man she knew would be there, making yet another reappearance in her life. “Hi,” he said, standing half in, half out of her office, his hands tucked into the pockets of his khakis. She glared at him. Her legs shook so hard she eased around behind the desk and sat before she fell down.
“Hello,” she said, keeping it noncommittal, willing him to leave. “This is certainly a surprise.”
“Yes, well…it’s a small world.”
“So it would seem.” She tapped her fingertips on the desk top but didn’t say anything else. He matched her silence without making it awkward. His face was a mask of patience—extraordinarily handsome patience. She blew out a breath. “Can I do something for you? I really have a lot to do today.”
His slow, easy smile emerged, widening, making her scalp tingle and her ears burn hot. “Did you like the flowers?”
She sighed and rolled her eyes. “Yes. They are nice.” More silence. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” He tilted his head. She tried not to react. “And…?”
“And what?” She bit off the ends of the two words, hoping to convey her unhappiness with his continued presence. She stared at him, a bizarre sensation filling all her senses. She could smell, feel, practically taste Ethan right then. She closed her eyes, hating her life so much it made her teeth hurt.
“Gayle?” He was next to her now. She could tell. Warmth rolled off his skin and caressed hers in a way different from what she’d felt with Ethan. “Are you all right?” His hand was on her shoulder. His fingers touched her jaw, her chin, her lips. The heat of him made her feel safe, and loved, and no longer wretchedly alone. She jerked away from him with such violence her chair rolled backward and hit the wall with her still in it. He stood, arms crossed, not talking, not demanding anything of her.
“I’m fine. Please go.” She swallowed hard, tears burning their way down her cheeks. “Please?” This last came out a raw, painful whisper. She kept a death grip on the chair arms and her gaze trained down on the floor. “I don’t know what you want from me but…”
He crouched down in front of her, his palms covering her hands. “I don’t want anything from you,” he said, his voice soft. She clenched her jaw, determined not to look at him. But he wouldn’t move. “Relax, Gayle. It’s all right. I’m sorry—”
“Don’t fucking tell me you’re fucking sorry,” she spat out, finally meeting his eyes. Strands of her hair had escaped her tie-back and hung over her eyes. She must look like a straight-up crazy person. She tried to lean away from him, to pull her hands out from under his, but he wouldn’t let her. Instead of being threatening, however, the gesture was the opposite—it was oddly comforting.
“Okay, I won’t. I’m not sorry. Fuck sorry.” He smiled. His face was so close. His lips so…very tempting.
“Yes. Fuck sorry,” she whispered. “I think you can let go of me now.” She allowed herself to smile at him and it felt so good, she kept doing it until an inappropriate giggle burst out of her, followed by a loud chuckle and a bark of laughter. Noah leaned back on his heels, hands on his thighs while she had her hysterical fit, both hands clapped over her mouth, tears rolling down her face. “Jesus,” she said, waving her hands in front of her eyes. “Wow.” She swiped at her cheeks and leaned back. Noah hadn’t moved an inch. He sat, watching her. “So, you can go now. For real.”
He rose, graceful as a dancer, and tucked his hands back in his pockets. “About that coffee?”
Gayle sighed and stared at the ceiling. “You are persistent.”
“Yes, it’s one of my many stellar qualities.” He waited in silence while she pondered this strange life turn she’d taken. “So, when are we having coffee?”
“I never said I wanted to have coffee with you.” Dear Lord, am I flirting? I am, indeed. She leveled her gaze at him. “Did I?”
He shrugged and leaned on her desk. “Water? Beer? Wine? Tea?” His grin widened. “I’m flexible as well as persistent.”
“Are you even old enough to drink?”
“I’m twenty-nine. I’ll be thirty in a few weeks.” He ran a hand across his lips and around the back of his neck. “I’m blessed and cursed with a face that’s always looked about ten years younger than I actually am.”
She scoffed and crossed her arms but was relieved to know he wasn’t as young as she’d guessed. “I’m not drinking anything with you.” She rose, keeping her hands on the desk top to steady herself. “I don’t know what this is, but I don’t think I’m…ready to date, if you know what I mean.”
“I do know. And I wouldn’t exactly call it a date. More like a chat.”
Her skin tingled. God help her, he was gorgeous. But she couldn’t do this. She wouldn’t do this. “No, thanks,” she said, refastening her tie-back. “Not interested.” She smiled at him, her equilibrium regained.
He leaned toward her, startling her so much she couldn’t move before his lips touched hers, ever so briefly. She flinched and put a hand on his chest, then dropped it back to the desk. “You have a lot of fucking nerve,” she said, her voice strong. “Please go.”
He grinned, pushed himself away from the desk and stood for a few seconds, his legs wide apart, his shoulders set, hands on his hips as if facing some kind of obstacle to be breached. “I’ll go,” he declared. “But I’ll be back.”
Gayle pointed to the closed door. Noah walked backward, never taking his eyes off her. She took a minute to take in his near-perfect body, cover-model face and thick head of dark blond hair, making sure he understood she was ogling him right back. They played the stare-down game for a few more seconds until he made it to the door, opened it, winked at her then ducked out, giving a loud farewell to Susan.
She waited for a few minutes, fingertips pressed against the desk top, jaw tight, teeth grinding. For the first time in a long one her thoughts didn’t go directly to Ethan, and her first emotion wasn’t fury at him for leaving her, for taking their little boy on that fucking plane.
At the thought of her son, an excruciating pain ripped through her chest, settling in her gut, making her legs wobble. Her boy. She’d lost her boy. A scream bubbled up from her throat, but she tamped it down, dropping into her chair and putting her head down on the cool glass surface in front of her.
Her therapist had been after her for months to say his name, but she’d refused. It was as if accepting Ethan’s death by fiery, terrifying plane crash was more than enough. The reality she’d been living with, that she’d scattered two sets of ashes off the balcony of their home before she called the realtor to list it, had been the basic fact she’d been suppressing.
“Liam. Oh God. Liam,” she whispered, scrabbling around in her purse for something and muttering her son’s name over and over under her breath. After a few desperate seconds, she turned the damn thing upside down and sent the contents rolling across her desk. Finally, she found what she’d been looking for and held it in both hands, staring down at the last photo she’d been able to find of them all together. It had been floating around in the bag for months, purposefully ignored by her, but left there, just in case she needed it.
She stared down into his face, caught in a laughing moment—the kid had always been laughing, so it hadn’t been hard to do. She and Ethan had their arms around him and were looking at each other over his head. She remembered the moment now, like it had happened two seconds ago. She recalled exactly what Ethan had said.
“We’re lucky,” he’d said. “This kid will never not smile for a camera.”
She’d said, “Well, he comes by it naturally. You won’t ever not smile for a camera, or a pretty lady.”
He’d made a fake ‘who, me?’ face and she’d given him her best ‘spare me’ look. Liam had kept laughing. The photographer had kept snapping the pictures.
She touched his face—the boy she’d wanted so desperately she’d endured miscarriages, the hormone shots turning her into a weepy, sloppy mess, until Ethan had thrown the whole lot of them out the window of their bedroom with a loud shout and a curse. “Fuck this shit, Gayle. I don’t care if we have a baby. I don’t. I swear I don’t.” He’d dropped to his knees in front of her as she’d sobbed her way through another evening, wrapped his arms around her legs and pressed his face into her lap. “I can’t stand this anymore. I can’t bear to see you this unhappy. Let’s enjoy our lives and stop worrying about babies.”
She’d conceived Liam that night and he’d been born three weeks early, yet perfectly healthy. She’d never been happier in her life. Ethan had been beyond ecstatic, staying home with her and curling up beside her while she nursed or napped. It had been yet another extension of the extreme fairy tale she’d managed to conjure for herself somehow. Gayle put the picture down on the desk and stared at it, willing herself to accept the totality of her loss.
Interestingly, the tears seemed to have dried up, even as she released the memories of him, of her baby, her little boy, into her brain and let them spill over, subsuming her memories of her life with Ethan. “Susan,” she called out. “What else do I have scheduled today?”
“Not much, really.” The woman stood in the doorway, a tablet in her hands. “Are you all right?”
“No, I’m not. I need to go home.”
Susan nodded and poked at her tablet’s screen. “I’ll take care of it. You go on. Get some rest.”
“Yes. Rest.” Gayle picked up the photo and gazed around at the mess she’d made from her purse. “Rest.”
Susan poked her head back in the office after a few minutes, startling Gayle out of her semi-trance. “I’ve canceled and rescheduled everything. Do you need some help?” Susan stood by the desk and stared down at the detritus of pens, lipsticks, tampons, paper clips, credit card receipts, old mints.
“No. I’m fine. Thanks.” She started scooping everything back into her bag, leaving the photo on the middle of the glass. She’d spoken more sharply than she’d meant to. “I’m sorry, Susan. I don’t mean to…”
But the sympathetic look she’d gotten used to was back. She blew out a breath and got up, leaving the photo where it was and shouldering her purse. “Let Ben know I’ll be in tomorrow as usual, but I need some t-t-t-t-time.” She shocked herself with her inability to speak. “Thanks.”
“No problem,” the woman said. She looked down at the photo, then up at Gayle, her face a mask of sadness. “Oh, honey. I’m so—”
Gayle held up a hand. “I know. You’re sorry.” She grabbed the picture and jammed it back into her purse. “I’ll, um, see you tomorrow.” She ducked her head and fast-walked out into the hall, past a few clumps of people still hanging around after the meeting and straight to the elevator. When it took forever to arrive, she whirled and headed for the stairwell, ignoring all the stares of everyone around her whose lives were normal, who lived every day with their loved ones and never gave a single thought to what they’d do if it were all yanked away from them in an eye blink. Like she’d done, until the eye blink had happened and she’d been left a hollow shell, a sorry excuse for a woman—a childless widow who cried at the slightest provocation.
“Fuck sorry.”
She smiled at the memory of Noah’s words, and wondered how many times she’d say ‘no’ before she said ‘yes’ to his invitation for a ‘chat’.