“Wes.” I start to say something else but my throat seems to close around the words. I swallow over the lump that’s forming there and force myself to speak. “What was Trent talking about? What Elmwood Gables development project?”

Wes doesn’t answer. He doesn’t look at me either. The elevator doors slowly slide closed again. The car jerks lightly and then starts to go back down.

“Wes.” I force myself to face him now. My heart is ricocheting against my ribcage, but I try to breathe through it. Maybe there’s an explanation for this. Wes has his hands in all kinds of projects. Maybe Trent was mistaken. Breathe. “Please, just tell me. What was Trent talking about?”

He shakes his head. His shoulders are slumped, almost as if he’s already resigned himself to something. That doesn’t exactly fill me with confidence.

“It’s just a project we’ve been considering.” He’s staring straight ahead now, at the mirrored wall in front of us.

“What does that mean, considering? What exactly are you planning to do at Elmwood Gables?”

Wes breathes slowly, his nostrils flaring. His jaw ticks. He meets my eye, finally, but only in the mirror.

“It’s a development project. Condos, retail space. It’s something we’ve been working on for awhile. It’s not official yet, though. The proposal hasn’t even been submitted.”

“But why would you even consider a project like that? It’s community housing. You’re just going to tear it down?”

“We’re not going to tear the whole thing down. Just … parts of it.”

“Which parts?”

He doesn’t answer. I put my hands on my hips.

“Which parts, Wes?”

“The community center,” he admits. “The garden. The park. A couple of the older buildings. The city wants to offload any of the land they don’t consider essential.”

My heart aches, and my hands fall away from my hips. I picture that beautiful garden, paved over and replaced with yet another glass tower. What a fucking depressing cliche.

“How could you do that?” I expect my voice to be filled with fury but all I can hear is an overwhelming sadness.

We reach the lobby floor and the elevator doors slide open but once again, neither Wes nor I move. There’s a group of people waiting to get on and even though I glare at them, they pile on anyway.

Wes and I stand in awkward silence while the car trundles up through the floors of the hotel, stopping every minute to let someone else off. Everyone seems to take their sweet time, and it feels like forever before Wes and I are alone again.

“I’m sorry, Rori. I should have told you.”

He sounds apologetic, but my stomach is still twisting at the news. That beautiful space is so perfect. I can’t believe that Wes would tear it down like it was nothing. Every time I think he’s changed, something new comes along and knocks me back down.

“Did you know the community center is one of my clients?” I desperately want him to look me in the eye this time. I want him to know that those anonymous people who live at Elmwood aren’t the only ones he’s going to hurt.

I get my wish. Wes whips his head around to face me.

“What? What do you mean they’re your client?”

Once again the elevator glides open on the twenty-first floor, and once again, Wes and I don’t budge. Our eyes are locked in battle that I don’t even understand. In a minute the elevator doors slide closed again.

“What do you mean they’re your client?” Wes repeats, as if I hadn’t heard the question.

“Just that.” I cross my arms over my chest. “They hired me to help them promote the garden, to get more people using it. It’s a gem, Wes. Have you ever seen it?”

He shakes his head.

“Of course not.” I throw my hands up. “Why would you even care? It’s just about the money, right? Who cares if people need those spaces?”

“I do care, Rori,” he insists. “This all started long before you came into the picture. I had no idea you would end up being involved.”

“It’s not just me, though.” I’m so frustrated that angry tears are starting to prick my eyes. I can’t believe that Wes is so dense, so … heartless. “These are real people, Wes. At least one of your own employees lives there. Maria. Remember her? She volunteers at the community center too. You saw how she talked about it in that video …”

I trail off. Wes’s eyes flick up to meet mine, and understanding dawns.

“You knew.” My heart feels like it’s dropping as fast as the elevator. It hits rock bottom at the same moment we arrive back in the lobby and the elevator doors ping cheerfully open again. Another wave of people swarm on. I stab the button for the twenty-first floor, for the third time.

Now I’m so angry I can barely look at Wes as we slowly climb back up through the floors. I know this is a business decision for him. I know that this is what he does for a living. And I love that he’s ambitious and successful. But the Wes I used to know would never have even considered demolishing community resources like this. The Wes I knew cared about people.

The fact that he had let Kyla and I go on with our presentation, watching that video and knowing that in a few months Maria’s life would be completely upended — the thought fills my stomach with acid. Was he just laughing at us the whole time? I blink back the tears that threaten to fall. I can’t believe I was starting to trust him again.

“That’s why you didn’t like our presentation,” I hiss, once we’re alone in the elevator again. “Not because it was off-brand for GoldLake, but because you knew it would be bad PR to feature Maria in a video when you were about to rip up her home.”

“I told you we aren’t ripping up anyone’s homes,” he snaps. “But yes, you’re right. That’s why I couldn’t let you use that video. Even though it was really, really good. Seriously, Rori.”

“Oh, don’t try to kiss my ass now. I can’t believe you did this, Wes. I feel like you’ve been lying to me this entire time.”

My legs are shaking now and when the elevator opens up on our floor again, I storm out. Wes follows behind me. He seems to be moving slowly, as if he’s trudging through quicksand, but I have enough angry energy for both of us. I can’t look at his face though. If I do, I’m going to cry.

We make our way silently to the room. I try to slam the door behind us, but the stupid soft-close function means it just clicks softly into place. How unsatisfying.

“Rori, I’m so sorry,” Wes says. He scrubs his hands over his face. “Honestly. This whole things feels like it’s turned into a shit show. You were never supposed to get hurt by any of this. I had no idea you’d end up so personally involved with this place. We needed someone to help us get the hiring program off the ground, someone who could help us make it look like it was legit …”

“Like it was legit?” I whip around to face him again. My heart hammers out an anxious rhythm. “It’s not legit?”

“No, that came out wrong,” he says hastily. “It’s legit.”

“So why did you need me, exactly?” I ask the question out loud, but it’s more for me than for Wes. I’m pacing back and forth in the room now, even though there isn’t a ton of space. I push past Wes, trying to think through what he’s telling me.

Or not telling me, as the case may be.

“You needed the program to look legit,” I mutter to myself.

“It is legit,” he repeats.

“I’m not talking to you.” I bite the knuckle of my thumb. My brain is working on overdrive, but I feel like there’s still a thread I’m missing.

“Why’d you hire me?” I turn to face Wes now. He sits down on the bed, resting his hands on his knees. It’s the question I’ve been wondering since Wes reappeared in my life a few weeks ago. Celia was convinced that he was really back because of his feelings for me, and I realize that at some point along the way, I let myself start to believe her. That Wes sought me out for me. Because there was something unfinished between us.

“We needed you,” he says now. “To help us promote the hiring program.”

“I know, but why me?” I want to scream the words at him, but I force my voice to stay level. “You have your own in-house marketing team. You work with global PR firms. I work in a start-up over a laundromat. So why me, Wes? Why, after all this time, did you come looking for me?”

Wes looks broken, but he doesn’t look away this time.

“I’m so sorry, Rori. We hired you — initially — because you work with non-profits and it would look better for us if we had an authentic firm vouching for us. No one’s going to believe our own marketing on something like this, but we thought if we had a company like Marigold promoting the initiative, it wouldn’t look like it was just a PR move.”

And there it is. The thread I’m missing.

“The entire hiring initiative was a PR move, wasn’t it?”

Wes doesn’t answer. He doesn’t have to. The thoughts are clicking into place, and it’s like matching up the colors on a Rubik’s Cube. Except way less satisfying and more soul-shattering.

“It’s all been a lie,” I say weakly. My legs are so wobbly now that I have to sit down on the bed, but I choose the opposite corner from Wes. The whole width of the bed stretches out between us. “You’ve been using me this whole time. You needed some good PR and I was the perfect patsy. Just a little do-gooder you could manipulate into helping you look like a good guy. And I fell for it all. God, I even fell for that bullshit about your mother.”

“It hasn’t all been a lie,” Wes says quietly. “You have to believe that, Rori. The stuff about my mother was all true. And the way I felt for you — the way I feel for you — that’s not a lie either.” He reaches his hand out across the bed, but he’s too far to reach me and I refuse to reach my own hand out towards him.

“I can’t even look at you right now.” I fold my arms and turn towards the window. The sun is streaming in, bright and cheerful, oblivious to the fact that inside this hotel room, my heart is breaking all over again.

“Rori, you have to talk to me. ”

“We have nothing to talk about it.”

“I don’t agree. I’m not leaving here until we talk about this.”

“Fine. Don’t leave. I will.” I stand up and start shoving clothes into my suitcase, not even really paying attention to what I’m grabbing. I can text Emma, I think, or Blake, or my parents. I have to be anywhere but here right now.

Wes crosses the room towards me. He grabs my wrist suddenly. I’m dangling a bra and I let it fall from my fingers.

“Let me go.”

“Not until you listen to me.”

“I have no interest in hearing anything you have to say.”

“Then maybe you’ll listen to this.”

He slides his hands through my hair and then his lips are on mine. For a second I forget myself. I forget everything that just happened in the last twenty minutes, forget the way my world feels like it’s crumbled down around me. That’s always what it’s like when Wes kisses me. It stops time. It erases places. It bends the fabric of reality.

I let myself go. Just for a minute. The sweet relief of oblivion. Wes’s lips on mine, his hands roughly knotting through my hair. The crush of my breasts against his chest.

Then I pull away. I pick up the bra off the floor and shove it into the suitcase, turning away from him.

“Rori,” he says again, but I’m already roughly zipping up the suitcase and shoving open the door.

Wes follows me down the hallway. He follows me into the elevator too, even though I try to jam the close button before he can sneak in. I turn away from him while we’re in there, although the mirrored walls mean I see him no matter which way I face. I focus on the display panel over the door as it ticks down the floors.

“Rori, please. You can’t imagine how terrible I feel about this. I honestly never meant for you to get hurt. I didn’t know that we’d get involved, that any of this would happen. I didn’t know that my feelings for you would be … I didn’t know that I’d fall in love with you.”

I suck in a breath but still refuse to meet his eyes, even in the reflective glass. He reaches out and puts his hand gently, hesitantly on my shoulder. In a moment of weakness, I tilt my head, resting my chin against his fingers. We stay like that for a minute.

“Rori,” he says again, but at that moment, the elevator doors sweep open. I take a deep breath and rush out into the crowded lobby, dragging my suitcase behind me.

I have no idea where I’m going or what I’m doing now that I’m down here. I can feel Wes following me, so I force my feet to keep moving.

I walk towards the front doors of the hotel, but at the last minute veer off towards the restaurant. Maybe Celia will still be there.

I burst in and nearly collapse in gratitude when I see her and Jace settling up their bill.

Celia looks up right away, almost as if she can sense my distress through some kind of BFF ESP.

“Rori, what’s wrong?!”

Instead of answering, I burst into tears. Celia wraps her arms around me, while Jace looks on, concerned.

Celia strokes my back.

“Maybe you should go,” she says quietly. I sneak a peek behind me and realize she’s talking to Wes. “I’ll talk to her.”

“Rori, I still want to talk to you.” Wes’s voice, like lava dripping down my spine.

I turn to face him. I take a deep breath, steadying myself.

“What’s the point, Wes? We have nothing to talk about. You should just go back to the city.”

I expect Wes to fight me, but instead he nods solemnly. I watch as he walks out of the restaurant, away from me and from all of us.

Celia reaches for some napkins and passes me a handful. I mop up my face as best as I can.

“I’m so sorry,” I mutter. “I didn’t mean for you to have to deal with any of this today. You’re supposed to be celebrating.”

“How can I celebrate if I know my best friend is crying her eyes out over some guy?” She pauses. “I mean, I’m assuming it’s over some guy. Did something happen with Wes?”

I nod, another round of fresh tears pricking my eyes. I try to stem them with the napkins but they won’t stop coming.

Celia and Jace exchange a glance.

“Come on.” Celia links her arm through mine. “We have an hour before we have to leave for the airport. Let’s go sit in the bar and you can tell me what happened.”

Jace nods. “I’ll go pack up the rest of our stuff. Let me know if you need me to change our flight, babe.”

“Oh, God, no,” I protest. “I’m not going to delay your flight. I just need a minute.”

“Well, we’ll see what happens.” Celia takes my arm and ushers me out of the restaurant and across the hall into the hotel’s bar. For a minute I think we might find Wes there, but when I scan the space I don’t see his familiar frame anywhere. He’s gone.

Thank God. That’s what I wanted.

Right?