Ella

I couldn't take my eyes off her butt.

It was currently bare and resting atop the dark cherry wood desk. She was my fiancé's secretary. The cherry wood desk was my fiancé's desk in his office in Concord, New Hampshire.

It was Saturday morning, and I'd felt so bad for poor Derek, who had been working extra hard to get as much work out of the way before our wedding ceremony, which was only months away. He'd been putting in fourteen hour days six days a week. He even slept in the office a couple of times, because he was working late to get everything caught up at the office.

That Saturday morning, I decided to drive down from Dartmouth College where I was finishing my BA and pick up some bagels and coffee, bringing them to the office so we could at least have breakfast together. He was going out of town that night on a business trip and weekends were the only time we had together while I was finishing up my spring term. A week after I was done, I would graduate with my Bachelor's Degree in English with a concentration in creative writing. Then, we were getting married a month later.

He usually drove up to Hanover to stay with me Friday and Saturday night, but he was going out of town so I thought I'd surprise him with bagels and coffee, and maybe get in some hot sex before he flew to Washington.

That was when I realized the picture-perfect life I thought I had was a sham.

Wealthy family, great education, attentive best friend, and on top of it, engaged to a handsome, well-educated corporate lawyer working for my father. Square-jawed and firm abs -- the whole package. After graduating with a BA in English, I was planning on getting a job as a business editor in Concord where Derek and I would live and starting a family. We were the couple everyone else wished they were. We went to charity events and gala openings. We were invited to all the most important parties.

Even my father approved, and he was a stickler for credentials and breeding. My father, the Emmet Carlson, Governor of New Hampshire, was hard to please but Derek Marshall pleased him. The two of them couldn't wait to be Father- and Son-in-Law.

We were engaged to be married at a resort in July in Bermuda, with our closest friends and family in attendance. Then, I'd start my new life as Mrs. Derek Marshall, wife to the future Congressman and maybe even, one day, first lady to the President of the United States of America. Why not?

Everything was truly perfect.

Or so I thought.

Then I saw her naked butt on the cherry wood desk and was as much mesmerized as I was horrified while Derek pumped into her, her butt cheeks squishing and jerking in unison with each of his grunting thrusts.

Yes, I found Derek, who henceforth and forthwith shall be known as Jerkface, boinking his sexretary on the desk in his huge corner office.

Jerkface was in the last throes of passion and Bunni was all, "Oh, baby, baby, pound me, pound me harder..."

I dropped the bagels and coffee on the floor in the doorway to his office, interrupting him while he was ramming into her, her bare ass on the Johnston file. Then I turned on my heel and left the office, jamming my finger against the elevator button, my world collapsing around me.

I was too shocked to know how to respond. I only knew I had to get out of there and fast.

"Ella!" Jerkface grabbed his slacks and managed to slip them on, covering up his now limp dick, and caught up with me at the elevator just as the door opened. "Ellie, baby, I'm so sorry! Don't get the wrong idea about what you saw," he said, actual panic in his voice, practically tears in his eyes. "Oh, Ellie, sweetheart, don't look at me like that! I love you. She means nothing to me. It was just a one-time thing."

"I heard that," Bunni called out from the depths of the office.

"Ellie, it means nothing. I was anxious about the wedding and the work has been overwhelming and--."

He got to my side, the waistband of his slacks in his hands. "Ellie..."

"Fuck off, you fucking jerk." I stepped inside the car and pressed the down button, my vision blurred from my tears. He was still zipping up his slacks as the doors closed and I was finally alone.

"Ellie! Don't do this!" he called out as the elevator began its descent.

Luckily, his voice soon faded and before I knew it, I was out of the building, running down the street, wiping my cheeks and trying not to sob out loud.

I arrived at my car and opened the door, sliding into the driver's seat before locking the doors and letting my tears flow.

Jerkface arrived at the car door just as I was pushing the start button, having taken the other elevator. His white shirt was open and his feet were bare. I swear I hated him so much at that moment that if I could have driven over him and gotten away with it, I would have.

"Ella, don't do this to me!"

"You did it to yourself, Jerkface," I yelled through the window, giving him the finger. I drove off with a squeal of tires, wishing I was on gravel road so I could kick it up into his cheating face, but I wasn't.

I managed to drive back to Hanover without crashing. Once inside my dorm room, I packed a bag and made hotel reservations. For the first few days, I didn't tell anyone exactly where I was – not even Steph, my bestie and dorm mate. All I said was that Jerkface and I had split and I needed to spend some time alone with Movie Channel and a tub of Dutch Chocolate ice cream.

Then, I cried my eyes out.

As I was lying on the hotel bed, the movie Get Bill playing on the television screen, a huge chocolate fudge sundae with whipped cream for supper, I heard my cell chime for the tenth time. I would have ignored it but I decided to check, see what new excuse Jerkface had concocted. Other than more panicked texts from him, vowing undying contrition and loyalty forever and ever, there was one from her.

BUNNI: He was only marrying you because of your father. He doesn't love you. He really loves me but wanted to use your father to get ahead in politics. Be thankful you found out now before it was too late.

I stared at the text, then punched out a response.

ELLA: I don't want a cheating jerk like him anymore. He's all yours.

For the first week afterwards, I lurked around my dorm, waiting for commencement ceremony and spending time with my bestie, Steph. After commencement, I moved back to Concord with my parents and tried to figure out my life. A month passed and then two. My mother tried to talk me into giving Jerkface a second chance, but I refused, steadfast in my determination that he'd had his chance. Now that Jerkface and I weren't getting married, I was free to figure out what the hell to do with my life.

For the past year, I thought I had everything planned out but now my life was wide open.

A year earlier, I had gone to a writer's conference in Manhattan and it was there I met the woman who would change my life. Sharon Rogers, an editor with a publishing house in Manhattan, read my resume, looked at my credentials and suggested that if I wanted to be an editor, I should consider doing an internship with her in Manhattan. They hired one each year for a one-year term. The next opening would be the following fall so I could keep it in mind.

One night as I sat alone in my bedroom, I got a text from her asking if I was still interested in an internship with her company. I realized that I had to do something to move on so I was ecstatic that she considered me.

She'd been without an assistant for two weeks after her last intern informed Sharon that she took a paid job and didn't even give Sharon twenty-four-hours-notice.

ELLA: How soon do you want me to start?

It took a while, but she finally responded.

SHARON: Ella! Are you serious? I can't believe my luck. I was worried you would have already found a paying job and wouldn't be interested in an unpaid internship.

ELLA: I want to move to Manhattan and get into the publishing business. I have some money saved so I could do an internship for six months.

SHARON: Well, then, come! It's perfect timing. How soon can you be here?

ELLA: As soon as I can get a place to stay and a ticket there, I'm your man. Can we say next week at the earliest?

SHARON: Oh, thank God. Call me as soon as you know when you're arriving. We'll talk about your start date and terms of employment.

ELLA: Thanks, Sharon. You're a lifesaver.

SHARON: No, the thanks are all mine. I can't believe my luck that you want to work as an unpaid intern. I was looking through the resumes of other candidates a friend of mine in the headhunting business brought me but you have the best credentials. Bachelor of Arts with an Honors in English, experience editing your school's literary magazine, your own work published. I'm so glad we met at the conference.

ELLA: I can't wait to start.

I sent the message and leaned back onto the bed, my focus now on finding a place to live in Manhattan. It wouldn't be an easy task, but if Sharon was willing to take me on as an intern, I'd do whatever I could to go to Manhattan.

I'd leave New Hampshire and all the memories of cheating Jerkface behind me and never look back.

My father wouldn't be happy about it, and my mother would weep and moan, but I had to make my own life, on my own terms. I had always wanted to move to Manhattan and get into publishing, but had postponed it all because Jerkface was so insistent we get married and settle down. He was so persuasive that I let him talk me out of going to Manhattan for a few years while he finished the term working for my father.

I'd learned my lesson well. Don't compromise on your dreams for a man.

I wouldn't make that mistake again.