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wrong of me to work so hard to not love you and then fall in love with
them.”
“Just go home. Wait for me.” I pulled a hankie out of my pocket and
tried to dry her eyes for her, but she snapped it from my fingers and did it
herself. “I’ll talk to them, and if it means you stay away from my parents
until they come around, then that’s what we’ll do. Okay? I still run Crowne,
so they can’t get rid of me.”
“It’s always about you.” She shook her head, refolding the hankie.
“That’s never going to change. I should have seen it, I mean…” Her short
laugh was aimed directly at herself. “God, you wanted me to sign off on
naming our fictional children, for fuck’s sake. I’m so stupid.”
“If you’re so stupid, maybe I should make the plan.” I crossed my arms.
“Because mine was pretty good.”
“A plan? I love you, you stupid shit.”
She loved me. I could barely hear that from behind the soundproof wall
of my frustration at the collapse of our plan. I was turned around, facing the
wrong direction, pulled by the tide of needs that I had assumed conflicted.
Maybe they didn’t. Maybe it was all going in the same direction, and that
direction was out to sea.
I’d had it all in my hands. Everything I’d worked for my adult life had
been mine, and now it was all at risk because she loved me and I was a
stupid shit.
Emotional inertia kept me full speed on the path she’d abandoned,
grasping for what I thought I’d attained.
“That’s not relevant,” I barked.
My head must have sprouted a second face, because that was how she
looked at me. As if I was insane. What was so hard about this? We had a
fire to put out and she was adding gasoline.
“Of course you decide what’s relevant.”
I reached for her, but she turned and ran down the stairs, holding the
handrail so her diamond ring scraped the wood. At the landing, she turned
to look at me.
“We’ll talk when I home,” I said.
“Just stay away from me.”
She went down the next flight, and I was about to chase her when I
heard my name.
“Logan!” Byron called, running.