“Always.”
As she rose, smoothing a hand over her skirt, it was like watching the scene unfold in slow motion. He was here, but he was somehow floating above it all, watching it happen to someone else as she slung her purse on her shoulder, gave him a hug, and walked to the door, waving goodbye.
The sound of the door shutting stabbed him in the heart. This was the real hurt. This was the big wound. He headed for his kitchen and rooted around for a bottle of whiskey. He found one and took a long swallow, letting it burn.
Then another that scorched a path down his throat.
The night hadn’t gotten better at all. It had turned far worse.
* * *
Keep it together.
She repeated that mantra over and over as the elevator chugged to the ground level, then as she stepped out onto the marble floor of his lobby. With her chin up, she marched purposefully to the door, clenching her teeth so the doorman wouldn’t see her cry. She didn’t want to be that woman. The woman who leaves a man’s apartment in tears.
That night in New Orleans when she’d asked Nate to be her temporary lover, she’d never expected it would come to this. That a few weeks later, she’d leave his home heartbroken.
“Do you need a taxi, ma’am?”
The first tear slid down her cheek. Because this random stranger knew what she needed more than her best friend did.
“Yes, please” she said, and he scurried to the curb, thrust his hand in the air, brought a silver whistle to his lips and ten seconds later, was holding open the yellow door for her. He handed her a tissue, and gave her a sympathetic smile.
As the cab shot her downtown, the neon lights of Manhattan blaring by, she let all those bottled-up tears fall. She’d have to get them out of her system now, since they had a wedding to go to in four days.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
New York, afternoon . . .
Indiana Jones jammed his snout under a bush along the path in Central Park, and after a few seconds of nose-to-ground recon, Nate tugged on the leash. The dog backed up and continued on the trot-like pace that his little Dachshund legs necessitated as Kat chattered on about something.
It had been three days. Seventy-two entire hours of not talking, not calling, not seeing her, and not touching her. Every single one of those hours was killing him. As if he’d been cruelly excised from her life. Or maybe he’d been the one who’d done the slicing. He didn’t know. He couldn’t figure out a damn thing. He’d gone for long runs in the heat of the late June mornings, he’d logged endless hours at the office, he’d finalized all the arrangements for the travel to Jack’s wedding. Every second he’d been aware of her absence.
She’d texted him twice. Simple, friendly messages. One was a photo of a guy roller-skating in jeggings, and she’d captioned it: Saw this guy on Seventh Avenue. New fashion trend? Then, she’d snapped a shot of a woman in the Times Square subway station who’d painted herself gold and moved robotically for tips. Only, she was snoozing on a bench. Sleeping on the job, Casey had written.
Innocuous messages. Harmless notes. The kind of texts she’d occasionally sent him before they’d started sleeping together. He hadn’t received a text like this since they were truly just friends. She had switched gears so efficiently, from the sweet, sexy, romantic, open, vulnerable and utterly passionate woman to his witty, funny, firecracker of a friend. He’d responded to both notes in kind, replying with Who knew jeggings were all the rage? And It must be tiring to move in slow motion.
He scratched his head as Indiana Jones found a new patch of grass to sniff. This was Nate’s one moment of relaxation in the last few days—taking his sister’s dog for a walk as she pushed her girls in a stroller. Cara had conked out for a late afternoon nap, and Chloe was clapping and shouting doggie at every pooch they passed. Girl after his own canine-loving heart.
“So then Chloe wound up spilling all of it on the floor for Indiana Jones,” Kat said with a laugh, then left a pregnant pause.
He raised his chin and stared quizzically at his sister. Shit. She’d just delivered a punch-line to a story and he hadn’t a clue what she’d been talking about. “That’s funny,” he said, trying to recover from his fumble.
She slugged him on the arm, then brought her hands back to the stroller. “You weren’t listening.”
“I was too listening,” he said quickly, reeling off a white lie.
She shook her head at him. “Oh yeah? What did Chloe spill?”
He had no idea. “Milk?” he asked, taking a stab in the dark.
“Busted. It was spaghetti. She thought it was hilarious that the dog was trying to get her food from the high chair.”
He held up his hands in surrender. “Fine. You caught me. I was drifting off.”
“If I didn’t know better, I’d be worried that I’m boring,” she said as she wheeled past a pack of teenage boys tossing a Frisbee across the lawn. “But yet, I do know you, and I’m pretty sure I also know what’s causing your astronomical levels of distraction.”
“What’s causing it?”
“Casey,” Kat said in a matter-of-fact tone, shooting him a pointed look, one that said I’m right and you know it.
“Yeah?”
She nodded. “You’re in that guy state. That moody, irritable guy state that only comes from trouble with a woman. Which tells me you messed up with her.”
His eyebrows shot into his hairline. “Not true. Not true in the least, and why would you say that?”
She nudged him with her elbow as they walked around a curve in the path, heading towards the 5th Avenue side of the park. “I made an educated guess.”
“Hate to break it to you, but you guessed wrong. I didn’t mess up. She decided she only wanted to be friends. So there you go,” he said.
Kat shot him a doubtful look. “She just wants to be friends? I have a hard time believing that,” she said, bending over the front of the stroller to point out to Chloe a Beagle running alongside his owner.
“And why do you have a hard time with that?”
Kat turned to look him square in the eyes. “Because that girl is in love with you, Nate.”
He stopped in his tracks. His feet were stuck to the concrete. All the sound in the park had been zipped up in her words. Her beautiful, hopeful words. “What?” he said, stumbling on the question.
His sister nodded several times, stopping too. “I saw the two of you at Yankee Stadium. And at my house. I’ve seen the way you look at her, and the way she looks at you.”