Chapter 16
Ian
“And that concludes my presentation.” I clear my throat and press my hands on the boardroom table as I glance around the room. “Are there any questions?”
Dana Peschka stares at me like she’s waiting for the punchline in a horrible racist joke. She glances at Walter, and they exchange a glance that tells me what I already know:
I’ve just blown it.
“Thank you, Ian,” Dana says with a crisp professionalism that borders on pity. “We’ll be in touch.”
“Right. Thank you.” I stand there like an idiot for a few seconds, trying to come up with something else to say. Some way to make up for the fact that I just delivered a presentation with the emotional depth of a snack-sized Ziploc bag.
Dana shifts in her seat, and Walter just stares. My palms are sweating, and I struggle to come up with some way to connect with my audience. For crying out loud, we’ve worked together for weeks. We’ve shared a staff bathroom and eaten dinner together.
It occurs to me these bits of trivia are not helpful, and also that Dana and Walter are waiting for me to leave. The sinking sensation in my chest isn’t unfamiliar, and neither is the knowledge that someone wants me to go.
Sarah.
I swallow back the lump that’s not new. It lodged itself in my throat Saturday night and hasn’t gone anywhere since.
Struggling to maintain some shred of dignity, I start shoving papers into my briefcase. “If you need to reach me, you have my phone number and email and—”
“We know how to get ahold of you.” I look up to see Dana pressing her lips together in a tight line. “It’s been a pleasure, Ian. Thank you for fulfilling the terms of your contract.”
“Not a problem.”
If I needed any further indication that their decision is made, that would be it. My contract is up this Friday. There won’t be a job offer on the table at the end of it.
I give a curt nod, then lift my briefcase and shift it to my left hand. “Thank you for the opportunity,” I say to Dana as I shake her hand. “Good luck with everything.” I extend the same handshake to Walter before turning and striding out the door.
So that’s it. That’s how it all ends.
I knew from the start that I was bombing my presentation. My words came out stiff and meaningless. There was data, but no heart. Flowcharts, but no emotion.
I might be emotionally stunted, but even I realize that’s not the way to win a job.
It’s how you blew things with Sarah, too, you idiot.
Gotta appreciate a subconscious that kicks you when you’re down.
I’ve made it halfway to the elevator when I hear the tap of high heels behind me. I almost don’t want to turn around. If I can just get to the elevator and shut myself inside, I can close this door behind me and—
“Ian, wait.”
I freeze with my hand on the elevator button. Closing my eyes, I take two deep breaths. Then I turn to face Dana Peschka.
“You don’t have to say it,” I tell her. “You’re going with another candidate.”
She doesn’t argue. “Look, Ian—you’re a great guy,” she says. “It’s just that our company culture here at Wyeth Airways requires something a little—different.”
“Different,” I say, pivoting to face her. “You want the guy I was at dinner two weeks ago. That guy would have gotten the job.”
She levels me with a frown like I’m the D student blurting a rare correct answer in class. “I can’t say for certain, but yes—the personality you showed us that evening was much more in line with the corporate culture of Wyeth Airways. What’s required to take our company to the next level.”
“And therein lies the problem.” I take a deep breath and let it out in a heavy sigh. “That’s not me. Not the real me.”
She frowns and folds her arms over her chest. “Pardon me for saying so, but I think you’re wrong.”
“Excuse me?”
“I’m saying you’re wrong.” Her frown is chiseled in place, but there’s warmth in her eyes. “I’ve been running companies for a long time, and I know people. That guy you showed us at the restaurant a few weeks ago? That’s more the real Ian Nolan than you realize.”
I can’t hold back a snort of disbelief. “You’re saying that you know me better than I know myself,” I say slowly. “That I’m mistaken about who I really am.”
“No,” she says, drawing out the syllable like she’s talking to an ill-behaved teenager.
“I’m saying sometimes people shove their heads so far up their own asses that they lose the ability to see the light.
” She taps one stilettoed foot on the tile floor.
“That’s my professional assessment, take it or leave it. ”
My mouth drops open. I can’t believe she’s talking to me like this. I can’t believe—
“I can’t believe I let Sarah get away from me.”
Dana doesn’t blink. It’s like she expected me to say this all along, and I wonder whether we’ve been talking about work or my love life this whole time.
Maybe both.
I’m still too stunned to speak, which is fine since Dana isn’t through. “You want to know why we offered you this contract in the first place?”
I open my mouth to answer, but she doesn’t give me a chance.
“We liked you because you were tenacious,” she says. “You’re hardworking and dedicated and have a track record of making smart business decisions. You want to know why we considered taking you on full-time for Wyeth Airways?”
“Because you wanted someone passionate and emotionally present, and you mistakenly thought that was me.”
“No, you’re mistakenly believing it’s not you,” she says. “That guy we saw at dinner a few weeks ago was a great guy. Smart and funny and passionate and alive and exactly the kind of guy Wyeth Airways needs.”
Exactly the kind of guy Sarah deserves.
If Dana’s words hit me like a slap, my own thoughts are more of a full-fisted slug to the stomach. I stand there sucking in shaky breaths like a kid on the playground who just got gut-punched beside the monkey bars. I can’t find my voice, which is just as well since Dana has more to say.
“Here’s the thing, Ian,” she says. “You can be both. You can be stiff and rational and detached, but unless you’ve got the other side to balance you out, you’ll never be an effective leader.”
Or an effective fiancé. An effective husband.
I know I should care about this job, but I don’t. Not right now. All I care about is Sarah, and the hurt in her eyes when I walked away. I put that hurt there. Me. I did that to her, and I’m the biggest piece of shit in the world.
God, I love her.
The thought hits me between the eyes like a hatchet blade, but more painful.
I love her? How the fuck did that happen?
Dana Peschka is staring at me like my brain is leaking out of my ears, and maybe it is. Maybe I’ve finally lost it. Honestly, I don’t care. I’ve lost Sarah, and that’s the only fucking thing that matters right now.
I grip my briefcase tighter and take a breath.
“I know I blew this job,” I tell her. “And I’m sorry about that.
I should probably stick around right now and fight for it.
Convince you I’m passionate and human and emotionally up to the task of running this company.
But there’s someone else I’d rather persuade. ”
“Sarah.” She doesn’t flinch, doesn’t smile, doesn’t waver from the knowing expression she’s worn from the moment I met her. I wonder if she sees the gaping hole in my chest where my heart used to be.
I nod numbly, but my brain is already headed down the elevator and out onto the street to find Sarah. To convince her that I’m not dead inside, that I love her more than I ever thought possible.
I was just too chickenshit to admit it.
But I’m not now. “I have to go.”
“Understood.” The faintest little ghost smile graces her features, or maybe I imagined it. “Take care of yourself.”
“Thank you.” I slam my hand against the elevator button, surprised when the doors ding open like it was waiting there the whole time. I step inside and turn to see Dana still watching me.
“A decision’s rarely final,” she calls. “Good luck, Ian.”
I don’t know whether she’s talking about the job or my relationship.
But right now, only one of those things matters.
“I love her,” I say out loud, testing the words to see how they feel coming out of my mouth.
They feel pretty damn good, so I say them again with more conviction.
“I love Sarah Keating more than anything else in the world.”
As the elevator doors close, I could swear I see Dana Peschka smile.
It takes me a few hours to track down the name of the interior design firm owned by Lisa Michaels, and three tries to get the phone number for the posh Pearl District shop where she works.
It could be because my hands are shaking.
Lisa is quiet on the other end of the line as I explain what I need. When I finally stop speaking, she is polite enough to refrain from asking if I’ve sustained a head injury.
“I’ll see you here in four hours,” she says without asking a single question. “You’d better be sure about those measurements.”
“Thank you.” My throat feels tight, and I’m humbled beyond reason that this woman I’ve only met a few times is helping me without hesitation. “You have no idea what this means to me.”
“Yes, I do,” she says. “You’re not the first guy to freak out when he thinks his heart’s in danger of getting stomped on. It’s what you do afterward that counts.”
She hangs up before I get a chance to ask what she means, so it isn’t until I walk through the doors of her tidy little shop that I get a look at her face. I expect her to be protective or dubious or even angry, but I don’t expect her to be…smug?
“Here,” she says, thrusting a fancy shopping bag at me. “Take a look and see if that’s what you had in mind. I had to try four different fabric shops to find those, and the dimensions were a little unusual.”
I stare into the bag and feel a rush of gratitude so powerful it nearly knocks my feet out from under me. “It’s perfect,” I tell her.
“The rest of it is next to the door,” she says. “Let me know if you want a box.”
I glance over at it, warmed by the realization of how much work she’s invested. The miracle she just helped me create. “Thank you. It’s exactly what I need.”
“So is she.” Lisa watches me like she hasn’t decided yet whether I’m worth trusting. “You know that, don’t you? That she’s the best thing that’s ever happened to you?”
I nod and clutch the bag so tightly my knuckles are white. “I know it now.” I swallow hard, surprised to discover the lump has started to dissolve. “I’m sorry it took me so long to figure it out.”
“Is that the only thing you figured out?” She folds her arms over her chest, and I see she’s not going to let me out of here so easily.
“I know that I love her,” I say. “But I need to be the one to tell her to her face. And I need to let her know I’ll spend the rest of my life proving that to her.”
“Good.” Lisa nods firmly, looking stern but pleased. “I knew you’d come around. I had a good feeling about you, Ian.”
I take a deep breath and set the bag on the floor at my feet. “Let’s hope Sarah does, too.”