Chapter 3
ELIJAH
The booming announcement drowns out the faint audio from the television set resting high behind the bar, where the countdown completes and hundreds of fireworks light up the night sky.
Happy New Year.
I drown that thought in my beer, drinking until my lungs burn and the fizz attacks my nose just enough to be unpleasant. The sooner I get on that plane, the sooner I can leave this rotten city and its rotten people behind.
“Another?” The bartender arches a brow at my now-empty glass.
I nod. “Please.”
“Coming right up.” The empty glass, gleaming with leftover foam, vanishes from sight and is replaced with a fresh one before I’ve even got my phone out of my pocket.
The screen lights up with hundreds of automated New Year’s well-wishes, and they have to be automated because everyone I know is likely up to their eyeballs in drink right now and incapable of using a phone.
It’s the perfect night for me to slip away, leaving behind everything I’ve ever known.
None of it is worth remembering.
Picking up my glass, I gaze down the airport toward the gate where my plane will be boarding. Twenty-eight more minutes and I’m out of here.
I pick up my glass and savor the fresh chill of my next drink as my phone rings and a name flashes up on the screen.
Cheating Cunt.
The fuck does she want?
Tapping my earbud, I answer the call but don’t speak. A second later, her voice floods my ears and fills my aching gut with dread.
“Elijah? It’s Imogen. Are you there? Elijah? Can you say something? Hello?” Silence drags on for a few long seconds. “Are you seriously not even going to speak to me? How fucking childish are you?”
A pulse of anger licks at my skin and I grit my teeth. “I said everything I needed to say while we were in court.”
“Oh, Elijah.” She sighs in relief. “I knew you were there. Why would you answer if you didn’t want to talk to me?”
“Curiosity. What kind of shit could you spew at this time of night?”
“It’s New Year’s.” She pauses. “Do you remember last year? At the roof party with all of our friends? It was such a beautiful night.”
She speaks wistfully as if remembering one of the best nights of her life. All I remember is trying to get drunk and then a lot of rain. “What do you want, Imogen?”
“I hate how we’re leaving things.”
“What did you expect?”
“I don’t know.” She sighs again. “I just… everything feels so final.”
“That’s what happens when you need to use the court to equally split everything with your cheating girlfriend who threw your relationship away four months after that supposed beautiful New Year’s.”
“I told you it was a mistake,” she snaps, losing all the faux sweetness from her voice. “Why won’t you believe me?”
“Because I know you, Imogen. You were counting down the days until you could jump into bed with that prick.”
“No, I loved you!”
“No, you didn’t.”
“Yes, I did! You were the one who… who was so cold and unloving. You checked out of our relationship months before I cheated on you. You’re the one who made me feel unwanted and unloved. Like I was nothing more than a decoration on your arm or another statue in your penthouse.”
Regrettably, there might be some painful truth to her words. My reasoning for being with her wasn’t out of the love she craved, but I’m not foolish enough to believe she ever truly loved me in return. “Then you should have left.”
“I wanted us to work.”
“All the way into another man’s bed?”
“Women have needs, Elijah. I thought men like you enjoyed competition.”
“I’m not competing with anyone for anything. My personal life is exactly that. Personal. My heart isn’t a game.”
“Could have fooled me.” She snorts.
“I’m hanging up.”
“No, Elijah, wait.”
“What?”
“I… I miss you. I thought maybe… maybe now that all the court stuff is finalized and over, maybe we could get a drink? Go and talk like we used to?”
“I have nothing to say to you, Imogen.”
“You could at least try!”
“Why?” I straighten up in my stool and glance down toward the gate. “We can’t even talk on the phone without sniping at one another. There’s nothing left between us. There hasn’t been for months.”
“Was there ever?” Imogen demands, her words sharp like the needle manicure she always gets.
“Goodbye, Imogen.”
“I’m coming to see you tomorrow. We’ll talk face to face.”
“You do that.” I hang up with a tap of the earpiece.
I won’t be here tomorrow.
Twenty-Two minutes. That phone call felt way longer. I focus on my drink and then, after a handful of complimentary mini pretzels, I dig my latest business proposal out of my briefcase.
This is my New Year. Amber Ltd is finally expanding out of pure gemstone acquisition and dipping its toes into the jewelry market.
It’s time we cut out the greedy middleman and spent more of our time and effort creating beautiful jewelry for the masses.
I’m sick to the back teeth of the stuck-up, obnoxious elite acting like they’re better than everyone else because of the gemstones on their fingers.
The world of Imogens needs a reality check.
Two pages in, another call comes through, this time from Buster, my CFO.
“Elijah, tell me you’re not on the plane yet.”
“I’m not on the plane yet.”
“Excellent. I have concerns.”
“Concerns you can tell me in fifteen minutes?” I ask with a glance at the gate.
“Sure. I’ll talk fast. Angelic Jewels. I’ve been poring over everything you sent me, and I gotta say, I don’t see the vision.”
“Seriously?”
“Yeah, seriously. You’ve got this small business operating out of San Francisco that isn’t even worldwide. They have eleven stores. That’s it. Just eleven.”
“I know.”
“Do you know who else has eleven stores? No one. No one does because eleven isn’t even a real number. It’s dust at the bottom of the drawer. What kind of company can draw in anything worthwhile in this market with only eleven stores?”
“Buster, take a breath.”
“I’ve taken a breath. I’m breathing, can you hear me?” He gasps exaggeratedly in my ear. “I’m breathing. Eleven stores, Elijah. What are you doing to me?”
“Did you really read everything I sent you?”
“Yes, of course I did.”
“No, you didn’t because if you did, you wouldn’t be focused on those eleven stores.”
“What else is there? Eleven stores up and down the coast, some questionable deals with a gemstone supplier that we need to vet in case we end up in the same situation as your father, and a CEO who’s making demands.
Did you get my email? He’s adamant that two giants can’t exist, Elijah.
They can’t exist!” Buster chokes on his laughter, bringing a smile to my lips as I drain my beer.
“I know how it looks. Trust me. But you need to look a little deeper. It’s worth it, I promise.”
Buster sighs dramatically and groans. “Fine. I’ll read it again.” Then his voice softens. “How’re you doing?”
“Fine.”
“How are you really doing?”
I glance at my watch. Eight minutes. “I’m tired.”
“Sleep on the plane.”
“I will.”
“But you’re good? You’re really just packing up your entire life and moving across the entire country to escape a girl?”
“Yes. And no. It’s not just her. It’s everything. I’m smothered, Buster. I feel like I’m drowning constantly. I need out of here. I need away.”
“I get it.”
“Do you?”
“Yeah. After your Mom, Imogen was sucking the fucking life out of you, dude. I get it. You need to disconnect.”
He sort of gets it, but not as deeply as I need him to. I could explain to him that life in New York is meaningless, that people see my name and act like they know me, that all they want are my business and my contacts so they can use me.
I want to feel like a person.
Like I matter.
But daring to say that out loud just makes me sound like a child throwing his silver spoon out of his highchair in a grumpy rage.
“Yeah,” I sigh after a moment of contemplation. “You get it.”
“Listen. I’ll look at the report again. Just promise me this isn’t you trying to offload some millions in a bad way because you’re feeling rich guilt.”
“The fuck is rich guilt?”
“Y’know, that thing everyone goes through at New Year's when they feel the need to support the less fortunate.”
“You really didn’t read my email, did you?”
“Why, what have you done?”
“This deal is great, first of all. And second of all… everything my mother left me, I put it in the charity fund.”
Buster is silent, possibly for the first time in his life. “You’re actually killing me.”
“We’re going to do great things with it.”
“You want me to lose my condo, don’t you?”
“We’ll help people.”
“You’re setting me up for a life of crackers and whole milk.”
“It was helping no one just sitting there.”
“What the fuck did Imogen do to you?”
“I have a flight to catch.” I stand and tap my card, paying for my drinks, and shove the proposal back into my briefcase.
“Am I waking up homeless?” Buster groans.
“I’ll call you when I land.”
“If I’m still alive. Safe flight.”
“Thanks.”
“And remember,” Buster says dramatically as I stroll toward the gate, briefcase in hand, “be careful. You can’t run away forever, Elijah.”
That’s what he thinks.
I’m never setting foot in New York again.