Chapter 25 Fuck that Man
Fuck that Man
SARAH
It was another twenty minutes before the last person clustering around my table left, heading for the door into the hallway.
I was just reaching over to collect my things when I sensed another presence.
From the corner of my eye, I saw the swish of a woman’s skirt as someone else approached, the person clearly having waited in the wings until I was free again.
I was exhausted and wanted to head back to my room to process everything—and look over all the job leads I’d gotten. But I braced myself to chat anyway. That’s what I’d come for, after all.
Except when I looked up, my heart nearly burst as I recognized the person standing there beaming at me.
“Ellie!” I exclaimed.
She laughed as I threw my arms around her.
“Oh Ellie.” I was nearly in tears. “I have never been so happy to see a friend. You, specifically.”
Once again, we’d let years pass between seeing each other.
“I didn’t know you were going to be here!” I said into our embrace. When I finally pulled away, I took her in. She looked the same, except for her hair. She’d lopped off the bulk of her curls, leaving a French bob. It looked pretty and fresh.
“You like it?” She pushed at her hair.
Her big brown eyes held the same warmth as they always had.
My eyes welled with tears. “I love it. I love you!”
My voice cracked on the last word, and Ellie’s brows pinched in concern. “Honey, are you okay?”
“Fine,” I said, my voice slightly wobbly. Thank God we were alone. “Just tired. And your hair looks amazing.”
She held my shoulders and inspected me. “I know it does.”
I laughed, blinking and looking up, willing myself not to break into sobs.
Ellie raised a brow, waiting for me to explain myself.
“I’m just a little overwhelmed.”
“I’m not surprised! Did I just see the VP of Empire Building hand you a card?”
I grinned despite myself. “She offered me a job.”
Ellie beamed, folding her arms. “You deserve it, Sarah. You’ve worked your ass off to get here, and that was an incredible talk. I’m so glad it replaced ‘Multi-Unit Wood Frame Development’.”
I let out a big, tension-loosening laugh.
“Hey,” I said, needing to defend Seamus’s original proposal. “I would have gone to that! And Seamus is awesome. But when he bowed out, I figured there were enough presentations on that kind of thing. So, y’know, I risked pushing my own personal agenda.”
When I’d asked Jamie what I should talk about when he’d offered me the last-minute spot, he’d just said “something good.”
Ellie and I caught up for a bit. She was in Detroit now with Tommy, who I was shocked to hear was fifteen, and apparently in with a not-so-great crowd. “I’m thinking about moving, honestly. Somewhere smaller, where I can keep more of an eye on him. It’s just jobs I’m worried about.”
Ellie explained she’d moved into doing some teaching at the local community college. “It’s fun, especially instructing guys in their twenties who think they know more than me.”
I rolled my eyes. “Ugh. Sorry.”
“Oh it’s fine. I manage to find ways to get them to electrocute themselves fairly regularly. Just small shocks, of course.”
I laughed, picturing it.
“Well, Vermont’s probably too far away,” I said, “but Heartbreaker has plans for a trade school for women there. I’m sure Winona would love to chat with you.”
Ellie’s eyebrows flew up as I told her about our plans. The school was still at least a year away, but it was only planning and bureaucracy in the way—Mitchell was a billionaire who’d buy Winona a whole country if she asked.
Getting Ellie on board for the college would be the cherry on top of all the amazing things that had happened today, Jamie Reilly be damned. Though it would be ironic, and frankly devastating, if she moved to Quince Valley after I left.
I wrote Winona’s number on a Heartbreaker flyer. “I’ve told her about you before, but I’ll tell her to expect your call.”
I zipped up my laptop case. “Where are you going now?” I hadn’t been to any of the other sessions; I’d been too busy preparing for this one.
“Something about green roofs,” Ellie said, pocketing the flyer. “But I dunno; it’ll be hard to top this one. The only other one that had the crowd this absorbed was your boss’s keynote this morning. Wasn’t it phenomenal?”
I stuffed my papers into my briefcase with a little more force than was necessary. “I didn’t see it,” I admitted.
“You didn’t see it?” She looked shocked. “Sarah, I thought you said things were good between you two?”
It had been a long time since we talked.
I guess from that perspective it was odd that I hadn’t caught my own boss’s address to the whole conference. But I hadn’t been able to stomach watching him, even if he wouldn’t see me in the enormous crowd.
“We have a lot to catch up on,” I said. “But I’ll catch it on the recording later.”
She frowned. “You definitely should. Anyway, I was surprised he didn’t say anything at yours.”
“Maybe if he’d bothered to show up, he might have.” I closed my eyes at my bitter tone. “Sorry. Jamie and I are… there’s a little tension.” That was putting it mildly.
“Sarah,” Ellie said softly. “He was here.”
I laughed. “What? No, he wasn’t.” I’d looked.
“I saw him! He’s kind of a hard guy to miss. He was right over there.” She pointed to a space at the back of the room near one of the exits. Then she shaded her eyes. “Though it is kind of hard to see from up here with these lights in your eyes.”
It had been a blind spot.
My heart thudded. He’d been here. Even after what had happened between us this morning, he knew how disappointed I’d been when he said he might not make it.
But the short burst of softness vanished as quickly as it had arrived. He may have shown up, but he still hadn’t gotten his shit together. He’d slinked out after just as quietly.
My anger at the whiplash he’d put me through—not just this morning, but for the past two years—simmered, bubbling up now to something hotter.
More purposeful. I grabbed one of the peppermints from the bowl Seamus had gotten placed up here.
But even the sharp iciness of the mint, which usually calmed my nerves, did nothing to clear my anger over Seamus’s asshole dad.
Even from afar he’d managed to taint what had been an otherwise perfect presentation.
“Sarah, are you sure you’re okay?”
Ellie looked like she was seriously worried about me.
“I’ll be fine,” I said, gathering the last of my things. “Actually, I am fine. More than fine.”
Suddenly, I was clear about what I needed to do. I needed to take control of this situation, by getting Jamie Reilly out of my head for good.
As we walked from the room into the corridor, which was filled with people standing around until the next sessions started, I felt a plan percolating. I looked purposefully at Ellie. “Are you going to the social tonight, Ellie?”
“Oh, I don’t know.” Ellie’s eyes went to the largest of the groups standing outside. Sam, surrounded by a small crowd of women.
“Ellie,” I said, pulling her over to the wall, out of earshot of anyone else. “Listen. I don’t know about you, but the talk I just gave about empowering women on the job—we need to extend it to our personal lives, too. We should go out there and live it.”
Ellie’s eyes narrowed. “Sarah Cooper. Are you alluding to hooking up with some random man?”
She was joking, but I wasn’t. I hadn’t planned on going to the social either, in case I ran into Jamie. But fuck that man.
I smiled a little deviously. “That’s exactly what I mean. The way men do. Hot, meaningless sex.”
What better way to expunge Jamie from my brain for good than by replacing him with someone else?
At Ellie’s dropped jaw, I said, “I mean, flirting works too. And no pressure at all. But that’s what I’m going to do.”
Articulating the thought—that I was going to go out and try to have hot, meaningless sex with a stranger—made my heart pound.
And made me the tiniest bit queasy.
I’d dated a few times since I moved to Quince Valley. But every time I went out with someone, they couldn’t hold a candle to Jamie. They weren’t smart or grumbly or so sexy they made my insides melt. They ended chastely, every one.
For a moment, I was slammed with the intense, whole-body feelings that had consumed me this morning, when I was fully willing to fuck all the consequences by letting Jamie fuck me right there against the window.
I’d been so lost in want for him I could feel the rough pads of his fingers on mine even now. The heat between my legs.
And now, my traitorous brain reminded me of other things.
Bigger things than the hormones. How he was at my talk.
How he pressed a hand to my stomach as we slid on black ice.
How he looked at me sometimes across the boardroom at work, like he was proud of me.
How from the moment I’d met him, he’d listened to me like what I said was important, and never acted like he was just waiting for me to finish talking so he could take over.
Even in the past year, when things had gotten so bad, he still listened when I spoke.
Even when he didn’t like what I had to say.
But I’d been torn up about him for two whole years. And I was done. Jamie’s hold on me was over. It had to be.
Ellie was examining me with an eyebrow raised.
“I promise you I’m not insisting you to do what I’m doing,” I reassured her. “But we should have a good time tonight, no matter what. I hope you at least do that while you’re kid-free.”
She grinned. “You are making points.”
For a moment, I faltered. Would Jamie show up to the social? He’d made it sound like he wasn’t going to go. But fuck that. Him being there would be even better. Let him see me flirting with someone. Let him see me leave with someone.
Let him see how little he meant to me.
Sam looked over then and smiled. His eyes caught on Ellie for a moment, and her cheeks went pink.
I leaned in, picking up my briefcase. “That’s Sam, and he’s fantastic. I bet he’d be up for a little flirtation.”
“Oh, God no,” Ellie whispered. “He’s gorgeous, but he seems very…unserious.”
“And what’s wrong with that?”
“Who are you?” Ellie asked. “And what have you done with my friend?”
I hooked my arm through hers. “You can call me Shelly, now.”