CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO #2
I tell them everything. And of course, they agree to go to Jake’s to retrieve my bag for me. Before I leave, Quinn takes down the Polaroid they took before Jake and I went on the ghost tour. “You should have this.”
Jake and I didn’t take any photos together aside from this one. Not a single selfie. At first, it felt too awkward for me to ask him for one. Then we spent December together, fully present, living moments instead of performing them to capture in pixels and print.
Now that it’s over, I wish I had more than this single grainy Polaroid. But it’s fitting, really. There’s something about Polaroids that evokes the past, and that’s always been where Jake and I were headed.
* * *
Three days after Christmas
The morning of my last full day in London, I wake up crumpled like a rag doll on my loveseat at Paperwhite. Still in my champagne dress. I couldn’t bear to take it off last night because it was the last thing Jake touched.
I can’t pack yet since my bag is still at Jake’s, so I take a shower and stay in it until the water runs cold.
The only clean clothes I have here are the ancient “SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL LIbrARY” sweatshirt and bleach-stained black sweatpants I brought to sleep in.
For obvious reasons, they never went to Jake’s.
There’s a knock at the door. I expect Quinn or Cherry with my bag, but it’s neither of them.
It’s Juno Wilding-Wood.
She looks as sleek and cool as an icicle. White sweater, snug cream jeans, silvery hair pulled into a mirror-smooth bun at her nape.
I blink at her. “Did Jake send you?”
“God, no. He’d be furious if he knew I was here. May I come in?”
I invite her in, and she perches on the edge of the loveseat. I finally open the box of Nespresso pods I bought at the beginning of the month, brewing a cup for each of us, even though I’m a little embarrassed by it. She murmurs a “Thank you” when I hand a cup to her.
Before she says anything else, she shows me a text exchange between her and Jake. It’s dated one week after I arrived in London.
Jake:
I’ve met someone, can we talk?
My laugh is sour. “All this time, I couldn’t stop thinking about how it was impossible someone like him wasn’t already committed to someone else. And all this time, he was.”
“Jake and I weren’t engaged. But we were meant to get married. Someday.”
“Not to argue semantics, Juno, but that’s the definition of a fiancée.”
She laughs softly and looks down at her left hand.
Ringless, with a flawless soap nails manicure.
“The Jake Frost I first met was always going to be married to his job. And I have no interest in giving up even a whisper of agency under the guise of ‘settling down.’ Our fathers have been courting each other for a merger for several years now, and Jake and I became friends. They’ve always thought we were more than that, and we let them believe it.
We probably would have gotten married, eventually. Call it, ah … a dynastic marriage.”
I wait for her to say more. When she doesn’t, I raise my brows and say, “OK?”
Juno studies me. “Marriage has been about social and economic reasons for far longer than it’s been about love. Marrying Jake would give me freedom, resources, security.”
“You can just say it’s about money and power.”
Juno doesn’t hesitate. “It’s about money and power. I like money and power. I’m not ashamed of liking money and power.” She narrows her eyes. “How much do you actually know about Jake’s situation with the firm?”
I’ve picked the cuticle on my thumb until it bleeds. I stick it in my mouth and mumble around it, “Very little.”
Juno nods subtly. “If Jake resigns on his own, his partnership agreement would make all his pro bono work in violation of the terms of his noncompete. He’d have to stop for eighteen months.
And some of the nonprofits he’s been helping don’t have that kind of time, Evie.
Not to mention the huge personal financial cost of walking away.
So he’s been trying to get Jameson to fire him. If Jake is fired, he walks free.”
“That’s … actually very clever.”
“Isn’t it?” Juno smiles, but her expression quickly turns serious again.
“You should know that Jameson closely controls what new partners see. There’s no moral ambiguity to the cases he exposes them to, and whenever anyone brings up concerns, he calls them the ‘subtleties of the game,’ positions them as learning experiences.
His inner circle handles the worst ones.
In the beginning, I don’t think there was any way Jake could’ve known the full scope of what happens in that firm. And by the time he did, he was snared.”
She notices when I glance at the text again. “Even though we’re not really together, there are many people who think we are. Optics. He wanted to make sure I was OK with whatever might happen between you two.”
My laugh is weak. “There’s no way he knew he was in love with me that early.”
“Probably not. But he could tell that he was going to be.”
The words hit me like shrapnel. Tears well in my eyes, but they don’t spill. God, I’ve cried more in the last few days than I cried my entire childhood. “Why are you telling me this?”
Juno sips her espresso. “I saw the way he looked at you last night.” She says it plainly, like no further explanation is necessary. Like the implication is obvious.
“Why were you there with his father?”
“I’ve been Jameson’s favorite little project for a while. I met him first as sort of an envoy for merger discussions. I assume he thinks of me as who he’d hoped Jake would turn out to be. He thinks I share his worldview. I haven’t bothered to correct him.”
Juno Wilding-Wood is ruthless. And a little terrifying.
I like her.
“Evie, I truly don’t know how Jameson knew Jake would be at The Shard, but I have no doubt his little ambush was premeditated. The man’s connections are astonishing. And he used me as a prop.” She primly sets her espresso cup aside. “I don’t like being used as a prop.”
“What was it like having dinner with a real-life Bond villain?” When I smile, the curves of my cheeks finally tip tears loose.
Juno laughs and walks to the door. “I like you. I think we would’ve been friends in a different lifetime.”
I sniff hard and wipe my eyes with the heels of my palms. “Me, too.”
Just before she leaves, Juno says, “You can’t outrun feelings, Evie. They’re way faster than you. And they can cross oceans.”
* * *
Cherry and Quinn drop off my bag later in the afternoon.
They didn’t even have to go to Jake’s place to get it—he brought it to Grey Earl’s shortly after they opened this morning.
They bring me a coffee and a box of my favorite pastries, too.
I’m fully committed to eating every single one before I leave for the airport tomorrow morning.
Before they leave, Cherry hands me something from her coat pocket. It chimes as it lands in my hand. It’s the little jingle bell from over the door at Grey Earl’s.
My eyes well with hot tears. “Oh.”
“Now don’t get all misty on us,” Cherry says. “I’ve got another. This one is permanently retired now.”
“Hang it on your door at home,” says Quinn. “It’ll tell you when someone lovely is about to come into your life.”
“I’m going to miss you two. Terribly,” I say.
“We’d better take a photo, then, eh?” says Quinn. They press their cheek to mine, and Cherry comes in from the other side, and we snap a picture with my phone.
“It never has to be goodbye, love.” Cherry squeezes my shoulder. “Let’s call it—‘until later.’”
* * *
I didn’t really cry until I tried to pack my bag to go home.
Now, I’m hemorrhaging tears.
I’ve been here so long, there are touches of me and Jake everywhere.
A bunch of bananas has turned black on the counter, but even if I were home in Queens, I’d never make the time to bake them into bread.
The small piece of meat pie from the Lamb and Flag is in the fridge, hard as a stone at this point.
I wish I’d just enjoyed it while I’d had the chance.
I slice cheese into chunks and use them to scoop chutney, and I eat licorice until my tongue goes numb.
I’ve acquired more things than could possibly fit in my luggage, and I briefly consider buying another bag to take everything home.
But I don’t. I have to leave it all in London.