“Ava.” I heard his footsteps behind me and I picked up my pace, throwing his apartment door open. “Ava!”
Instinct made me run to the elevator, my hands shaking as I hit the button. Thankfully, it binged right open.
“Ava!” I heard Caleb roar, but I wouldn’t look up.
“Shut the door, shut the door, shut the door,” I muttered in prayer.
It shut before he could reach it.
I heard the muffled shout of my name once more as the elevator descended.
I was in so much pain I was almost numb from it. Like my brain had frozen my pain receptors because it knew my body, my heart, couldn’t handle it.
The elevator doors opened and I walked out into the reception in a daze. Harper was waiting for me, sitting on one of the reception chairs, reading a magazine. Her head lifted at the sight of me and she stood, her smile faltering at my expression.
An overwhelming rush of love for her broke through the numbness and tears began spilling down my cheeks before I could stop them. Not wanting to have a public meltdown, I grabbed her good arm when she came toward me. “I need to go home,” I whispered.
Concern and fury fought for dominance in her eyes but she controlled both, taking hold of me to lead me out of the building. “What happened?” she asked as she searched the street for a cab.
“He said just because I was beautiful didn’t mean he could love me. It was Nick all over again.” I wiped angrily at my tears. “Why do men want me to feel worthless? What is that?” I laughed harshly.
“I’m going to kill him,” Harper growled with such menace I thought she might actually mean it.
Thankfully, a cab appeared before she could, and she waved it down. Just as I was getting in it, someone shouted my name.
Not someone.
Him.
I glanced back over my shoulder to see Caleb standing outside the building, his chest heaving like he was out of breath.
“Get in.” Harper practically pushed me into the cab. Then she yelled, “Burn in hell, dickwad!” before sliding into the cab beside me. “Mount Vernon Street. Now,” she ordered the driver.
He pulled away and I kept my eyes straight ahead, determined not to look back.
“He’s a liar and a coward, Ava.” Harper wrapped her arms around me as she spoke. “He loves you, I know it. But he doesn’t deserve you. A man who knows what you’ve been through, who knows what saying that to you would do to you, doesn’t deserve you. He chose to protect himself over protecting you and that is not okay. Do you understand? It’s not okay and you need to let him go.”
I nodded, feeling so dazed, it was a little like being drugged. I think I might have been in shock. “You’re right.”
“You are the smartest, bravest, kindest, funniest woman I know. No one can take that from you.” She gripped my hand tight. “You told me you were afraid I’d lose myself after what Vince did, and I’m trying really hard not to. And now you have to do the same. You can’t let Caleb shatter all the pieces of yourself you put back together after Nick and Gemma’s betrayal. Okay?”
I glanced up from our hands to hold her gaze. “Okay.”
“Promise?”
“I promise.” I took strength from her strength.
“We have each other. That’s more than some people ever get.”
“Damn straight.”
Our eyes were mirrors, reflecting back pain that we were determined to obliterate with our silent solidarity and gratitude for each other.
Twenty-eight
Caleb called.
Five minutes after the cab pulled away, my phone rang. Harper saw the gut-punch look on my face and promptly took the phone from me and blocked Caleb’s number. She then proceeded to give the cabdriver her address, in case the Scot decided to pay me an immediate visit.
I felt exhausted as we climbed the stairs to Harper’s place. My limbs were heavy, my eyes felt swollen, and all of my insides felt like they’d just suffered through an internal earthquake. It almost felt like the time when I was fifteen in the car with my mother when someone slammed into us in an intersection. For a while afterward my body still shook from the impact. That’s how I felt now.
My phone rang again in my purse and Harper shook her head at my wide-eyed look of panic. “It can’t be,” she said. “I blocked him.”
Fumbling for my phone, I winced when I saw it was Stella. I was not in the mood to take a work call, but I was also incapable of ignoring calls from my boss. “Stella?” I said, hoping I sounded normal.
“Emergency,” Stella clipped. “Gabe is supposed to be going to New York this weekend to get the specs on that Fifth Avenue penthouse he’s been bragging about.”
I liked Gabe. But he was a bragger and, yes, he had not shut up about that penthouse for the last week, not just because it was on Fifth Avenue, but because it was owned by a famous actress. “Okay?”
“He has the flu. And did not tell me but proceeded to get ready to leave for New York only to faint at the top of a flight of stairs in his apartment building. Now he’s in the hospital and his fiancée is blaming me for putting too much pressure on him.”
“It’s not your fault,” I said immediately. “And is he okay?”
“He has a concussion, and of course the flu. As sorry as I am for that, if he’d just told me, he would not currently be hospitalized and I would not be panicking about losing this client. A Hollywood A-lister, Ava. We haven’t had one of those in a while. If she likes what we do, she will tell her friends.”
Realization hit me and my exhaustion actually doubled. “You want me to go to New York.”
“Yes. First swing by the office. I’m here and have all of Gabe’s notes, so you’re going in prepared.”
“I’ll be right there.”
We hung up and I stared dully at Harper, who was scowling. “Guess I’m going to New York.”
My friend’s hands flew to her hips. “You just had your heart broken. You should have told her that.”
“Well, Gabe has the flu and a concussion, which kind of trumps broken heart at the moment.”
“Do you hear yourself? Your voice is all flat and sad. Not the greatest impression to make on a client.”
“I’ll pull it together. In fact, this is just what I need. A distraction.” I began making my way back down her apartment building steps. “I’d better call another cab.”
“Maybe I should come with you,” Harper suggested.
I threw her a grateful smile over my shoulder, one I knew didn’t quite make it to my eyes. “Hey, I’ll be fine.”
She did not look convinced. “Call me when you land.”
I hugged her. “Thank you.”
As it turned out, the trip to New York was exactly what I’d needed. It forced me to stop myself from crumpling up into a ball in my bed and sobbing until there was no water left in my body. Anytime my thoughts turned to Caleb and our confrontation, my throat seemed to thicken with too much emotion. I felt like I was choking on it.
So I buried my head in the client file Stella had given me.
Once I was in New York, I got to my hotel and could barely eat, but I had a couple of glasses of wine knowing it would make me sleepy. It worked and I thankfully slept, my alarm waking me early. On Monday I was much too busy taking specs at the penthouse to dwell on anything else. Just as I assumed would happen, I didn’t meet with the actress, but with her personal assistant. We spoke at length about the design and she hovered over me the entire time I was taking measurements with my laser distance meter. It was a smart little tool that worked out lengths, heights, and area volume. After I’d taken copious amounts of photos of the space, the PA and I talked even more. I spent a total of six hours with her, leaving just in time to catch my evening flight back to Boston. The entire time on the flight I worked on the project, jotting and sketching ideas.
I updated Stella in the taxi ride back to my apartment, and I did it with the same calm I’d approached the entire weekend. Somehow, I’d even managed to convince myself that I was okay.