A Summer to Remember

chapter Seventeen

As much as I loved Paul, the moment I started to spend time with Talia again just made me realize how much I’d missed her. She looked great and I knew she was happy because for the first time in her life, she was living it the way she wanted to regardless the personal sacrifices she’d had to make to do it.

We sat on the sofa in the sitting room in my loft and drank an expensive chardonnay that was starting to take affect.

“What did your parents say?” I inquired.

“They weren’t happy and basically told me I’d gotten myself disinherited until I could see the error of my ways, apologize, and get back on the straight and narrow course.”

My face fell because I wished her parents were more like mine but that would never happen. Her mother was former trash turned social climbing socialite and there was no way she would give up her lifestyle for her daughter. It wasn’t going to happen and it never would.

“Listen, you know I am here for you any time you need me, right?”

She leaned over and grabbed my left hand. “Of course. I knew what I was doing when I decided to leave and join Seth and Winter’s Regret. It’s my dream and I’m living it so I have no regrets, seriously. Both my parents can stuff it as far as I am concerned. Either they eventually come around or…well, I haven’t thought that far into the future.”

We both laughed out loud at this sentiment before she became serious again. “Didn’t you say Paul was at a retreat in Stamford?”

My heart began to pound because I didn’t like how quickly she’d changed the subject. What was she hinting around to and what was I so blissfully unaware about?

I sipped from my white wine and replied, “Yes. He asked me to go but I told him I couldn’t because I wanted to be here when you came back into town. We have been planning this weekend for the past week and a half but he only told me about the retreat last Friday.”

Talia finished the rest of her wine in her glass before she refilled from a chilled bottle on the table in a bucket of ice. “Listen, I didn’t know whether to tell you this or not but there is a reason why he wanted you to go. The retreat isn’t just for the investment bankers…it’s more of a getaway where they have their fun and the top investors are invited along. Lots of women and men—very expensive and highly skilled sex workers mostly—and the crème de la crème of East Coast society.”

My heart dropped in my chest and I reached for the platinum chain I wore around my neck. “You wouldn’t think he’d cheat on me, do you?”

Talia’s pale green eyes refused to look into mine as she gazed towards the floor. “Honestly, I don’t know but I also know of a certain bitch who will be there and believe me, she will take advantage. Drugs and alcohol are never in short supply at those exclusive weekend parties and who knows what Paul might do with a little coke in his system and Ashley pawing all over him like a bitch in heat?”

I stood and walked over to the floor to ceiling picture window. The sun was high in the sky and from my view, the city looked warm and inviting though I knew it was hot and muggy outside with dense air filled with car fumes and God knew every carcinogen in the world that was bad for one’s health. We wouldn’t have known it though because the loft was air conditioned and set to a perfect sixty-eight degree temperature.

I closed my eyes and the room began to spin. I opened them just as quickly and suddenly, I felt like I couldn’t get enough oxygen in my lungs. My heart raced in my chest so hard, it hurt and although I wasn’t asthmatic, a bad anxiety attack could make me feel like one. I collapsed to the floor before I knew it. Talia was at my side.

“How could I have been such a stupid f*cking fool? I should have never let him go alone. He had this look on his face like he was putting up a brave front but…I won’t handle cheating. That is the one infraction I wouldn’t be able to forgive.”

“But he could physically abuse you and that would be all right?”

I glared at Talia. “This is no time for your stupid and obnoxiously inane jokes. Would you be so f*cking blasé if the shoe was on the other foot and we were discussing Seth instead of Paul?”

She became serious again and smiled wanly. “No because I have been in that position and I know how much it f*cking hurts. Listen, you don’t know he’s done anything bad yet. Why don’t you call him and just talk to him? Sometimes hearing a friendly voice will chase those demons away and help him keep his cock in his pants where it belongs.”

I nodded my head before I stood and grabbed my Samsung. I voice dialed Paul and he answered on the second ring.

“Hey baby, how are you doing?” he greeted in that sexy masculine voice of his. “I have missed you like crazy but I promise I am being a very good boy for you.”

“I should have gone with you and I am sorry I didn’t. Will you forgive me?”

“Oh my God, Jerrica Peterson is drunk! Honey, I’m fine, really. I told you nothing is going to happen to me. I am going to sit through a boring dinner and I will probably retire early tonight and jerk off thinking about you before I drift into a blissful sleep. Seriously, where is all of this coming from? Please don’t tell me you think Ashley is a threat?”

I began to walk into the kitchen as I said, “So you know she’s there? Why didn’t you tell me? I would have agreed to accompany you. You shouldn’t be there on your own. It makes me look vain and selfish. I should have thought about what your superiors would think if you came alone. I’m sorry.”

“What the hell for? Listen, everyone knows I have a beautiful and talented girlfriend who couldn’t make it because she had a previous engagement. No one hates you or thinks you are a bad significant other and believe me, you aren’t missing anything. You will meet all these people in less than six months at the extravagant Christmas party they hold at the Waldorf Astoria every year.”

He breathed through the phone and just the sound of his voice put me at ease. “I’m all right but can you pass the phone to Talia? I want her to cut off your limit soon.”

I rolled my eyes before I handed the phone to Talia and she listened patiently before she handed the phone back to me. “He wants the last few words to be with you, not me.”

I grabbed the phone and pressed it to my ear. “Babe, I love you so much. Take care of yourself and don’t you dare drink yourself into a stupor worrying about me.”

I sighed softly. “I promise I won’t. You be careful too and promise me you won’t drink too much and no drugs, not even a sniff of cocaine. I want you ready when that bitch tries to pounce on you. I love you and I’ll see you Sunday evening, okay?”

“All right. Love you more.”

I made a kissing sound into the phone. “Love you and have a good evening.”

“I will.”

There was a silence between us but it was comfortable and understandable before I whispered, “I’m going to hang up now.”

“Okay,” he replied.

I pressed end and immediately felt better. Talia walked into the kitchen and slipped an arm around my shoulders. “Feel better now?”

I nodded silently. “Yes, much better.”

“Good, then let’s order from our favorite Chinese restaurant and watch cheesy chick flicks already.”

“I am definitely down with that!”



Sunday morning and afternoon was spent with Talia at the various open air markets and walking in and out of various cool and unique shops in Greenwich Village. By the late afternoon, Talia and I were both thinking about dinner and neither one of us wanted to stay in the area so we took a cab uptown to the upper Eastside and found a great Greek restaurant we both loved.

“Wow, what a day it has been and can you believe I have to leave tomorrow morning? I’m crushed but I have to get back down to Miami. Seth won’t stop blowing up my phone.” She looked at me with this twinkle in her pale green eyes and an overly satisfied smile on her face. “Sometimes I feel like I am his mother instead of his lover. Isn’t that a bit sad?”

I tried to laugh it off because I didn’t like to judge other people’s relationships. It’s what had gotten me into trouble with Jude and Savannah. It turned out my brother had taken her to the retreat and I was okay with it but I had to admit I’d never seen it coming.

“No, not really…unless you consider the case of Jude and Savannah,” I responded before I ate another bit of my pomegranate chicken salad which was a favorite of mine.

“I do believe she thinks out of the four of us, she is the least good looking and that simply isn’t true. It would be nice if she managed to get a grip and understand that men aren’t the enemy and Jude really seems to like her although with your brother, we both know what that means,” Talia explained before she dug into her lamb gyro with relish.

I sipped from my Pinot Grigio. “Actually, I don’t know what that means at all. Is my brother considered some kind of player or something?”

“Or something.” Talia raised expressive yet perfectly shaped eyebrows. “I think half the women in Manhattan have taken Jude for a test drive. It doesn’t mean anything because he has the attention span of a gnat. Don’t get me wrong—Jude is brilliant but he is a total man-whore.”

I rolled my eyes in an exaggerated way. “Jeez, why does this sound like it’s coming from someone who is speaking from experience?”

“Because I am.” She sipped from her Pinot Noir and breathed deeply. “To answer your question, yes, I slept with your brother. It was a beautiful and absolutely gorgeous affair that lasted one whole week. However, both of us knew what it was about and we were fine with it. I will never regret the time we spent together.”

“Great, so I have to live with it for the rest of my life my brother is sampling each and every one of my best friends like candy. Has he been with Autumn?” I inquired rather reluctantly.

I don’t even know why I asked the question because I truly didn’t want to know the answer if I was completely honest with myself. Granted they were my best friends but they were also grown women who were over twenty-one and could make decisions for themselves.

“Yeah, he got to Autumn our freshman year at Vassar. She was in absolute heaven but you know how she is. She seems so innocent and sweet and fragile but I have never met an emotionally tougher woman than her.”

I laughed out loud at this assessment because it was completely and honestly true.

“Mmm, look what the cat dragged in,” a haughty voice announced in a not too conversational tone of voice.

Both Talia and I looked up to see Ashley and her cousin, Imogen. If I never saw these two ever again, I could live a long and prosperous life without a shred of regret.

“Christ on a cracker—what the f*ck do you want?” Talia wondered in her rudest voice with a south Boston accent so thick, I’d almost forgotten she’d spent the first decade of her life there.

“Very nice,” Imogen began in that annoying English accent I was beginning to hate with a vengeance. “Is that how ladies talk or just common street trash whose mother happened to land a jackpot of a man?”

“F*ck you, you uptight Limey whore. You think you’re too high and mighty to earn a ‘reputation’? Welcome to America, bitch. According to my sources, most of the men you’ve f*cked have formed the general consensus you’re a lousy f*cking lay and fake orgasms quite terribly.”

I continued to nurse my wine because this was not a discussion I wanted to get into by any stretch of the imagination. It was best if I kept out of it because both Imogen and Ashley could cut deep when they wanted to hurt someone. The only difference was Talia was more or less bullet proof.

Ashley raised a perfectly manicured eyebrow before her blue eyes made direct contact with mine. “By the way, I would grill Paul very closely about the retreat in Stamford. I’m not one to spread gossip but let’s just say he wasn’t exactly on his best behavior.”

I swear at that moment I wanted to do something really ghetto like stand up and knock the shit out of that smug bitch. However, my parents’ raised a proper young woman who didn’t behave like that so I smiled rather ingratiatingly before I turned my head toward Talia and pretended Ashley wasn’t there.

“What looks good for dessert?” I questioned my best friend.

“I know because it was the two of us getting busy underneath the sheets,” Ashley declared before she walked off with her cousin and turned to me at the last minute with a smirk on her face.

The lying bitch. Paul wouldn’t touch her with a ten foot pole and she had to be telling me this just to get a reaction out of me but I refused to fall for the bait. That would have been too easy. However, I didn’t even have a quick, witty retort prepared therefore the WASP cunt still ended up having the last word and that pissed me off to no avail.

“Tell me you don’t believe a word of what she said,” Talia said in a low voice. “She’s lying and only trying to get a rise out of you. Paul isn’t that way and he would never hurt you.”

“I know,” I merely replied.

However an icy exterior had already started to form around a heart filled with a love so pure and true for Paul and I had already felt myself beginning to go numb. I wanted to have faith and believe the best of him but I emotionally had already begun to prepare for the worst.