sole reason of getting even with me for leaving him.
“I was a mess after you left,” Romaine retaliates. “Cash was a good friend to me.”
“Yeah, such a good friend that she talked you into getting married at the very lodge where I work. It sounds to me like she’s trying to rub my face in the fact that she has you and I don’t.”
“You didn’t want me.” He says angrily. “Plus, how do you know that Cash knows you work here?”
“Gee, I don’t know, Romaine, maybe because for all the years that I’ve known her, she’s always talked about how she’s a city girl and can’t understand why anyone would want to be anywhere else.”
“She wanted to get married in a place where we could be private without a lot of media attention,” he says as though quoting her.
I plop down on his couch and practically spit, “That’s working out well, huh? The lodge is crawling with reporters.”
Romaine crosses the room to join me. “It is kind of weird. I mean, they were here, waiting for me. I assumed someone at the hotel leaked the news that I was coming.” He changes the subject and says, “I still love you, Tara. I miss you every day.”
“I don’t believe you. If you loved me, you wouldn’t be marrying Cash.” I know I sound jealous and while I don’t think I really am, I hate the idea of the two of them together.
“Life moves on. I couldn’t stay in a funk forever waiting for you to come back.”
“You named your new album after us. Why would you do that?” I want to know.
“I wrote the songs during the end of our relationship, not after our relationship ended. I think it’s my best work yet.”
“Well, just so you know, a reporter from the Tattler has been here and she’s interviewed me. The first article comes out tomorrow.”
He nods his head. “Okay. Did you talk about us?”
“I talked about how I’d moved on from us. About how I want everyone to just leave me alone so I can live my life in peace.”
“Does that guy in the chef’s hat who wheeled you in here have something to do with your moving on?”
I wrestle with how to answer his question. Romaine knows me better than anyone, but he’s no longer my partner. I finally say, “James and I are dating.”
He runs his hands through his hair before blowing out the air in his lungs. “Do you love him?”
“Does it matter?”
“Yes, it matters. Because I swear, Tara, if you wanted to come back, I’d cancel this wedding in a heartbeat.”
“That doesn’t sound like something a man in love would say,” I tell him.
“I was in love with you, and you see how well that worked out for me.”
“So instead of waiting to love someone else, you jump into marrying Cash?” What is he thinking?
“I’m just as tired as you are about the two of us being the topic of tabloid news. I figured by marrying Cash, they’d have something else to talk about.”
“Yet, you named your new album after us,” I practically hiss.
“I thought we’d be back together when it came out,” he explains. “I’m not going to pull my best music because you don’t want me anymore.”
I stand up and start to pace in front of the living room window. “What does Cash think of that?”
“It bothers her,” he confesses. “But she supports my career, so she’s going along with it.”
“Yeah, she supports you so much, she’s scheduled your wedding to be at the same place where I work. I’m the pastry chef here, Romaine. I’m the one she has making your wedding cake. Tell me that doesn’t sound like a bitchy woman trying to get revenge.”
“I’ll ask her when she gets here tonight. Look, maybe she did know you worked here, but why would that matter if you’re over me, like you claim to be?”
“Because she’s putting on her show for the press. They’ll rip me apart in the papers all over again. Once that article comes out tomorrow, every reporter here will know what Cash did. They’ll be chomping at the bit to make me look like a loser.” I take a deep breath and try to gain my equilibrium, before saying, “I came here to get away from them, from you, from that whole life.”
If the look on his face is any indication, I’ve really hurt his feelings. He finally says, “Don’t make the cake. I’ll call a local bakery and get