The Baby Pact (Babies and Billions #5) - Holly Rayner Page 0,26
felt as though that might never happen.
She sighed and turned her attention back to her research. She was supposed to be coming up with interior design ideas for one of the coffee shop locations she had been working on, but she felt creatively bankrupt. Not a single good idea had occurred to her all day long.
She didn’t like to rely too much on other designers’ projects for inspiration; she knew how important it was to differentiate, to make sure that her own work stood out from the pack. But Rhea had never been great at interior design. Architecture was her forte, and it was the primary service that Green Destiny provided. The interior design portion of the project was just a supplemental service.
We need to partner with an interior design business to provide this service, she thought, leaning back in her chair and closing her eyes.
She would suggest the idea to the partners, and hopefully they would see that it was a good one. If they had professional interior designers to handle projects like this, Green Destiny’s team would be able to focus on what they did best—the actual builds.
Too bad Zach’s company isn’t EcoInteriors.
She shook her head. Why was it that every train of thought led her back to Zach? It didn’t matter what she was trying to focus on. She always wound up dwelling on him.
It wasn’t as if she could have used his company, even if he had been in interior design. She could never communicate with Zach again. That part of her life was over, and she knew it.
She was just having trouble internalizing the feeling.
And the worst part was that New Year’s Eve was getting close. They hadn’t made plans, of course, but when they had been seeing each other, Rhea had allowed herself to fantasize about the idea of finally having someone to kiss when the ball dropped, something she had never experienced before. It was a silly thing, almost meaningless, really. But she had been looking forward to it.
Now it looked as though she was going to be alone on New Year’s Eve, just as she always was.
She fished out her phone and looked at it. She had received two more texts since she’d put it away.
“Come on, Rhea, just call me. Whatever I did, I’m sorry.”
“Can’t we work this out? I really don’t know what I did wrong. I don’t want to lose you again.”
It was heartbreaking. She believed him when he said he didn’t know what the problem was. But did that mean that he didn’t know what his father had done? Or did it just mean that he didn’t know that she had found out about it?
There was no way to be sure.
And it didn’t matter anyway. She would still have to distance herself from him. There was no other alternative.
“What’s up, Rhea?”
She looked up. Kaylie was leaning on the doorframe of her office.
“Can I come in?” she said.
“Sure,” Rhea said. “Of course you can.” She shoved her phone back in the drawer. “Business or personal?”
“Personal,” Kaylie said, dropping into the seat opposite Rhea. “You’ve been walking around like your puppy ran away today. Are you okay?”
“Just today?”
Kaylie frowned. “Is it still about that breakup?”
“Yeah,” Rhea admitted.
“I wish I’d gotten to meet the guy,” Kaylie said. “It seems like you really liked him.”
Rhea nodded. She wondered, not for the first time, whether she should just admit to Kaylie that the guy in question had been Zach, their old friend from college. But, as always, it seemed like a risky idea. Kaylie had liked Zach. If she knew that he was in town, she would probably want to meet up with him, and Rhea wouldn’t fault her for that. But a connection between Zach and Kaylie would bring Zach right back to where Rhea didn’t want him—in her life.
“It’s just hard,” she said, hoping to distract from the identity of her ex. “Being alone around New Year’s. You’d think I’d have gotten used to it, but I guess I haven’t.”
Kaylie nodded. “I get it,” she said. “This is the first time I’ll have had a boyfriend for the day.”
“You’re kidding,” Rhea said. “I didn’t know that.” Kaylie always seemed to have boyfriends. She had never been unlucky in love the way Rhea had. “Weren’t you coupled up all through college?”
“Well…” Kaylie shrugged. “I tended to break up with them when we went home at the end of the semester. Long distance is hard for me.”
Rhea nodded. She could hardly criticize her