a laundry list of bullet-pointed moments, everything I’ve been through with Caplin Hawkins in the last couple months flits across my mind.
The women, the apology, the makeover, and the party. The weird, slightly cheesy, stilted talk of moonlight strolls and lovely twirls and promenades in his office. The weekend getaway in a cabin.
My heart damn near drops into my shoes when those real-life memories match up a little too closely to my literary memories.
All of it, nearly every damn thing, can be found in the pages of the books I’ve read—the books he currently has sitting inside his bag. And they span from the time I started working with him until last night, when I finally slept with him.
My stomach churns, and I reach down and grab one of his mints for myself. His queasiness has spread to me.
I sit back in my seat and angle my face out the window. My dad’s voice is louder now as he’s still trying to express to my mom that a football player like Glen Harwick, one of the best running backs to ever play for the New York Mavericks and the king of footwork, would never lose to some Teen Bop Kids reality star like Hugh Beckman on Dancing with the Stars.
Apparently, according to him, finesse on the football field has been studied scientifically and linked directly to rhythm and dance. I think he’s full of shit, but I’m too busy trying to figure out what the fuck is going on in my life to care.
But it is a Sunday afternoon, and I’ll have plenty of time to lay into Cap—and interrogate him about the books and the strange coincidences that have quite literally given me a painful, confusing case of déjà-fucking-vu—in the privacy of the office tomorrow.
For now, while we’re riding in a car with my parents, I’ll just keep all my angst and my questions to myself.
But the rest of the ride turns eerily quiet. After thirty minutes of nothing from either Cap or me, my parents actually clam up too. It’s like the silence is contagious.
Eventually, though, the painfully quiet drive comes to an end.
As we pull up in front of my apartment building and Cap puts the Range Rover in park, I grab my phone from the cupholder beside me and open up to my calendar. “What time do you need me in the office tomorrow?” I ask, my voice neutral and, for all intents and purposes, professional. “I have to record in the afternoon, but I can be there in the morning.”
Cap looks between me and my parents as they gather their stuff and climb out the back doors, a tiny line marring the space between his eyebrows.
I raise mine in response. “Hello? Time?”
Cap unbuckles his seat belt and turns to face me, but his eyes go to the console as he digs around for some unnamed object. “Actually, I was thinking…”
“Yeah?”
“Liz is due back from maternity leave soon, and you’re super busy with your other job and…” He pauses, his voice growing quiet, and my heart makes a strong attempt to escape my flipping chest.
Liz isn’t due back for at least another month, and his caseload is insane right now.
He needs the extra help around the office more than ever, yet it sure seems like he’s trying to get rid of me…
“And?” I question, but when he opens his mouth to respond, no words come out.
What the fuck is going on?
“Just say it, Cap,” I prompt further, and this time, words do come out.
“I think maybe it’s time we part ways.”
Painful fucking words that have the accuracy of a sniper, taking aim at my chest and hitting the bull’s-eye that is my heart.
A manwhore tiger never loses his scumbag, player stripes, my mind taunts, and the memories of last night are instantly tainted by the way he’s treating me right now.
It’s like all he did was use my literary preferences to get me into bed, and now that he got what he wanted, he’s fucking done with a capital D.
God, I’m such a fool.
All I can manage is a nod. It’s pretty much all I’m capable of right now, but my nose stings obnoxiously. I threaten myself with cutting the damn thing off if it betrays me.
I will not cry in front of this man.
I refuse.
I push my lips into a firm line, and instantly, the bricks making up all of my defenses that he carelessly broke down over the past two months stack right back