die. But if I can find this level of connection with you, then I can sure as hell find it with someone else whose sole aspiration isn’t to become a breeding mare to some papered stud with a fucking title in front of his name.” He gave her one last disgusted look. “Have a nice life, Rori. It was certainly educational knowing you.”
Rori didn’t flinch when her door slammed shut behind him. She was too stunned—too furious. More than anything she wanted words to throw back at him, even if she had to stoop so low as to open her door and scream them down the hall like a mad woman. The problem was, she was speechless.
He was wrong, of course. She didn’t care about titles. She cared about equality and equity in a relationship. And if there was one thing she and Mike definitely were not, it was equal. Their definition of a party wasn’t even on the same page, so how could they ever see eye to eye on what a marriage was? If she listened to him, her heart should be the deciding factor on who she chose to be the father of her children.
Yeah. Right. Like that approach was really working all that well for Western society. A one-in-two chance of divorce, and an eight-out-of-ten chance of infidelity? Based on those odds, Mike could take his rash promises and blow them up someone else’s skirt.
Like any other man, Mike’s love would have faded away, taking him with it.
The heat of her tears streamed down Rori’s cheek before she realized they had made it past her defensive lines. She let them fall, sliding down the wall behind her as she stared at the door Mike had just disappeared through. It was all for the best. It had to be.
Her parents had been right. It would be easier this way. Easier if he hated her. And definitely for the best that she hadn’t made love to him. Because that’s what it would have been. Not simple lust or even a fun time between friends. She would have loved him, and she would have told him she loved him.
And what a fine mess that would have turned into.
It was already a mess, but at least Mike would get a job out of the deal. Rori could thank Jean for that much. Mike would get his big break. Even if she never saw him again, Rori could be happy for that.
“Fuck,” she breathed as the pain of it all hit her full force. Then, hugging her knees up against her chest, Rori sat on the floor of her apartment and let herself sob.
Chapter 57
It had been so tempting to accept Jean’s offer of a first-class plane ticket home the night before, but Mike Cannon was a man of his word. He told Rori he would make a video of her art show, and that’s what he planned to do. Besides, he’d already put three days’ work in. Might as well get the pay off of the actual event.
It was rather obvious that Rori hadn’t expected to see him when she arrived at the gallery. She visibly flinched when their eyes met after she walked through the door. She’d been very careful, he noticed, not to look his way again.
Two could play at that game. Besides, not looking at her made it a little easier not to remember how perfectly smooth her skin was under those clothes and how willing she had been in his arms just the day before.
It still floored him that she could go through the motions of love so well and yet not mean a moment of it. To be so cold, so calculating was so beyond Mike that it hadn’t occurred to him for a moment that Rori could switch beds so easily. That was what he had to keep in mind in order to keep his distance from her on their last day together. Tonight she would go to bed with Anton.
Well, good riddance.
Just then, a teasing hand slipped onto Mike’s shoulder and gave a playful squeeze. “Ooh. Are mommy and daddy fighting?” Chloe teased.
Mike forced a playful smile on his face before turning and playing dumb. “Depends, I guess. Who’s mommy and daddy?”
“You and the celebrity of the moment, of course. Did you two have a fight? Or bad sex?” Her nose crinkled. “Bad sex is the worst.”