Page 87 of Not You Again
I sniff, insisting through my hands, “I work best late at night.”
“On invoices?”
The room is quiet while I pull myself together. I can’t do this here, not with an audience. I’m so humiliated I want to melt into the floor. I’m supposed to have it all together. I’m supposed to create a flawless experience for brides, and here I am, breaking down about my own goddamn marriage.
Kit’s going to leave. Nothing I say will stop him. That’s why he sent me all this help. He wants to make sure I’m taken care of while he’s gone, just like his mom. I’ll be well kept and here for him whenever he deigns to visit me.
I’m sure my eyes are rimmed with red as I turn to Odette. “I’m sorry. I’m not having the best day.”
Ruby steps forward and speaks in a soothing voice. “I’m sorry to have bothered you at an inconvenient time, but if I may?” She gestures to Odette.
Defeated, I shrug. “It’s up to her.”
Odette gives me one last look of pure pity, then says to Ruby, “Let’s hear it.”
Ruby gently nudges me to the side, and I look on, numb, as she begins asking Odette about her ideal wedding dress. Questions I should have asked her myself but couldn’t seem to pull it together long enough to do. Heidi takes notes on her tablet as they talk, too.
Before long, Odette turns to me, her mouth in a firm line. “You’ve given me a lot to think about. Thanks for your time.”
I can only nod as Heidi and Odette depart. Catarina and Ruby are already compiling notes and swiping through photos on their phones.
Jamie gives me a hug before they leave, too.
I want to cry anew. These two women Jamie brought are more qualified than I am to do my own damn job. And Kit paid them all, thinking it would, what, make me feel better? Help me get more sleep, or something?
All I feel is inadequate. These two women have impressive degrees and experience. The only things on my résumé are a year at a dry cleaner and another at a chain bridal store as a seamstress. I’m self-taught at everything from hemlines to spreadsheets.
What a perfect cherry on top of this shit sundae. For the first time in a long time, I feel in my gut how easy it is for all of this to be stolen from me. By someone else, who said he’d be my partner at the altar. This is why marriage was never on my list.
And Kit can go to hell.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIXKIT
I’m going through employee reviews when I get the call. It’s my least favorite part of the job—rating employees like an app on a phone—so my phone buzzing across my desk is a welcome distraction. After dinner with my mom and the conversation with Andie afterward, I hoped to feel surer about decision day. It’s only a few days away now, and I thought surely I’d know my answer.
Or rather, surely I’d know Andie’s answer by now. She hasn’t said she’s changed her mind about the divorce money. She hasn’t told me she wants to stick it out and see what we can be. She hasn’t told me that she loves me. Nothing like that. Even after I told her I was all in.
Hell, she knows I may be jetting off to Italy for work and won’t even ask me to stay. I thought, with everything we’ve uncovered, we’d be farther along than this.
All we have is a couple of weeks of nights in bed together and a handful of experiences from the show stitched together with the thread of our first crash and burn.
I hope it’s enough.
“Hi, Lisa.” I answer my phone because I never ignore a call from Mom’s home nurse and sink heavily into the expensive leather chair at my desk. The penthouse is even emptier than it used to be, with my sparse belongings nestled in a closet beside Andie’s. “Did I forget to pick up a prescription again?”
“Kit.” Lisa’s voice is firmness wrapped in crackling cellophane. It puts me on edge. “Your mother fell while trying to dust the tops of the cabinets this morning.”
I bolt upright, the employee reviews blurring in front of me. “What? She can’t reach the tops of the cabinets.”
“If she’s on a stool, she can.” Lisa is so calm, my skin prickles with the anticipation of a storm.
“She wouldn’t be so—”
“I found her when I got here thirty minutes ago. She was disoriented and in severe pain.”
My vision begins to narrow, growing dark at the edges. My voice cracks. “Is she—?”
Lisa seems to understand my fractured attempt at information gathering. “I called an ambulance. They’re taking her to Emory.”