Page 21 of One Sweet Lie
“Take them out of here and see how much you can sell them for on the street.” He scoffed. “If I had known how greedy and unappreciative you were, I would’ve bought them from the grocery store.”
“You’re not going to pay meanything?”
“I’ll cover the gas for your car ride home." He opened his wallet and pulled out a few twenty-dollar bills. “You’re more than welcome to stay at my event, but only if you let this go and stop acting like it’s the end of the world.”
Before I could process what was happening, he strolled toward the ice sculptures.
“Be super careful with those!” He yelled. “They cost five thousand each!”
I walked over to my dessert display and noticed how everyone who walked by did a slow double-take. How they took pictures and moaned in delight as they tasted my work.
Fuck him.
And fuck this.
I picked up a box and started tossing some of the cupcakes back inside.
“Excuse me, sir.” I grabbed a half-eaten cupcake from a guest. “That hasn’t been paid for, so you can’t eat anymore. Thank you.”
“Miss?” I snatched one from the woman wearing a ‘Mother of the Bride’ sash. “Sorry, that’s not free.”
“You, over there with the brownies?” I called out to one of Eric’s terrible friends. “Can you bring that over here, please? It hasn’t been paid for.”
“Ma’am, you’re causing a disturbance.” Someone grabbed my elbow. “I’ve been asked to escort you out of the party.”
“Not without my desserts.”
The DJ turned up the music, and guests crowded the sweets table as the security guard pulled me away.
He let go of me outside, then he handed me the bag of extras I’d brought.
I’d kept my tears back all week, but I couldn’t fight these.
“Please walk all the way off the property, Miss,” the guard said. “Or else I’ll be forced to call the police.”
I headed down the sidewalk, and the levees broke.
Everything in my life was officially falling apart, and I needed to stop lying to myself once and for all.
I can’t afford to live in New York.
I don’t have enough savings to start a bakery of my own.
I never finished cooking school, despite my dad and stepmom giving me the money for tuition.
That last lie hit me so hard I stopped walking.
Sasha’s taillights beckoned me in the distance, and I wiped my face on my sleeve.
“He’ll get his karma eventually, Harlow,” I whispered to myself. “Let it go, let him go.”
I took out my phone to delete my “Dream Board” on Pinterest and noticed a missed call from an unknown number.
Grateful for a minor distraction, I called it back.
“This is Barbara Hildreth speaking, how may I help you this evening?”
“I was just calling this number back. If this is about a debt, you’ll have to call me back in ten years.”