Page 59 of Thank you, Next

“But you are one of the best.” The empty flattery with a tinge of mild condescension grated against her nerves. In the year since they’d broken up, she’d forgotten that. Probably along with a million other things that used to irritate her about him.

“I’m actually the best according to that list that came out last month. Where were you on the M&A list?” Alex asked, knowing that Jason wasn’t on it. It wasn’t his fault; mergers and acquisitions was a popular legal specialty among Ivy League grads. The pool was stacked. Family law was less shiny and sexy, and so she’d risen through the ranks more quickly.

“Well, we were hoping you would draft the agreement for us.”

Alex didn’t want to do this and wondered if it was Jason’s way of rubbing in her face that he’d chosen someone else to spend his life with. Or maybe it was his way of letting his fiancée know that she could be replaced if she didn’t behave in exactly the way he expected her to.

Either way, it smelled fishy. And Alex wasn’t going to agree to anything before getting to the bottom of it. She turned to Danielle, who was playing with one of her paperweights. “Would you give us a minute? My assistant can show you the new espresso machine or grab you a bottle of water.” Before Jason had shown up, she’d been thinking about a third latte. But now she needed a bottle of Valium and a handle of Tito’s. “I just want to talk to Jason privately for a minute.”

“Sure.” Danielle jumped up. She was certainly eager.

Alex didn’t let her smile slip until the other woman had cleared the doorway. “What are you really doing here?”

Jason leaned back and unbuttoned his Brioni suit jacket so she would see his very flat abs. He wanted her to salivate over what was no longer hers. She’d rather be looking at Will’s abs underneath a white T-shirt. Or just bare.

“I told you that I need a prenuptial agreement.”

“You also know that we could have done this with a phone call, Danielle needs her own lawyer, and it’s probably a conflict of interest for us to work together or on opposite sides of this matter.” Alex took a breath but continued before Jason had a chance to interject with any bullshit. “Now, tell me why you’re really here so that I can give you a referral and you can leave.”

Jason, for his part, did not turn to dust from the way she glared at him. Damn it. “You’re right. I wanted to see you.”

“You seem to have found a reasonable facsimile of me to look at. Try again.”

They were probably running out of time to talk in private, and Jason knew that because he looked over his shoulder before he said, “I just wanted to be sure.”

“Sure of what?”

“That I was right about you.”

Alex hated the way he said that. “Right about me how?”

“That you really wouldn’t care that I was getting married to someone else. That what we had didn’t mean anything to you.”

“I mean... I did care. But then I took a good, long look at myself.” She left out the part about seeking out her exes. “And we were never right for each other. We looked good on paper, but I didn’t feel for you how I needed to feel.”

When she was done, Jason narrowed his gaze.

Alex sighed. Jason had a huge ego that nothing she said would likely penetrate. Maybe that’s why they’d lasted for almost a year. She hadn’t been able to push him away using her usual methods. If she didn’t call him for a week, he wasn’t the kind of person who was sensitive enough to think she was upset about something. He would believe her if she just said she was busy.

Totally different from Will. She had to stop comparing him with Will. Because she’d never loved Jason. They had just seemed like a good fit. They looked good together, and that was all that Jason was ultimately looking for.

He didn’t want to deal with a real person who had real feelings. Everything was a negotiation with him, and Alex didn’t want to live like that now that she knew it could be different.

But she couldn’t tell Jason all that, and he wasn’t really the person she needed to tell. And she didn’t have time to get into it, because Danielle came into the room with a cup of coffee.

Alex waited until Danielle sat down to say, “It was lovely to meet you, though it’s unfortunate that we won’t be able to work together. But I’m giving you and Jason a list of attorneys I think would be a good fit.”

Danielle was definitely getting the better list.

TWENTY-SEVEN

Will found Alex out by the pool. He’d waited almost a week for her to come to him, and he’d been patient enough. He hadn’t wanted to bring Lexi into it, but he’d broken. He’d missed Alex and would deal with her running away from him.

It was late evening, after the restaurant closed, and the pool lights put a blue cast over everything. Including Alex’s face, which made her look especially sad.

She turned when his feet hit the concrete and looked at him until he dropped into the pool chair next to her.

“You came after me,” she said softly.