“Clean!” Teeth bared and lips smiling, she nods for approval to hop off the stool.
“Super clean, cuddlebug.” I hook her around the waist, grab my bag, granola bar, and coffee, and we’re out the door.
I check my phone after she’s in her car seat and I’m stuck at a red light. “We’re totally going to make it on time.”
Cally beams from the backseat. “’Cause we’re magical!”
“You know it.”
The kid steals my heart every day. And maybe she’s right. Magic might let me make it into class before Professor Dickhead does his daily dickheaded duties.
Seventeen minutes later, I screech into class after dropping off Cally a few buildings over.
“Very close, Miss Kingsley.” Professor Dickhead shuts the door behind me and launches into a verbatim recounting of exactly what the textbook read.
My lungs pound because I ran across campus, but I made it. I tumble into my seat. All I have to do is keep this up another semester or two, combined with a couple of online classes, and my godforsaken no-pay internship will turn into a real dollars-in-the-bank-account job that pays more than school credits and gift card bonuses.
I’m in this for the future, for Cally. So I can raise my baby girl and eventually have a college degree and job security. But until then, I’m completely exhausted, doing the best I know how.
CHAPTER FIVE
Emma
TGIF.
Thursdays are always the worst, because I’ve been on the clock at Emerald’s, then classes, then the Delightful Diner, and then my internship. I’m sitting in a client meeting and taking notes for Jeremy Rossdale, my boss, the managing partner of Creative Dynamic Worldwide. With the exception of a couple of hours’ sleep, I’ve been on the job for twenty-four hours in a row. Somewhere in there, I played a solid game of hide-n-seek and dried Cally’s tears when we couldn’t find anything that was packed.
Moving with a two-year-old? Not easy.
But it’s Friday—no classes and my only job that doesn’t require physical labor, even if it’s also the only job that doesn’t pay. The internship’s lack of a steady paycheck might blow, but I have a promise from Jeremy: if I get my college degree while doing mundane intern work, I will be hired as an entry-level marketing executive and have a foot in the door for if and when the art department hires. Meaning I’ll be paid to do something with a camera, even if it’s just brainstorm shoots.
Still, the potential for a paycheck and benefits? Yeah, that I’ll bust my butt to get. It’ll be a dream-come-true job, mostly because my clothes will stay on and my paycheck will be direct deposited. No writhing and crawling on the floor for bills, no carrying trays of coffee and half-eaten pancakes for coins.
The internship is my long-tail approach to success. Eat that, Professor Dickhead.
I try to stifle a yawn and fiddle with the yarn-and-bead bracelet Cally made me last night. It’s pink and purple. When she showed it to me, she did a dance and sang a nonsensical song that still makes my eyes burn with tears. Such a cute kid.
My mom came over after Cally went to sleep so I could pick up a shift at the diner. I wore the bracelet, and all three of the truckers who came in for coffee and hash browns remarked about it.
Staying busy has served a secondary purpose recently. The last few weeks have been a roller coaster. Summerland County gossip has buzzed for days about Grayson dying overseas, and my trip to see Pops went about as well as a disaster.
But on the upside, my twenty-first birthday is almost here, and I’ve finally been able to scrape together enough money, with a little assistance from my folks, to move Cally and me from our one-bedroom teeny-tiny, should-be-called-a-studio apartment to a real, albeit still teeny-tiny, house. I picked up the keys earlier this week.
God, I need some coffee if I’m going to make through moving. My phone flashes with a text from Sarah, my best friend and fellow marketing intern.
Sarah:
Meant to tell you, I drove by! Super cute house. Way to go you. You don’t even touch your neighbors, it’s really something. Proud of you.
I roll my lips to keep from smiling. The new house rocks. I’m bursting to get everything out of the apartment and into the house so it will finally feel real. Dad and Ryan moved the beds, a lot of boxes, and our necessities this week. Cherry will take Cally tonight for an auntie slumber party so I can unpack boxes.
My phone rings, and I silence it. The caller ID shows an unfamiliar number. Jeremy looks over, his nose pinched.
I mouth, “Sorry.”
Again, I fiddle with the bracelet and take all the notes he’ll need. My handwriting is perfect, but I’ll have them typed and in his inbox before he leaves for the weekend.
My phone rings again, same number. Two calls in a row make me think of emergency situations. Cally fell. Got sick. Got lost. My stomach twists.
“I think that about wraps this up.” Jeremy stands. “Emma, need clarification on anything before we break?”
“No, sir. Got it all.” I tap my notepad, which is covered in details. He asks to be polite, but never in my time with him have I missed something he needs.
“Better get that.” Jeremy nods at my phone.
“Right. Thanks.” I slip out of the conference room and head toward the privacy of the hallway to answer. “Hello?”
“Hey, Ems.” The nervous scratch of a faraway voice reaches into my soul, wrapping its brutal tentacles around me.
No one calls me Ems. No one but Grayson Ford. The boy I dream of, the man I dance for, the reason I’m still living, and the source of all my desperation. My throat tightens to the point that I think I’m going to choke, and an intense pounding in my chest finds its way to my ears. There is no way I just heard what I did.
“Grayson?”
It’s him. The him who ruined my life. Who
made
my life. Who confused my mind to the point that I can’t figure out if I’ve been destroyed or set free. The him who… is… dead.
I tremble and press against the wall, feeling a wave of weakness. I’m unsure if I’ll crumble to the floor, praise God, or just melt.
“You’re—alive?” My voice breaks. Tears spill. I want to throw my phone and run. But I can’t.
“Yeah… maybe not the guy you knew, but it’s me.”
There’s a gravity to his voice that rolls through me. Three years have passed since he broke my heart. Three weeks since Randall confirmed Grayson had died.
Gray was supposed to be my best friend. He was supposed to be the one I loved forever. But he never saw the tears stream down my face. Never knew the hurt and humiliation and anguish. He just disappeared into the night, and I had to hear from the county gossip machine that he was in boot camp at Fort Benning. I didn’t even know if it was true. I even thought about just showing up there one day.
I cried myself to sleep for what seemed like an eternity, waiting for him to call, to explain. To do something that would show I hadn’t been in love with a soulless liar. But I was.
And still, I am.
Pathetic.
“You there?” His voice is deeper. Darker, as if he’s damaged. There’s something to it, almost as if I can touch the coarseness running through him.
“I’m here.” I can’t hang up. An overwhelming hope bleeds through me, wishing that somehow, errors of the past will magically mend.
“Been a while.”
I’m wordless.
He mumbles something, and it sounds as though his hand runs over his mouth. I can picture him threading his fingers into his hair.
“You’re mad. I get it. I deserve it, that’s the goddamn truth.”
Mad
? Is he kidding me? I survived my freshman year at community college while pregnant, a newborn’s constant waking while pushing myself to work
three
jobs, then I mourned him.
Mourned!
“I’m not mad. I’m—” I take a deep breath, trying to fend off a screwed-up mixture of vicious anger and nervous breakdown. “I’m at work.”
“We gotta talk.”
What?
My shirt is strangling me. My stockings are too tight. Coming unglued seems too easy, and I hurt, so deeply and so raw, that I’m shaking. Crumbling.
“Emma?”
Two options: talk or hang up. But I do neither. I’m in shock. Like clinical what-the-fuck-do-I-do-now shock. I swallow the knot in my throat and force my mind-mouth connection to forge something. Anything. “I’m here.”
I want to sound mature. Maybe even unaffected. At the very least, I want to sound as if the tornado that is my life didn’t start the night he walked away. The love of my life—whom I hate—has come back from the dead? All I want to do is kill him! Or maybe hug him. I don’t know.
“Hell, Ems,” he growls. “I’m sorry.”
My lips pull between my teeth as I fail to ignore the shivers skimming across my shoulders. He sounds like a man. Like sex and heat. His words coat me, holding me, and I hate my visceral response to just his voice.
But it’s been years… “You don’t get to call me Ems. Never. Not again. No one calls me that.” Even though it’s one of the sweetest sounds I’ve ever heard. If a word could hug and forgive,
Ems
could do that.
Grayson’s breath drifts into the phone and whisks over me, stirring me to the point that I can’t stand. I head to the intern office space, and my chair catches me as I fall, wondering the whys and the nows of this call. No matter what I think, I can’t muster enough of a regret to hang up.
“Emma…”
As it turns out, my drawn-out first name has the same sinful effect as “Ems.” I hate it—and really don’t. “What?”
“I need a minute.” As fast as my heart rate picks up—I’m nervous and protective of my world—he tacks on a growly, “please.”
The word has just enough sweet Grayson Ford attached to it. Memories tumble through my mind, all ignited by his rough, graveled timbre. I pinch the bridge of my nose, knowing I should be angry. I
should be
a woman scorned. But I’m not. I’ve always had the hope that this call might happen. And God, when I thought he’d died, I fell apart.
“The guy you knew… he’s gone. But some things don’t change, Emma, and you saving me is one of them.”
My heart can’t decide whether to pound or clench. It’s hurting. I’m reliving the million pieces of my shattered heart that I’ve hidden. Despite his haunting memories and living paycheck to paycheck, my life is good right now. Maybe it’ll be better if he stays the unrequited dream-come-true that I dance for every Wednesday. At least that way, I’ll never know what it’s like to be devastated twice in a lifetime.
“Okay. I’ll lay it out for you,” Grayson says. “I have… regrets.”
That pulls me out of my head. “Regrets?”
Regrets
! “Are you kidding me?” My blood pressure rises, and I can’t even fathom a response. I just… he has
no
idea. Holy shit, I can’t breathe. “Shut up, Gray. Don’t say anything else.”
Anger pounds in my head. I’ve had a life to live, complete with major what-the-fuck-should-I-do-now moments. Soul searching and delayed regret has never been on the agenda. Only two mouths to feed and responsibilities. “Take your regret and—”
“You never deserved me leaving. I never wanted to go. It’s—you deserve an apology.”
“Yeah, I do.” My lungs want to explode, and I swear to Jesus, the room starts to spin. This is what I’ve waited to hear for so long.
“I’m sorry, Ems. Leaving you killed me. Ruined me. I’m fucked for having done it, and I’m asking for your forgiveness.”
Dropping my head back, I stare at the ceiling and take inventory of my feelings after his big confession. Nothing’s changed. They’re just words. What did I think would happen?
Am I any happier? No.
Angrier? Nope.
Euphoric? In love? Relieved? No, no, and no one more damn time.
Well, that isn’t true. I’ll always love him. But still, we aren’t the same high school kids. What a realization. I’m different now. I bite my lip, thankful I don’t have the monumental task of trying to explain to Cally that she actually had a dad but he died. “I have to get back to work.”
He clears his throat. “Work?”
I nod as if he can see me. “My boss is gonna have a fit if I don’t get back.”
What more am I supposed to say?
All’s forgiven?
My inner subconscious is a demented, two-faced traitor.
I love you. Leave me alone.
“Then I’ll call you later.”
“What? Why?” He doesn’t get to show up when he feels like it. “I wanted to hear that from you for forever. And now I have.” I choke. “I thought you were dead!”
Silence lingers. “Shit. I shouldn’t have called like this.”
“No! Yes, you should have. But you should’ve done it years ago. You should have done it when I was heartbroken and alone. When I gave you everything and you walked away.
Everything
. Do you get that!”
“Ems—”
“No! Not with the Ems.”
“Sweet Jesus, fuck me. You have no idea. I just needed to hear your voice again.”
“God, you’re a selfish prick. You can’t be serious. I needed your voice
years
ago.” Holy crap, I’m sweating I’m so angry. “Your voice. Your help. You! I needed you to be here. You have no damn idea how much.”