Love, Chloe (6 page)

I carefully tore out the page and folded it in half, sticking it into my wallet, the action reverent, as if the location might increase my chances. I put the wallet into my purse, reaching down and pulling on my heels as Dante turned down Cammie’s street. Benta lived in a luxury tower, but Cammie loved her brownstone duplex. I wasn’t a fan. The heat came out through a steam radiator, for God’s sake. The woman couldn’t stand germs but bathed in water that shot from 200-year-old pipes.

The SUV rocked as we pulled closer, and I leaned across, trying to see through the snow, my eyes squinting on the figure in front of the brownstone. It was Cammie, stamping her feet against the cold, looking pissed. I cracked open the door, surprised to see Dante jump out, his grin wide and friendly, one he’d never flashed at me.

Hmmm. So the ice king
did
melt. Maybe I just wasn’t his brand of heat.

His grin instantly softened Cammie’s scowl. I stumbled out, slipping on the icy sidewalk, Dante completely unaware as he shook Cammie’s gloved hands, her giggle floating my way. I tried to sneak by and their lovefest came to an end, Cammie’s hand reaching out and grabbing my coat. “Can’t go up there.”

“Why?”

“Something clogged up the plumbing on our floor. The whole place is flooded. I’m waiting for a ride.”

“Boyfriend coming to pick you up?” Dante spoke from behind me and I turned at the question, raising my eyebrows.

“No, just a cab.” Cammie said, smiling. She glanced at me. “I thought we could go to Benta’s.”

“Let me drive you.”

Wow
. Definitely not the Dante I knew. He and Cammie were suddenly in movement, one of his hands on her elbow, helping her across the curb, the other opening her door, apparently no need to consult little Chloe in the decision-making process. I slogged alone through the snow, and managed to climb, unescorted, into the passenger side.

We pulled away, and Cammie beamed at me, any irritation over the plumbing gone. “He’s
hot,
” she mouthed, nodding toward the front.

I shrugged as if I hadn’t noticed, more than a little irritated at Dante’s 180 toward friendliness. Then again, Cammie and I had always appealed to different types—a good thing for a friendship. “Go for it,” I mouthed back. I settled into the seat, turning up the heater, and watched her do just that.

I woke up Saturday morning on Benta’s loveseat, a spare comforter wrapped around me, a puddle of drool underneath my cheek, to the distinct sounds of a hookup. Not skin-slapping, breath-gasping actual humping, but something solidly in the second-base vicinity.

My spot in the living room gave me a front-row view of the action, happening on Benta’s kitchen counter. Cammie’s dark bare legs were wrapped around one hell of a jean-covered ass, her pale pink nails digging into the guy’s white T-shirt.

“Ahem.” My subtle throat clear got me nothing, the frantic kissing—if anything—heating up.

“Cam.” I reached for my cell, ready to throw it at her, my eyes instead catching on the time display. And
that was
when my irritation grew tenfold. Not even eight. On a
Saturday
morning. I rolled over on the loveseat, throwing the blanket over my head, not at all interested in meeting her date. I had a pretty good idea of who it was, especially when I heard the smooth scrape of an accent whisper her name. I hid under the covers, eavesdropping despite my best attempt to go back to sleep. At some point among their whispered goodbyes, I fell back asleep and was spared anything more ’til noon, when Cammie and Benta pushed me awake and into clothes, promising sushi and sake.

An hour later, and I would scream if I heard Dante’s name one more time. Cammie wouldn’t shut up about him. Granted, I might have been a
teensy
bit jealous, my own romp envisioned with the strong and silent Italian.

Plus, to be honest, how awkward would it be if this turned into anything—my co-worker and my best friend? Chances were it wouldn’t. In the five years I’d known Cammie, she’d never had a relationship last more than a few months. Her eye …
wandered
. That was the nicest way to say it. Tell her she couldn’t touch something, and she’d trample your ass in her haste to dig her fingers in. Benta, on the other hand … well, Benta was weird. I could spend an entire week talking about her crazy love life, one that included some of the freakiest sex on the planet.

After two sake bombs, courtesy of my friends, I forgot any irritation about being woken up early. Cammie was freaking
beaming
at us as she dissected every last moment with Dante, so I couldn’t help but be happy for her on that front too. Not that I could really stay mad at the person keeping me from sleeping on the streets.

We left lunch slightly buzzed, stumbling our way into her apartment, no evidence of flooding present, where she wandered to bed. I found cleaning supplies, determined to be the Best Houseguest Ever and clean the kitchen. I had Spotify playing, a Lysol wipe in hand, and was on a stool, emptying out the cabinet above the fridge, when I moved aside Cammie’s cereal and felt it. My fingers closed on it without thought, pulling it out, the box instantly recognizable, a powder blue one with a tag that made my stomach curl into a tight fist. I stepped off the stool and wondered why, in the jumble of healthy crap that had been in that cabinet—there was a jewelry box with my name on it.

I didn’t have to wonder
too
much. The box was trademark Vic, my name scrawled in his rough handwriting on a crisp white tag. My denied engagement ring had been Harry Winston, but every birthday, Valentine’s, and “just-because” present was from Tiffany’s.

I sat down on a stool, smoothing the label’s white ribbon with a trembling finger. Half of me wanted to rip off its lid in my haste to see the gift. The other half wanted to drive to the closest dumpster and fling the box inside.
Vic had picked this out
. Thought of me. Still wanted to spoil me. For a girl who’d spent Christmas ignored by everyone but my two friends, it hit hard. I gently tugged on the ribbon and lifted the lid, seeing a folded note on top.

When I opened the note, the spicy scent of him floated up from the linen stock.

My love,

I will think of you every Christmas for the rest of my life. I hope, whatever you do this year, you are happy.

Always yours,

Vic

I set it down, my heart seizing, the words painful to read. I picked up the box and looked at the pendant earrings, delicate clusters of diamonds that circled a larger stone. Perfect. Not that I had expected anything less. I closed the box and pushed it back, lowering my head ’til it rested on the counter and allowed myself a moment of tears.

I
missed
him. I loved him as strongly as I did when we were together. Yes, he’d broken my heart. But it had taken every bit of my willpower not to relent when he’d begged for forgiveness, when he’d drunkenly professed his devotion to me from a busy street while I stayed cozy in my old apartment, pretending not to hear. When he’d cried. The man, despite everything else, knew how to get me. Knew how to seduce and how to wrap my heart up so tight that I was scared I’d never rip it free.

I hated him.

I loved him.

I wanted him.

I missed him.

And I really should call and thank him for the gift.

I didn’t call him. Instead, I did the right thing, putting on my big girl pants and writing him a letter. A polite letter in which I thanked him for the gift, but firmly refused it. I stated that we were no longer together, and I didn’t feel such gifts were appropriate. I wrapped it and the Tiffany’s box together and put them in a bag for his driver to pick up.

My high road was a short one. Less than ten minutes later, I threw the letter in the trash and put the earrings in their proper place: my earlobes. I glanced at my watch, realized I had less than twenty minutes to escape before Cammie got home, and called Benta.

“Want to treat your poor best friend to dinner?”

The girl didn’t hesitate, and forty-five minutes later we were sitting at a rooftop bar and ordering drinks.

“Cute earrings,” she noted, gesturing with her straw toward my ears.

“Thanks.” I waved to the bartender, trying to divert this conversation to appetizers.

“They look like something I saw a few weeks ago. In a box. From Viiiiicc.” She stretched his name into three syllables.

Shit
. I stopped trying to get the bartender’s attention and turned to her. “You
knew
?”

Of course she knew. Cammie couldn’t get her eyebrows waxed without a sidekick so Benta had been the first call made when Vic dropped off the gift. They’d decided I was better off not knowing and hid it.

“I
told
her it was too risky keeping them at her house, especially with you staying there.” She rolled her eyes, as if to say,
Rookie mistake
…

My irritation mounted. “I can handle Vic. It wasn’t up to either of you to keep that from me.”

“Oh please!” Benta’s cheeks flushed with heat. “Do you
remember
what you were like after that breakup? How you lived on your couch, binging on reality TV and subjecting every poor food delivery guy to your sob story?” It was true. I still couldn’t order from my favorite pizza place. “I
know
you. Right now, you’re thinking that you should call Vic and thank him for the earrings. Let me tell you, Vic bought that present with the change rattling around in his cupholder. It’s not like he
thought
out the gift and is sitting by the phone, anxiously waiting on your call.”

I shut my mouth, my witty comeback dampened, the picture she drew of Vic exactly what I had been envisioning.

Benta leaned forward. “Forget Vic. Let me set you up with this guy we’ve hired. He’s
gorgeous
, Chloe, and he’s hilarious.”

“Yeah?” I looked at her. “Then why aren’t you dating him?”

“He’s too passive for me. I need a man who’ll fight back when I kick.”

Too passive. Wow, she knew how to sell ’em. “Pass. I could use some singledom.”

“You’ve been single eight months. It’s been long enough.”

Food came, saving me from a response, and I pulled out my phone. Checked my email and saw a few from Nicole. Skimmed their contents and murmured support while Benta checked out the bartender’s ass.

The last email caused me to look up, catching her stealing a sip of my drink. I snagged it back. “Nicole just emailed me, saying she’ll be in Vegas in March.”

“For what?”

“The …” I scrolled down the email. “Adult Entertainment Expo. Not sure what that is. Sounds boring.”

At Benta’s snort—mid-crunch of a shrimp—I jerked my head up, just in time to see her eyes water as she pounded her chest. She waved off my help, grabbing her ice water and holding up a finger as she drank.

When she finally came up for air, her voice wheezed. “The Adult Entertainment Expo? I forgot you were working for the condom supplier of the world.”

“Why? What is it?” My phone wouldn’t cooperate, a Google search taking as long as Benta to put me out of my misery. I looked at her impatiently.

“It’s a
porn
convention. In
Vegas
. Too bad she isn’t taking you.”

A porn convention
? I would have doubted the intel, but Benta would know, her family created an online dating website that makes Tinder look like a kiddie ride. The woman reviewed sex statistics and dating trends over breakfast. She laughed at my look and grabbed my drink, toasting me while finally getting the last of her shrimp—and my daiquiri—down.

A
porn
convention. Working for Nicole got stranger every day.

I rolled the ball across the floor, Chanel scampering after it, her nails clicking across the floor. My phone rang and I pushed to my feet, grabbing it off the desk, the name on the display making my heart jump.

“Mom?” I shut the door and leaned against it.

“Hey darling. We were just calling to check in.”

“I’ve left you a bunch of messages.”

“Oh, I know. We’ve just been busy.”

“For two months?” My voice was hard, a tone I had never used with her before.