“I’ve gotta go.”
I don’t wait for her to respond. I walk out, closing the door behind me before hurrying home without looking back.
Maybe I don’t hate her as much as I thought I did. Maybe I don’t hate her, but it changes nothing. Forgiveness at this point is optional, but forgetting everything we lost is impossible.
I barely sleep a wink all night, and when I do, I dream of Alec snarling down at me for betraying him. I see my mother’s tear-stained face as she sees me holding hands with Sorrow and my father clutching his heart like he’s dying. Each nightmare is worse than the one before it. In the end, I’m up before the sun, working out to burn off some of this restless energy.
I’m the first one in the office. I fill the coffee machine and wait for it to brew before heading into my private office andlogging on for the day. I read over some emails and return a few before I compile a file with the footage of the shit that went down with Sorrow yesterday.
When the smell of coffee entices me, I head out to the reception area and pour myself a mug as the door opens. Felix and Aiden walk in with Blake right behind them, all of them frowning when they see me.
“What the fuck are you doing here so early?” Felix asks, heading for the coffee machine.
“You make it sound like I’m always late or something.”
“Oh no, you’re never late, but you have being on time nailed down to a fine art. You might never be late, but you’re never more than a minute early either.”
I toss the teaspoon at him, chuckling when it bounces off his forehead.
“Motherfucker.”
I shake my head before looking over at Aiden. “So how’s our resident Oscar winner this morning?”
“Still in shock, I think. She’s just carrying on as if we don’t have a gold statue sitting in our bathroom.”
Blake laughs. “Why the fuck is it in the bathroom?”
“I asked Tilly the same thing. She looked at me, confused for a second, before asking, ‘Well, where am I supposed to keep it?’ Honestly, I didn’t have an answer, so now it’s just there, staring at me while I take a dump.”
We laugh at his antics as each of the guys fills their mugs with coffee and heads to their own offices, until only Blake remains.
“How did things go?—”
Before he can finish, the door opens again. Marcus and Arlo walk in laughing about something but stop when they see us.
“What’s up?” Arlo frowns.
“Nothing, just wondering what you bozos are laughing about.”
“I was telling Arlo about this chick in the grocery store.”
“Sounds hilarious.”
Marcus flips me off. “It was, actually. So I run in this morning to get coffee because I ran out.”
We collectively wince at that.
“I’m heading to the checkout when this woman collides with me so hard, she literally bounces off me and hits the floor. I reach down to help her up, only she grabs hold of the display shelf, which just happens to be a pyramid of Pringles.”
I groan, already knowing where this is going.
“Of course, every single tube falls down, but I’m already in motion at this point. So when I put my foot down, I skid on a tube and go ass over tit myself. The basket with the coffee upends, meaning the woman who is still trying to get to her feet gets hit in the face with the contents.”
“At least it was a bag of coffee beans and not a can of soup.”
“Yeah, except while I was there, I figured I’d grab a few things that I needed.”
I tilt my head as Arlo cracks up, struggling to catch his breath.
