Two was usually my limit. Three, if the conversation was good and the wine didn’t taste like vinegar.
But tonight, my coworkers keep refilling my glass. And after the week I’ve had—emails, timelines, team meetings, launch planning—I let them.
We are celebrating the grant.Mygrant. And as the carefully guarded armor of control begins to slip, my inhibitions go straight tohim.
Spencer Devereaux.
I try not to think about him.
But apparently, the wine has other ideas.
Somewhere between glass three and Laney texting me a meme about Frenchmen and foreplay, I slip away into the bathroom and into a stall, like I am whispering something top secret.
I open my phone. Scroll to his number—stare at the blank screen for a long moment, and finally begin typing:
Turns out I’m stuck for book recommendations and could use some help.
Then add, before I can stop myself:
What might work best is if you could deliver them in person.
Send.
I wait. Ten minutes. Fifteen. Nothing.
No dots. No reply. No read receipt.
Radio silence.
I tell myself he might already be in France. He mentioned a cycling race—some elite event he was training for. Maybe he’s off-grid. Maybe he’s racing right now. Maybe he dropped his phone into the Seine.
But the excuses wear thin fast.
Which, if I’m honest, confirms every base fear I’ve been working to ignore.
Itwasnothing more than a one-night stand.
Heisout of my league.
And even though that’s all I’dintendedit to be, the truth is—I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about him. Not since the moment I’d zipped myself back into that borrowed dress and slipped out of his suite.
In the morning, I find not a text from Spencer but one from my brother, Carter, instead.
Carter and I share a mom, a complicated childhood, and not much else. Different dads. Different last names. About as much in common as a giraffe and a kangaroo
He’s never been supportive of my plans to uproot my life and move to France. Not when I tried to go right after college. And not now.
Then again, Carter has always taken a very linear approach to life.
At sixteen, Princeton was the goal.
Maplewick High wouldn’t cut it, so he moved in with his dad near a prep school in Connecticut.
After that, it was all step-by-step: Princeton. Law school. A safe job in corporate litigation. Move in with Serena, his college girlfriend, live in a townhouse that looks like an upscale catalog exploded.
They’ve been there for three years now. They aren’t married yet.
“We’re waiting for theright time,” as he puts it.
