She stood.
“Anna.” He reached a hand out, a pitiful offering from a man she’d given so much to. “I can do better by you.”
She caught sight of Kaci and Lance across the reception area. Two wonderful people she never would’ve met if Neil hadn’t abandoned her and who had introduced her to others she was blessed to call friends. She looked down at her ex one last time. “I have a good life,” she said.
And this time, she did the walking away, and he did the not-following.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
She did less climbing of the ladder and more hopping rung to rung.
—The Temptress of Pecan Lane, by Mae Daniels
Monday morning, Rex sputtered his normal protest, but Anna couldn’t stop smiling.
Until Jules popped in. “Hey, I need new RR—holy hell, what happened to you?”
She fingered the bruise on her cheek. “Next time you’re at a wedding where the bride’s bouquet is made of lollipops, run.”
Jules reached for the ruler in her desk organizer, but stepped back and gnawed on her thumbnail instead. “Nice wedding otherwise?”
“Yeah.”
“See anybody I know?”
She froze. Had Jules helped Neil?Why?
They stared at each other. Jules didn’t blink. Anna’s fingers tightened on Rex’s mouse. “I don’t think so,” she finally said. “How was your weekend?”
Jules held her gaze a moment longer.
As if she were calling Anna a liar.
Jules opened her mouth, but heat surged through Anna’scheeks. “You know what?” Anna said. “Ididsee somebody you know. And I’m having a hard time figuring out how he knew where to find me.”
A guilty flush crept up Jules’s neck. Her eyes hardened. “You trying to say something?”
“I’m saying it would’ve been a shame if my ex-husband made scenes attwoof my friends’ weddings this year,” she bit out. “Why would you do that?”
“Dothat? God, you act like getting back together with Neil would be horrible. How long did you mope that he was gone? How many times did we need to hold your crybaby hand over him? Did you ever think I was trying to do you a favor?”
Her jaw dropped. “You want to mess with my head? Fine. Mess with my head. But leave my friends out of it. It’s called a conscience, Jules. Get one.”
The flush had reached Jules’s ears and was sneaking up her cheeks. “You should be thanking me. Not like anybody else is interested in dating you and your problems.”
“Tell that to my boyfriend.” And even through her anger, she heard the squeal of triumph in her own voice. Maybe he was, maybe he wasn’t, but she was sleeping with him and he’d asked her to lunch today. Close as she would get.
Jules’s lip curled. “Enjoy it while it lasts.” She thumped the door frame. “I need new RR-40s if you want to keep your job.” She left a lingering odor of pessimism and ugliness in Anna’s cube.
Anna dug into her drawer for her can of Lysol. She shot a spray of disinfectant into the doorway.
And then she got back to work.
Because standing up for herself was fantastic, but it wouldn’t pay the bills.
It tookthree days for Louisa to get around to telling Mamie she’d found Jackson with a woman. He knewthat, because it took three days before Mamie called him. He was propped on his couch, eating reheated chicken and biscuits, still in his ABUs after work. He muted the game he still hadn’t watched all the way through and took the call. “Yes, ma’am?”
“We need to halt the biscuit orders over here?” she asked.
