He sighs, watching me, then pulls me into him. "You're right. What I said was more inappropriate than what you wore."
He kisses my forehead—the kind meant to reset everything, and I let it soften me a little, lean against him a bit, and breathe into his shoulder.
Citrus and amber cling to him, that familiar scent of my husband that usually comforts me, but not today.
He murmurs into my hair, "They're a nice couple."
I lift my eyes to him, unsure if he's with me or somewhere else.
"Lisa is nice," he says.
"I guess."
"Ben's helpful. Professional."
"Yeah."
"You met him in San Francisco?" His voice is casual, butweighted.
My heart starts doing its own percussion solo.
"Yeah. Not now. I mean, not during these months. He's an old friend from way, way back. Yeah."
His brows knit. "How far back?"
"Ehmmm. I don't even remember."
A lie. It was June 3rd, 2017. I'll never forget that day.
"Long time. When I was still a student."
"Did you know he was moving here?"
"No. How would I know? I was shocked too." There—not a lie—a point for me.
"Mm. Okay," he says, his eyes glued to my face.
And then the unavoidable comes: "Seems like a close friend. How come you never mentioned him?"
11
The evening sun flashes off the glass and steel of Union Square as I step into Carl's building.
I'm still a little shaken.
Not by what I said, but by how easily all the lies came.
I don't know Ben that well. Just friends with his sister, Mara. She used to be my close friend. One of the best, actually. Never introduced her because she's a New Yorker. Sharp, charismatic, hard to forget, harder to read. And yeah, I love Mara.
Only, I wasn't really talking about Mara.
Georgina, Carl’s assistant, opens the door and ushers me in. His office is Carl distilled: grandiose, curated to death, filled with striking furniture.
The walls glint with framed bestseller covers, arranged not as décor but as trophies—a testament to his uncanny instinct for what readers will eat alive.
Carl's behind the desk, typing like he's negotiating a hostile takeover in a wet-looking emerald suit. Almost too much. Except it's Carl, so it isn't.
I smile. Technically, I'm a washed-up author, but I still have the top literary agent on the West Coast.
