Shit.
I should hang up. That’s what I should do. I should just hang up. I don’t want it getting back to him that I was looking for him, don’t want to give him any reason to think I still want him in my life. My finger is hovering over the end call button, my heart in my throat, when Caroline speaks again.
“Listen, Sydney… He’s not here anymore. He’s not working anywhere, as far as I know. I don’t know the details—I don’twantto know the details—but he’s not welcome back here.” Her voice is quiet, tentative, like she’s afraid of being overheard.
“Oh. Okay, well, thank you?—”
“Wait,” she cuts in. “I’m so glad you called. Look, I’m sorry. You have no idea how many times I wanted to call you and tell you that.” She’s speaking so quickly, her words running together, like she’s rushing to get them out before I can hang up. “I know it’s no excuse, and I understand if you hate me, but you need to know: He lied to me. He told me that he’d been trying to break it off with you for months, but you were unstable, and he was scared you were going to hurt yourself. I didn’t realize he was just a lying piece of shit until he did the same thing to me. You know he cheated on me, too? After he dumped me, I found out that he was screwing some wannabe influencer that called him ‘master.’”
“Oh.” I grimace. “Ew.”
“Right?Him? Instant ick. Anyway, that’s beside the point. I just feel like I owe you a huge apology for my role in this. I never should have believed anything he said about you.”
“It’s fine, Caroline. We’re… We’re good.” I don’t even mean to say it, but the words come out anyway.
“We are?” she asks with a sniff, voice almost inaudible.
“Yeah. Trust me, I know what a manipulative dick he can be,” I tell her.
“God, he is! I wish I had never met him. I wish neither one of us had ever met him. I honestly wish he didn’t have the ability to meet people at all,” she says.
I laugh, surprising myself. Shit. I don’t want to like her. I don’t want kinship with her. But in another life, maybe the two of us could have been friends.
“Yeah.” I laugh again. “He’s definitely the sort of guy who should have started in prison and had to prove himself out.” I take a second to collect myself. “Look, we’re okay. Honestly.”
“Really?” She laughs skeptically. “Thanks. I think I needed to hear that.”
We awkwardly say our goodbyes, and I hang up.
He’s not here anymore.
He’s not working anywhere, as far as I know.
Then it could have been him outside the pottery studio. He could still be following me.
I’m shaking when I sit down, quickly gulping down half of my drink. The gin does little to calm my nerves.
“Sorry,” Jade says when she comes back from the bathroom a few minutes later. “I got to thinking about you and Chase and…might have had a mini cry in the bathroom, and then my eyes got all puffy…” She shrugs. “You know how it goes.”
I give her a strained smile and finish the last of my drink. Jade waves poor Seamus back over, letting him know it’s safe to approach.
“Another round, ladies?” he asks, leaning over the bar to smirk at us. His beard is red, but his hair is just a little lighter, a mixture of strawberry red and blonde, all the colors shifting together in the dim lights of the bar.
“Only if you want to carry us out of here,” I joke.
His smile widens. “I’d gladlycarry you, Sydney,” he says with that soft lilt to his voice. He gives me a wink before turning back around to go close out our bill.
My eyes go wide, and I glance at Jade, who’s stifling a laugh. Seamus returns with the check and places it down in front of us. He only charged us for one round, I notice, instead of the three that we drank.
“Um, thanks,” I say awkwardly, putting my card down.
“Oh, absolutely not. This one is on me,” Jade insists. “I bullied you into talking to me and made you cry. It’s the least I can do.” She picks up my card and flings it back in my direction before setting her own credit card on the tray and handing it back to Seamus.
9
SYDNEY
I’m still thinkingabout my conversation with Caroline hours later, as I pour myself a glass of wine and crawl into bed, book in hand.
