“I have a new client I’m excited about,” he said, cutting into his food. “Met him the end of last week. He wants to purchase two properties. One for himself, it’s a surprise for his wife. I’m guessing she lives in another state or something because he wants it be a welcome home, this is your house kind of thing. And he wants a vacation getaway home, something in downtown near everything.”Both cash purchases, proof of funds already verified.” He shook his head like he still couldn’t believe it. “I don’t know what it is about this guy but I like him already. He’s straightforward. Knows what he wants and these will be mybiggest individual sales of the year. Can you believe this?” He boasted.
I was listening but I was also somewhere else. I just smiled and tried to match his excitement.
“There’s a dinner tomorrow night,” he said. “I want you to come. He picked a nice restaurant, five star, for us to finalize the first purchase. I want to make a good impression. Just be warm, be interested, you know how you are when you’re on. These things with me. You have that charm. Please use it for me babe.”
“I’ll be there,” I said.
“This is one of the bigger ones baby. Cash buyer, two properties, this is a great start to Q4.”
“I said I’ll be there Brendon.”
He looked at me for a second. “You okay?”
“I’m fine. Just tired.”
He reached across and put his hand over mine and I looked at his face and felt something hollow move through my chest. He was so genuinely unbothered. So certain that everything in his life was exactly what it looked like. I almost wanted to warn him about something and I didn’t even know how I would begin to do that.
“Thank you,” he said. “For always showing up for me.”
I smiled and said of course and picked up my fork.
—
I wore the black dress. Fitted, stopped above the knee, open toe heels, hair pinned up. I looked good and I knew it and honestlygetting dressed was the most present I had felt all week because it gave me something to focus on that wasn’t the silence coming from the man I was waiting to get an explanation from.
The restaurant was Dakota’s Steakhouse. Proper five star, dim lighting, the kind of place where everything on the menu was described in three sentences and the portions were small and perfect. We arrived and the host walked us to the table and Brendon was already scanning the room for his client.
I excused myself to the restroom first.
As soon as I got into the restroom, I pulled out my phone and called Griz again. Straight to voicemail. I stood there for a second looking at myself in the mirror and then put the phone back in my bag and fixed my face and went back out.
Brendon was standing at the table greeting someone. He had the biggest smile on his face. When it came to securing a bag, this man was gonna put on a damn show.
I walked up.
And stopped.
Griz turned around in a tailored suit that fit him like it had been made specifically for his body, which knowing what I knew about his body it probably had. Dark, clean, a watch on his wrist that caught the light. He looked like a completely different version of himself from every other time I had seen him and also exactly the same.
He looked at me when I walked up and his face didn’t move.
My heart dropped directly through the floor.
Brendon put his hand on my back. “Baby, this is my client. And—” he laughed a little, “—it’s a small world, he’s also from corsicana, Texas. You two don’t know each other do you?”
“No,” I said. The word came out immediately. “Never met.”
Griz smiled at me. Slow and deliberate. Held out his hand. “Nice to meet you.”
I shook it and felt his thumb press into my palm for half a second longer than a handshake required and pulled my hand back.
We sat down.
I looked at him across that table and the questions were already stacking up in my throat. Brendon had said this man was buying a house for himself and his wife. Wife. I stared at Griz across the breadsticks and the candlelight and felt something ugly move through me. I think it was jealousy, mixed with the feeling of betrayal.
“I hear you are buying a home for your wife. That’s sweet. My fiancé bought my home for me months into our relationship. Where is she from? Here or back home?” I asked, making what seems like small talk.
He chucked, and looked at me directly. “She’s from back home.”
