He’s not going to be interested. He’ll take one look at me and decide I’m a bunny who’s after his money.
I shake my head.
He needs to know. But there is no way I’m asking him for anything.
Somehow, I’ll figure out a way to do this myself.
Sure, there have been a few bumps in the road, but I’ve managed this far without any help, and I’m sure I can handle this.
With freshly washed hair and a full face of makeup, I feel almost myself as I walk into the salon almost two hours later. The only issue is what I’m carrying. A decaf coffee.
I started ordering it the day I first got suspicious, just in case. Turns out, I made the right decision.
“Holy shit,” I gasp as I push the door open into our small staff room area out the back and find Sienna standing in the middle of the room with a bowl of oatmeal in her hand.
Sienna stares at me in surprise. “Didn’t you just park next to my car?”
I think back…did I?
“Yeah,” I mutter, assuming that I must have. “I just wasn’t expecting you to be right there.”
Sienna studies me, her brows pinching.
“So you’re not totally okay then?” she accuses.
I hold up my takeout cup. “I will be after this.” It’s bullshit, of course. Decaf coffee fixes nothing. But she doesn’t need to know that.
I’m going to tell Sienna. She’ll more than likely be the first person I confide in, but not yet. I need to get my head around it all before I burden someone else with my issues.
She puts a spoonful of oatmeal in her mouth before smirking at me. She looks guilty as fuck.
“What have you done?”
“Nuffin,” she mumbles around her breakfast.
“Sienna,” I half warn, half laugh.
“Ugh, fine. I managed to get two tickets to next week’s playoff game. You’ll come, right?”
Up until three weeks ago, I had managed to escape all invitations to watch hockey with Sienna. It helped that herbrother was here and used to watch with her. But since he’s moved out of town, she’s lost her partner in crime. And I fear I may have shown just a little too much enthusiasm last time.
Everett Donnelly is a bad influence.
“You won’t have to see him. He probably won’t even know you’re there. Our seats are up with the gods. They’ll be teeny tiny little people on the ice with no chance of picking us out in the crowd.”
Sienna looks at me with her big, pleading eyes, and I find myself crumbling faster than a pack of cards.
“Fine. Fine. But I am not wearing his jersey again.”
As each day passes,my nerves about stepping back inside that arena only grow.
But as much as I don’t want to do it, I know that at some point, I’m going to have to.
Some way, somehow, I have to tell Everett.
I’ve tried coming up with a million different scenarios, all of which are almost impossible.
The fantasy of him walking into my salon because he’s desperate to see me again, sweeps me into his arms, and tells me that he never wants to let go, is probably the most unbelievable of them all, but that doesn’t stop it from floating around my head regardless.
