Page 108 of Nothing to Tell

“We’ve done everything we said we would.My birthday was a cherry on top.I appreciate everything you’ve done for me.Everything.”

“What are you saying?”

“You’re off the hook.We’re done.”

“We’re done?”

“We said we were together for a month.A month is over.It’s pumpkin time.”

“Over?”

“Your mom and Keely wanted to make arrangements for the vacation in August.I had to tell them we were done.I would’ve anyway, but… I couldn’t let them make arrangements with me, or for me, when I knew I wouldn’t be around.”

She got up to come join him.

“Just like that?”he asked.“We’re done?”

“You’re free, Bastian,” she said, widening her smile.“Go out there free and single, have some fun.Get back to your life without the crazy chick you met in a basement.”She held out her hand.“Thank you, Bastian.I’ve had the time of my life.You’re an incredible human being and the best man I’ve ever known.Thank you.”

He bypassed her hand to touch her temple and ducked to kiss the top of her head.

“Thank you, Harper.”

What else could he do but accept her position?Superficially at least.Done didn’t mean done.Not to him.

“We want different things.”They want—“That’s what I told your mother.”Slowly she lifted her hand to his face.“Show me,” she whispered.

The smiling, bouncing woman revealed a flicker of something behind the impervious exterior.

If he pushed, she’d run a mile.His instinct was to grab hold and tell her every truth within him.It wouldn’t help.This was the long game.And he’d play it through, even if she didn’t know it.

Obliging her, he smiled, and her thumb moved against his cheek.“Goodbye, Bastian.”

“Call me if you need anything,” he said, taking her hand from his face to kiss her knuckles.

She nodded but her smile faltered.Immediately she turned away as if to hide it.Too late, he’d seen it.Never one to draw out discomfort, she went straight to the door and… though she paused, she didn’t look back, just slipped out of his life.

THIRTY-SEVEN

DAVIS SCOTT NEVER missed a chance to promote his own self-importance.Hence why they were in the midst of a party celebrating Scott Solutions turning thirty.Yep, it was the business’s birthday… Was there going to be cake?

Every client, past and present, had been invited to the hotel ballroom, hired to accommodate them and every contact in their proverbial rolodexes.Not as flashy as a Grand Hotel ballroom, but it did the job.

Adara and Carnell were on the dance floor, her mother and father networked with every new face.Damon and Charissa had disappeared somewhere a while ago.Judging by how they’d been recently, they were either screaming in each other’s faces or ripping their clothes off.

Life ticked along.

Harper put her empty glass aside.

“Would you like another drink?”her date, Donald, asked.

“Yes, thank you.”

And keep ‘em coming.How was she back here again so soon?Life teased her with happiness only to remind her of the true order.She was the woman who couldn’t keep a man, yep, that had been proven once again.

“Wait here,” Donald said.“I’ll be right back.”

They’d seen each other a couple of times that week.Donald was a pleasant enough man to spend time with but standing there examining the smiling, glamorous faces present, her thoughts returned to the man she hadn’t seen for two weeks.Memory had tormented her with him over and over.She couldn’t catch a break.