37

Liliana

Like a fool, I’d stayed awake far too long waiting to see if Alistair would call or come to my room after dinner. But he hadn’t even texted me.

I hadn’t left early for sympathy or attention, but after our night together, I thought maybe he’d have reached out. He’d clearly been far too busy with Veronica to worry about that.

Not only that, I was worried about what Bethany might do or say after finding out about me and Alistair.

But I could just deny it. She had no proof. It was her word against mine. Still, it made me anxious knowing that she could jeopardize my career at Donague.

Instead of lying in bed feeling crummy, I decided that my work was done. Anything else between Avalon Spirits and Hard Rock could be handled by Benedict and Alistair directly. I really didn’t want to be on the same flight as Alistair or Bethany, and be forced to sit through the awkwardness.

I changed my flight to the first one I thought I could catch. Then I sent an email to Bethany and the team, letting them know I’d be in the office in the morning.

By the time the plane took off, Alistair still hadn’t called or texted. With it on airplane mood, I wouldn’t hear from anyone until we landed. I tried to watch a movie but couldn’t stop thinking about Alistair.

Had he spent the night with Veronica? I couldn’t bring myself to think that. But the way he enjoyed her attention, at the very least, it was a possibility.

Get out before your heart gets broken, Liliana.

I tried to focus on the stupid comedy I’d picked. But I knew my heart was already cracking and about to shatter. If I wanted to avoid heartbreak, I’d have to go back nearly four years and start over.

I didn’t turn my phone on right away after I landed. I suspected he’d at least texted, maybe wondering where I was by that point. And I just wasn’t ready to deal with it.

After I got back into my car, I went straight to the office from the airport. I figured I might as well fill Charity in. Maybe I could finish that, and I’d be able to think about something else for the rest of the day.

The problem was that I didn’t have other campaigns to work on at that moment. Alex wanted all my energy on the Hard Rock account, so he’d cleared my schedule.

I needed to talk to him and let him know that I could take on more work. At least it would be a distraction.

The minute I stepped through the doors, someone shouted. “There she is! Kicking ass and taking no names!” Maddie ran up to me and pulled me into a tight hug.

“You heard already?”

“Heard you guys killed it! Benedict called this morning and gave us the good news. I mean, they want to see Hard Rock before any legal documents are signed, but they made a handshake deal. It’s all but in the bag!”

I chuckled. “Yeah, they were pretty impressed.”

I stopped by Charity’s office to let her know it went well.

“You and Bethany did a great job,” she said.

Alex stopped by to pat me on the back.

I should have been as giddy with excitement as Maddie was. Instead, I felt miserable. As Alex opened the door to leave, I turned in my chair.

“Now that Avalon Spirits is pretty clearly on board, can I be assigned to a different account? Maybe let Bethany handle the next steps?”

Alex and Charity blinked slowly at me like I’d lost my mind. Then Alex shook his head.

“I’d really prefer you stay on it. You’ve done such a fine job already, Liliana. And I’m sure Alistair would be disappointed to— wait, has something happened that I should know about? Something that makes you want to drop the account?”

Shit. Did Bethany say something to them?

By Alex’s reaction, I didn’t think she had. It must be something else he was asking. Sometimes, agency managers, especially women, got harassed by male clients.

It had never personally happened to me, but it sounded like that was what he was trying to find out.

“No, nothing like that,” I assured him.

He sighed in relief. “Then can I ask why you want to be reassigned?”

Because I was crazy? Because I was afraid of falling for a man who clearly wasn’t into committed relationships?

I thought of the promotion and how dropping an account like this wouldn’t be a good look for it.

“It’s not really that I want to be reassigned. I just feel like I need something else too. Maybe if—”

Alex snapped his fingers. “I’ve got you. I don’t want you to focus on one thing so much that you burn out, either. Let me see what I can do.”

He was gone before I could try to explain further. I knew he’d give me another account, probably just something minor for the time being. But maybe that would help.

Back at my desk, I finally took my phone off airplane mode. Several buzzes and beeps later, I put it down again. The messages could wait. But then it rang, a new call, so I took a deep breath and answered it.

“Why did you leave?” Alistair asked, sounding hurt and confused. We’d planned on spending some time together here before our flight that afternoon.

“I just felt the need to get back,” I said. “I hope you still went and saw the things you wanted to.”

“I spent a lot of time looking for you. Liliana, what’s going on?”

“Nothing, I just—”

“Liliana,” he said firmly. “Tell me what’s happening here. You justleft, and I don’t understand why.”

“We had a wonderful night together.”

“Night and morning,” he added pointedly.

“Night and morning. And I think we should keep it as that. A one-time thing.”

“Two times,” he pointed out, sounding annoyed. “Two nights, Liliana. And I definitely need a lot more than that with you.”

“It was a fun night, but I think we got carried away with—”

“Stop it. It’s more than that. You know that.”

Was it? Did I? I needed to get off the phone or I was going to do something really stupid like fuckingcry.

“Alistair, I’m at work. I can’t really talk about this right now.”

“Meet me when you get off. Or better yet, I’ll come to you. We need to talk about this.”

“I realize what’s happened hasn’t been entirely professional, but—”

“Fuck professional, Liliana. I want to talk about us. Let me come over when you get home tonight.”

Our professional relationship, even if he didn’t care about that at the moment, really was at the heart of my decision-making. It had to be.

How things ended between us would affect the account and my ability to represent Hard Rock. I couldn’t just run away and hide from this like a little girl.

“Come over at seven, and we can talk.”

“I’ll see you then.”

I somehow managed to focus on work for the rest of the day, maybe because I knew I didn’t need to think about Alistair until seven o’clock. I could put it off that long, at least.

Alistair pulled into my driveway fifteen minutes early.