Total pages in book: 139
Estimated words: 133321 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 667(@200wpm)___ 533(@250wpm)___ 444(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 133321 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 667(@200wpm)___ 533(@250wpm)___ 444(@300wpm)
“Mia!” she says. “Grayson is looking for you. He’s worried sick. What’s happening?”
“I need you to come to me. I need you.”
“Are you okay?”
“I’m not dying or anything, even if I feel like it. Just come.”
“Where are you?” she asks, urgently.
“I don’t know. Hold on.” I push to my feet and flip on a light.
“You don’t know?!” she asks incredulously. “Were you kidnapped? Do we need the police? Are you okay?”
“If only those things were true.” I sit down on the king-sized bed with a stupid orange comforter, when orange happens to be Grayson’s favorite color. Or not. I don’t know what is real anymore. “I’m in a Holiday Inn in Queens. I just told the cab driver to take me wherever.” I give her the address.
“I got it. Mia, what is going on?”
“Just come here and do not, and I mean do not, tell Grayson where I am or you aren’t a friend.” I hang up and walk to the window, pulling open the basic cream-colored curtains to spy the “liquor” sign. I’m not a drinker, but I need to be sedated right now.
I glance down and realize I’ve smartly settled my purse over my chest and it rests at my hip. Smartly, because I’m really barely hanging on right now. I find the key to the room on the floor by the door and grab it, sticking it in my purse. A short walk down the hallway and I’m exiting onto a street in what looks like a crappy neighborhood, but hey, I grew up in a crappy neighborhood. I’m just fine in this one. I cross the street, enter the store and walk to the counter. “Where’s the cheapest bubbly you have?”
The lady behind the counter, who has dark hair speckled with gray and seems to be missing a front tooth, looks me up and down. “You don’t look like you need cheap. That’s an expensive purse at your hip which means your outfit is expensive, too.”
“Yeah, well, I’d tell you I had a rich guy that fucked around on me and now I’m alone, but I bought these clothes and the purse on my own. And you bet your ass they’re expensive. I worked for them, not him, because I don’t need his damn money. It was never about his money.”
“Wow, honey. Fridge. Far right. Buy two. Spumante. It tastes good when everything else tastes bad.”
“How much?”
“Ten dollars a bottle.”
I yank a hundred out of my purse and stick it on the counter. “Keep the change. He’s buying the booze.”
She hands me a paper bag and two plastic cups. “One for now and one for later,” she says.
A few minutes later, I enter my room, struggle to get the stupid bottle to pop and then sit down on the loveseat against the wall where I guzzle the bubbly right from the bottle. My phone starts ringing, on the nightstand where I apparently left it, and I take my bottle with me to check it just in case it’s Courtney. It’s not. It’s Eric.
I answer. “What do you want, Eric?”
“He didn’t do it, Mia. He’s devastated. He’s freaking out. It was a set-up. He was—”
“Stop. Just stop. You’re his best friend. You’re like brothers. You’d say anything to protect him.”
“I would, but I’m not. He didn’t do this. He loves you. He needs you.”
“I’m not coming back. I’ll send the ring. I’ll send my credit cards he gave me. I don’t want his money. I don’t want him or that job either.”
“Mia, be reasonable.”
“Reasonable?! Did you really just say that to me? Go away and take him with you.”
“Mia. Mia.” Suddenly, I’m not talking to Eric anymore and it’s not him saying my name.
At the sound of Grayson’s voice, I can’t breathe. I hurt so badly. So very badly. “Go away,” I whisper, but I’m not even sure he can hear me. I hang up and throw my phone. I start to cry again and I don’t stop until my phone rings like ten times in a row.
“Courtney,” I whisper and I force myself to get up, kicking off my heels to pad across the carpet. My phone confirms Courtney has called four times. I call her back.
“Which room?” she asks.
I open my door and look at the number. “331.”
“I’m on my way up.”
I flip the lock to prop the door open and walk to the sofa, where I sit down. I’ve downed another drink and I’m starting to feel the blessed buzz when Courtney appears in the doorway, her blonde hair in disarray, her red dress ripped. “What happened?”
“Don’t ask.” She shuts the door and drops her purse on the floor. “He called me. He says—”
“I walked in on him with Becky’s naked breasts pressed against him.”
“He says she—”
“Don’t. Don’t you too. I saw it. Do you not understand that I saw it?” My phone rings in my hand and I toss it. “Just help me plan the rest of my life without him.”