Total pages in book: 156
Estimated words: 144696 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 723(@200wpm)___ 579(@250wpm)___ 482(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 144696 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 723(@200wpm)___ 579(@250wpm)___ 482(@300wpm)
I liked what we’d been listening to before, so I left it on Sigur Ros and set the iPhone carefully back on my nightstand. Then I reached up and clicked off the light.
In the comforting shelter of his arms, I let myself drift with the melancholy, hopeful strains of the music. The lyrics weren’t in English, and it took my sleepy mind some idle wondering before I remembered that Neil could probably translate them. “What’s this song about?” I murmured sleepily.
I heard him swallow, felt his deep, sudden breath at my back. “He’s describing weathering a storm at sea, in a sailboat. Landing on a rocky shore, thankful just to be alive, while the storm goes on around them.” Neil’s voice was rough, thick with emotion. “We will come out the other side of this, Sophie. And we’ll be stronger for it.”
He wasn’t talking just about the abortion; I didn’t even have to ask to know that. We had a tenuous new start on our relationship, and many challenges ahead of us.
I was grateful we had each other to cling to while we weathered the storm.
CHAPTER FOUR
On Monday morning, Neil had to return to work, and so did I. That is, he had to oversee Rudy’s switch to interim Editor-in-Chief, and I had to go empty out my desk at Porteras for the final time. It was a deja vu situation, since I’d just cleaned out my desk in Neil’s office a few weeks ago to switch to the beauty department.
We’d spent the night in my apartment again, although according to Neil my bed was an instrument of torture. He woke me before he left, leaning down to kiss my cheek. His face was soft and he smelled like aftershave.
“I’m leaving, darling. I’ll send Tony back with the car?” There was a note of concern in Neil’s voice, as though he were worried I would try to carry a carton of my stuff home on the train.
In the past, when we’d been fighting so hard to keep our relationship a secret, I would have rejected the idea outright. But I’d learned from Deja that my involvement with Neil was out, and a huge scandal around the office. I didn’t look forward to even showing up today, let alone doing a walk of shame with all my belongings. I nodded sleepily. “Sure. I’ll get up now and get ready.”
Even though I didn’t work at Porteras anymore, I didn’t want to go into the office and give everyone the impression that I was somehow defeated. I selected my clothing carefully, deciding on dark indigo skinny jeans, a loose and flowing black tunic— to disguise the post-abortion bloat that was making me feel so sexy— and tall black boots. I wound a gray and orange Hermes Camails patterned scarf around my neck. The scarf had been a gift from Gabriella; both Penelope and I had gotten them for Christmas the year before. It seemed crucial that I have some link to that old part of my life so that when I walked into Porteras no one could make me feel like I didn’t belong.
I’d just finished my make-up and my artfully sloppy braided bun when Tony buzzed the intercom. I put on some small hammered silver hoop earrings, grabbed the sturdy cardboard moving box I would take with me to collect my things, and headed into the breach.
“Good morning, Ms. Scaife,” Tony said, holding the door for me.
“Good morning, Tony. I’ll try not to puke back here today,” I quipped, noting that when I climbed into the backseat, it didn’t smell even faintly of vomit. There was no stain on the floor, either.
“Very good, ma’am,” he said, and his stereotypical Noo Yawk accent made the formal phrase sound more personal. “I’m glad you feel better.”
When we arrived at the office, Tony offered to go up with me to carry my things, but I asked him to wait with the car, instead. Like hell I was going to give anyone up there more ammunition to gossip behind my back.
At the security stand in the lobby, I checked in and received a visitor’s pass. That kind of smarted. I rode the elevator up with two other people, neither of them from the magazine, and I got off before they did. The first person I saw in reception was Ivanka, who looked up from the desk with a little smirk.
“Just going to get my stuff,” I said as I strode past her. I hadn’t meant to glance toward Neil’s office, but I did, and I spotted Deja sitting at my old desk.
I had expected every eye in the place to be on me, judging and condemning. I guess I was full of myself, because no one seemed to care at all that I was there. I got one or two curious looks from people as I breezed past their desks, and only one openly hostile glare.