Total pages in book: 107
Estimated words: 106001 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 530(@200wpm)___ 424(@250wpm)___ 353(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 106001 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 530(@200wpm)___ 424(@250wpm)___ 353(@300wpm)
Damn. That’s the way to take charge of your career. “You’re a go-getter.”
“Should I have given two weeks’ notice? When I told Jules I was quitting, she said I was free to go immediately. That I didn’t even need to come back to the office.”
I’m not surprised at all. “It’s fine. Jules said this afternoon she’d found someone else to hire.” I don’t add that Jules felt threatened by Harlow in the first place. Nor do I add that Ian and I basically invented an extra intern position for his daughter. Harlow doesn’t need to know that now.
“Okay, but I feel like I’ve left you high and dry. Can I still help with Afternoon Delight? I want to, Bridger. Can we still work on the idea for the hero’s backstory?”
“Of course,” I say, immediately since it feels like ours. “It’s our idea.”
Besides, working with her like this is safe. Ian wanted me to solve the script problem. And he’s shared story ideas with Harlow for years. The Afternoon Delight project is a natural extension of the nights I’ve spent at Harlow’s home when she was younger. Nights working with her father.
And…nope.
I can’t go there. Not now. Not with her sitting across from me looking so very lovely.
I fight off the thoughts of my partnership with her dad. I only want to think about these nights with this woman, visiting art galleries, checking out love letters.
“Besides, the show needs it,” I add, like dammit, come hell or high water, we’ll fix Afternoon Delight.
“Good. I want to help,” she says.
That gives me a plausible excuse to see her in the evenings. An excuse for Ian if he saw us or called. It’s not as if I can reveal to anyone else that we’re dealing with a story problem.
I’ll take whatever I can get with Harlow. Even with her off the team, there’s no way we can last. There’s too much still at stake. We’re an impossibility. A few nights though? Yes, please.
The server swings by and asks if we’d like a tapas menu. It’s tempting, utterly tempting to order a meal with her.
“Harlow? Are you hungry?”
“Starving,” she says.
We order a few small plates, and it feels like playing hooky as we stay a little longer and nibble on appetizers. Like we’re closing the place down, even though it’s barely past happy hour. “Tell me more about your meeting with the MoMA curator,” I say as I dig into a portobello mushroom.
“I’m going to spend the day tomorrow prepping for it. But I feel ready. I’ve been following her collections ever since I met her. She has an amazing eye,” she says. “And it turns out we both love The Frick.”
“The museum on Fifth Avenue? That used to be a house?”
“Yes! Have you been?”
“Never.”
She gasps playfully, lighting up as she tells me more about the collection, then takes a bite of her tofu satay. When she’s done, she says, “You’d like it there. Maybe someday…you can go,” she says, almost swallowing the we to say you instead.
Like she knows that we won’t happen—her and me at The Frick.
“Maybe I will,” I say, resigned, since realism is easier right now than giving in to the drumbeat in my heart.
As Harlow sets down her fork, finished with the meal, she says my name, firm but a touch desperate. “Bridger?”
“Yes?”
She glances around once more, as if she’s making sure we’re still safe. Her eyes lock with mine. “I meant it when I said I don’t want anything to happen to you.”
My heart slams painfully against my rib cage. Like it’s throwing itself at her. “I know, honey.”
“I thought about it last night. I can’t let something bad happen to you because of this.”
But something already is happening to me. She’s happening to me.
I should stop moving closer to her. Truly I should. She might have removed one jagged rock that could have sliced me. But there are plenty of others below us hidden under the raging river. There’s no way to cross these rapids safely.
There’s her father and the company, and I won’t get past those without getting cut apart.
For now, though, at least I’m not the guy who’s fucking an intern.
On that bitter thought, I push away from the table. “We should go. Because you have to experience some art.”
Her smile is magnetic. It says I understand her completely and in this moment, that’s all we have—our understanding of each other. “I do,” she says.
I pay the bill. I wish I could do this every night for her. And I suppose, I do know how to deal with the gesture she made by quitting.
I want to wrap her in my arms, kiss her for a good, long time, and take her home.
But I can’t.
27
LOST AND FOUND
Bridger
I barely say a word as we wander through the Bettencourt Gallery, past the stark white columns, checking out the letters on the wall. These missives are paired with paintings from modern artists, both capturing the theme of long-distance love.