I nodded, acknowledging him without words, because I didn’t trust myself to speak.
“There are still some clothes of yours in my room and in the laundry room. Feel free to finish getting ready—take a shower if you need to, use the bathroom, eat breakfast. I’ll be in here finishing this. And I guess just keep me in the loop of what you plan to do with all this.”
“I don’t want any of this. Throw it all away for all I care.” I swallowed down my need to cry. Although this time, my tears were made of more than anger. They were mixed with pain. Pure agony. An absolute broken heart, unlike I’d ever experienced before. If I thought flying home after Vegas alone was bad, nothing compared to walking back to his room alone.
After almost twenty minutes of sitting on the edge of his bed with my head in my hands, crying unlike I’d ever cried before, I finally managed to pull myself together enough to get ready and leave. As pathetic as it was to cry in his room by myself, it proved to be therapeutic, because it reminded me how I was the only one I could depend on to wipe away my tears.
And as I drove away with my clothes in bags in the back seat, I was reminded that superheroes don’t exist. Not even the ones who didn’t have powers from other planets. In fact, it was the first time I believed that I had a better chance of running into a man who could fly than I did finding a man who wore a mask at night to fight the bad guys. I learned I needed to start believing in the ones who’d been bitten by an insect and suddenly had superhuman powers, or the ones created in a lab.
Because real heroes didn’t exist.
No one would come rescue me.
As I drove away from Holden York, I learned just how alone I was.
“I must say, Janelle, your call surprised us all.” Samantha Verdurmen, one of the producers on the show, sat across from me at a large mahogany desk in New York City. “Last time we spoke to Connor, he said you two were planning a wedding for next summer.”
“Well, things happened unexpectedly.” Even though I sat here with a smile on my face, it didn’t mean my heart had stopped hurting. It remained shattered in my chest, but I chose to ignore it, doing what I did best—moving on and turning my back to the past. “As you’re aware, I had to get divorced, so that took some time.”
“And I see you’ve gotten the papers signed?” She picked up the envelope and pulled out the papers with Holden’s signature scratched along the bottom. I hadn’t even looked at it, unable to see his name in ink, dried, dissolving the marriage I had just barely gotten to enjoy.
After leaving Holden’s house, I didn’t know where else to go, so I stayed at a hotel for a couple of days while Connor helped me sort it all out. He’d called the show and found out the next steps we needed to take. We’d planned this meeting so they could guide us in how to proceed. They’d even set us up in a fancy two-bedroom suite.
“I won’t lie, Miss Brewer, I didn’t expect you’d get these signed. We were thinking you had changed your mind.”
I glanced at the other people in the room—none of whom I recognized. They were all suits, leaning back in their leather chairs, executives in every sense of the word, regarding me silently. Samantha was the only one who spoke, and even she remained vague most of the time.
“Well, if I’m being honest, I almost did change my mind. By the time those papers were signed, I wasn’t the one who asked for it.” I couldn’t keep the pain from my voice any longer. It may have been a week since I walked out of his house with the envelope in my hand, but that didn’t make it hurt any less. In fact, if anything, it only made it worse. Because I hadn’t heard one word from him.
I’d spoken to my family—each of them—at least once since I left, telling them I had gone to New York with friends for a girls’ trip I completely made up, and not one of them even mentioned his name. It hurt. A lot. But I had to forge on. I couldn’t dwell on his decision, because in the end, he’d made it based on my actions. On my inability to communicate to Connor regarding my feelings and desires for Holden. I was the only one to blame.
But the thing that hurt most, even though I hadn’t truly expected it, is that he hadn’t come after me. He’d dropped me just like he had after Vegas.
“So what happened? Why the change of heart on his part?” she asked, sounding more like a reporter than the producer of a lame reality show.
“It doesn’t matter.” I sat up straighter, hoping my body language conveyed that this topic was off limits. “What’s important is that I did my part, got the papers signed, and now all that’s left is to marry Connor and then collect our money.”
“Well, you still have to file for the divorce. This is only step one.” She held up the folder. “If you’d like, we have an attorney on staff who could represent you and have this taken care of on your behalf.”
I hesitated, really thought about her offer. It sounded like a dream, not having to deal with the reality of the dissolution of a marriage I’d only recently started to accept. It would mean I could move on and lick my wounds, while working toward collecting the check—the whole reason I was even in this position to begin with.
We spoke a bit more. I asked her questions about the attorney and how filing the papers worked, about how long it would all take and when I would be able to legally marry Connor. She asked me some questions about my views on marriage and if I thought Connor and I would be able to make a real go of things. I almost laughed at her when she asked me that. Our prize money wasn’t contingent on our relationship, so I didn’t have to be in love with him or even pretend we were getting married for the right reasons. Certain I had nothing to lose—and no one else to talk to—I chose to be honest with her and everyone in the room. I opened up about Holden and where things stood before I woke up that fateful morning. I explained how I’d felt before and after he chose to kick me out of his bed, his house, and his life, all within fifteen minutes.
It seemed that was enough to get Samantha to finally cut the act. Her hard exterior began to soften as we spoke, and she offered me insight and even a few unsought words of advice. I replayed them in my head over and over on the way back to the hotel. On the way back to Connor. In all honesty, I felt lost. Her words helped more than they hurt, but that still didn’t mean I had all the answers. At least I knew the game plan and what I wanted to do. I’d decided where I wanted to go after here and how I planned to get there. If only I could find out what I’d had to drink that night in Vegas that made me black out, because I’d get an IV of it this minute if it would erase all memory of this heartache.