Set a routine for yourself every day. Don’t just lie in bed wanting to die.
Always wear something pretty. It’s hard to be depressed when you’re wearing a gorgeous dress.
Don’t let yourself fall too far off the wagon. You don’t want to be a total wreck when you’re finally ready to get back out there.
I’m not sure if these pearls of wisdom are meant to be taken seriously or if Sam is just trying to make me laugh. Either way, by the time he holds the mirror up to my face with a theatrical, “Voila,” I’m feeling better than I have since I opened Ethan’s door to find Brandon on his front porch. And that’s before I see the absolutely astonishing job Sam has done on my makeup.
“What do you think?” he asks, as I stare at myself wide-eyed in the mirror.
“I think you’re a miracle worker.”
He preens under the praise. “I try, doll. I try.” He grabs a couple of face cards from his drawer and says, “Now, let me show you exactly what I did so you can do it at home.”
“I’m not sure that’s possible,” I tell him.
“Of course it is,” he answers, waving off my concerns.
I spend the next thirty minutes getting a step-by-step tutorial from Sam on how I can make myself look like this every day. I’m still not sure that he didn’t wave some kind of magic wand and do this to me, but I’m willing to take his word for it. At least until the first time I try out the look and make a total disaster of it.
Tori insists on buying me everything Sam recommends, even though I try to pay for it myself—what are credit cards for if not to splurge when your heart has been ripped out of your chest? Another pearl of wisdom from Sam, by the way. And though I still feel a long way from okay, I have to admit I feel better than I have in days.
It’s a start.
We spend the rest of the weekend eating ice cream and watching Titanic and a bunch of other love stories that don’t end well. Nothing like a sinking ship and thousands of dead people to put my own life and breakup in perspective.
Or at least make it seem just a little less traumatic.
By the time Monday morning rolls around, I’ve actually gotten close to eight hours of sleep over the weekend—a record for me in the last couple of weeks. And if I’m not exactly feeling refreshed, at least the hour I spend on my makeup is enough to make me look like I am.
It’s a big day for the legal department. We’re heading over to the Trifecta building to hammer out the last major parts of the merger agreement today—parts that deal specifically with intellectual property acquisition. We’ve been working toward this meeting for weeks and I only hope that it goes well. Otherwise I’ll be buried in patent research for the rest of the summer.
I dress carefully in the same old suit I wear for everything important. I even put on the Louboutins Tori got me that I haven’t worn since they crippled my feet on my first day at Frost Industries. With my makeup done and my hair twisted up into a complicated chignon, I feel as ready for the meeting as I’m going to get. Not that I’ll actually be doing anything but taking notes and looking up case law if that becomes necessary, but it’s still good to look the part.
Fake it ’til you make it. My own personal motto.
And it works, too. At least better than wallowing has. Maybe Tori knew what she was talking about, after all.
I feel almost okay as I pull up to the office. Or, at least, more okay than I’ve felt in a while. That isn’t saying much, but I’m going with it. I gain a little more confidence as I walk through the building and rack up a couple of compliments from people that I pass. And by the time we walk into the boardroom at Trifecta, I’ve almost managed to relegate Ethan to a sideshow in my brain instead of the main attraction. It won’t last—it never does—but I’ll take it as long as I can get it. Thinking about him once a minute instead of sixty times a minute is a big improvement. Or at least that’s what I tell myself.
And that, of course, is when my whole carefully constructed day comes tumbling down around my ears. Because even though he’s supposed to be in Paris right now in the middle of some global conference, he’s here. Right here. In front of me.
Looking as tired and strung out and miserable as I feel.
I have one second to assimilate his presence before he notices me. In that moment, my heartbeat triples, I start to sweat and adrenaline races through my body. Full-on fight-or-flight response.
I’m just about to flee—the response exists for a reason—when he glances up, his gaze sweeping over the whole group of us until it finds mine and locks on.
For long seconds he doesn’t blink, doesn’t move, doesn’t so much as breathe. And neither do I. How can I when I’m staring into his eyes—his beautiful, haunted, storm-tossed eyes—and can see everything I feel, everything I fear, reflected back at me.
“Chloe,” he whispers my name and as he does, I feel every ounce of protection I’ve built around myself—and my trembling, traitorous heart—collapse.
Chapter Seven
Ethan. Ethan. Ethan.
His name is pounding in my blood, a mantra in my soul.
Ethan. Ethan. Ethan.