I feel even more shit in the morning but ignore Ant’s advice of hand in your resignation right now, baby, and stay in bed. I force myself up and out and down to the office, and don’t check my phone for any more have you done it yet messages from Ant, because I know they’ll be there.
No. I haven’t done it yet, and I don’t do it. The letter stays in my draft folder.
“Come on, sweetheart,” Ant says over dinner once I’m done for the day. “Surely the right time must be coming?”
“Soon,” I reply, but don’t want to talk about it, just tell him I feel a bit wobbly and ask him to come to bed.
He does come to bed, and I fall asleep in a heartbeat, still exhausted from last night’s fuck and drink fest.
I reach work feeling a bit less trashed on Wednesday morning, but I still don’t send that letter. Ant pings me with a frosty why not? message at lunchtime, and he’s in a bad mood when I get home. He tells me how he wishes I’d take advantage of the opportunity most women would crave and devote myself to our life together – a life without the stress of a career and going to work every day.
You deserve it, baby, can’t you see that?
I can’t see that, though. I just don’t want to send in my resignation letter.
Thursday morning he gets frustrated as soon as I open my eyes, saying that the Wedding Bliss management team should at least get a bit of notice before the weekend, so they can begin advertising for a new member of staff as quickly as possible.
“Come on, Cass. With summer coming and the weddings rolling in, don’t you think it’s fair to give someone the chance they need to get into their role and prepare?”
He asks if I’ve told Janie my plans yet as I eat my breakfast porridge, letting out a sigh as I shake my head.
“Why not? Surely she deserves to know before your boss does?”
He’s probably got a point, but still, I don’t tell Janie when she asks me how I’m doing when I step into work. I hold back from telling her anything, just claim I’m still having a few issues with my stomach bug and back out of swimming tonight.
No big deal, I say. No big deal.
I get home to find I’m almost relieved when Ant announces he has another mattress night lined up for me.
This one is easier. Another group of well-suited guys who treat me like a cheap piece of meat, but there is no slapping or latex this time. It only takes a few hours to get them off at least twice over. I manage to come twice over myself as they cheer me on, telling me to use my clit like a slut and show them how loud it makes me moan.
I only down one bottle of De Chante tonight, so my retches aren’t quite so severe when I recover in the aftermath. My gift tonight is a pretty new handbag. A red one with a big silver clasp that looks like it must have cost thousands – because it probably did.
Then it’s Friday.
I wake up to find Ant staring at me in bed with a very determined expression on his face.
“You really need to do it today, baby,” he says. “Send that letter this morning. Believe me, it’s time.”
“What do you mean?” I ask, but he taps his nose.
His smile is beautiful as he strokes my hair from my face.
“Be ready for it,” he whispers, “because tonight is going to change our world.”
I get a weird tingle in my stomach, and it’s not from my hangover. It’s something in his eyes that speaks more than words. He’s not talking about the mattress room. It’s his Jekyll side that kisses me before I get up and leave for work.
He looks at me like I’m a goddess as I walk to my car, blowing me a kiss from the doorway as I drive away.
Something is coming. He has something planned.
I don’t know what it is, and I don’t want to dance around the topic in my mind. I don’t say a thing to Janie, and I try not to let myself question it, just try to do what he asks of me.
I have to.
This is what he needs.
I hover with my finger over the send button. My resignation letter is attached to the email to head office and ready to go.
But I can’t.
Still, I can’t.
I look around my office and I don’t want to leave Wedding Bliss. I don’t want to leave Janie, or my career, or the clients’ plans we’ve been working on so hard. Not yet, anyway. Not yet.
I think Janie and I are done with our appointments on Friday afternoon when the door opens unexpectedly. I’m busy with orders, my email in the background still loaded up with my resignation letter, unsent, so I don’t notice who’s arrived until I hear Janie’s voice give a hey, Claire!