Total pages in book: 105
Estimated words: 103050 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 515(@200wpm)___ 412(@250wpm)___ 344(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 103050 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 515(@200wpm)___ 412(@250wpm)___ 344(@300wpm)
“Well, let me know if Willow is…if you need me to come back. You know I’m always around the corner.”
“You’re still not thinking about a place of your own?”
“Let me know how it goes, will you?” I ask her. “I want to know how Willow takes it.” My life has been lived in two parts—the time my older sister Penny was alive and then after she died. I don’t want Willow to have to divide her memories up like that. It changes you.
“Willow loves Ray.”
The idea that my daughter could love a man who wasn’t me bristles at my collar. “It’s a change. A disruption. You don’t know how she’ll take it.”
Gabby sighs. “I’ll send you a text.”
I nod. “Congratulations. I want you to be happy, Gabby.”
“I know. I want you to be happy too.”
“I am happy,” I say, and I head to the front door. I have everything I could ever need. Everything works.
“If you say so,” she says. “Speak to you later.”
I step out into the heat of early June in New York, yet a shiver passes down my spine.
Gabby’s engaged.
Will she want Ray to stay over?
I pull in a breath and try not to think about how their engagement might change things. It won’t. It can’t. Our arrangement works for everyone. Why would she want to disrupt that? She wouldn’t. She’s a good mother. She knows our nesting arrangement works for Willow.
It works for me.
I don’t want any changes.
FOUR
Aurora
Obviously I’m familiar with the way New York looks. But I was not prepared for how different it would feel to any city I’ve ever visited. Everything’s bigger. Louder. More intense.
I landed the day before yesterday, exactly one month since my phone call with Avril, and today is my first shift. I was supposed to start tomorrow, but I asked to come in today. Sundays see a lot of guest turnover and I want to see the hotel at its busiest. That’s when I can get a real feel for the place.
As I make my way on foot along Fifth Avenue to Hotel on Ninth Street, I glance down at the pavement, which isn’t made from the usual slab or tarmac. It seems to be concrete. My mind starts to wander—how can two countries have such different pavements? Is it the weather? Is concrete easier to maintain? Why is everything so different?
Luckily for me, it’s only a five-minute walk between my apartment that Avril arranged for me and the hotel. At least I haven’t had to navigate public transport. It might have tipped me over the edge and sent me packing back to Woolton.
When I went back to my apartment on Saturday night, after a day of sightseeing, I burst into tears. I’d made such a rash decision—left a job I’d been in nearly twenty years and my friends and family to come to a place I didn’t know. What had I been thinking?
Eventually, I reminded myself that I couldn’t keep doing what I’d been doing because I didn’t want to keep getting what I’d been getting. I need to stop just letting life happen to me and make decisions. I’m only in New York for three months. Even if I go back home afterwards and it takes me a while to find a job, at least I’ll be able to look back at my life and talk about that one summer I worked in New York City.
I ignore the dull ache in my stomach at the thought that I won’t be telling those stories to my grandchildren, but my gaze hits the ground, watching the feet overtaking me and coming toward me.
Out of nowhere, something hits me. Or maybe I hit it. It’s not a wall, it’s another body, crashing into mine. I’m shoved into the wall next to me and I almost lose my balance, but I reach out and steady myself using the building I’ve been thrown against. My chest feels warm and wet.
I scream and step back, sliding against the wall, like that’s going to help.
I don’t fall over, but I glance down and see coffee all over my white shirt.
I’m wearing someone’s morning pick-me-up.
Suddenly, I’m aware of a person standing over me. The same person who rammed into me.
I look up, waiting for the barrage of apologies I’m about to receive.
Instead, a very tall man in a dark suit blocks out the sun. “You need to look where you’re going,” he growls.
I don’t know if it’s his piercing blue eyes, his British accent, or the fact he’s so rude that shocks me most.
I scowl, but I don’t reply. I’m too taken aback that anyone could be so obnoxious…and have such blue, blue eyes. He’s like a cat. Or a character in the romantasy novel I’m currently reading. His hair is glossy black and his jaw razor sharp, and even though he looks like he wants to kill me, I can’t help but wondering how any man got so good-looking.