“Yes, I am,” I confirmed, enunciating every syllable. I was pissed now, his recriminations burning through my guilt like a ball of fire. “I left everything in order for the next person and you have Natasha and Mike to help while you find someone, which you told me should be super easy.” Yeah, I was still mad about that, and so what if I let him hear it. I’d taken pains to never let him see how his indifference got to me. But I didn’t care anymore. “Besides, I don’t know what you’re so mad about, you accepted my resignation, I’m just ending earlier than expected.”

He was silent for so long I thought he’d ended the call. When he spoke again that weird hole in my stomach opened up again.

“You didn’t say you were leaving New York.” Was he—? No...nope, absolutely not going there. Deluding myself that my quitting meant something to this man other than being an inconvenience was going to take my mind places it had no business going. Still, he sounded so off.

“I wasn’t planning to,” I admitted. “I was going to rent a work share space in Astoria, but then a great short-term opportunity came up.” For a second I hesitated. This was all so weird. In three years this man had not expressed any interest in my life and now he sounded on the verge of losing his mind. But what could he do? I was like ten states away. “I have an opportunity to renovate a children’s library, and I’m going to take it.”

The door opened while I pressed the phone to my ear waiting for his response. Probably Julia coming to make sure I wasn’t booking my flight back to New York.

“How much?” Theo croaked, as I held up a finger to my best friend’s questioning look.

“What?”

“How much do you want to come back to work?”

Pure unfiltered fury exploded in my chest.

“Excuse me?” I made myself infuse those two words with as big a fuck you as I could relay over the phone. “I didn’t do this so you’d offer me more money,” I said through gritted teeth. “I know this might be hard for you to believe but getting you coffee is not exactly my life’s goal.”

“If you want to do a renovation, I have jobs I can give you. I could—”