My heart aches, thinking back over the past couple of weeks with Dash. Bickering with him over sushi… Spinning those wild stories about each other over dinner. Surprising him on the tennis courts—and then being surprised right back by his bird-watching interests, and the way he would light up with enthusiasm, describing a rare breed as we motored through the swamp. And the sex…

Oh, the sex.

I’ve never had passion like that with anyone. Not just the intensity and pleasure—and boy, was there pleasure—but the rest of it, too. Laughing, teasing, feeling totally at ease. Like I didn’t have to pretend to be an easier version of myself just to keep him happy: Less ambitious or driven, the way it’s been with other guys. I could say whatever was on my mind, babble about sheer lipstick recipes for an hour, and he would still be interested—because it was interesting to me.

I sigh. The irony isn’t lost on me: That it took a fake relationship to make me feel the most like myself with a man.

The question is, what am I supposed to do now?

I know what I want – it’s him. Us. But with everything that’s happened, is it already too late?

21

Dash

DING!

A gong rings out, somewhere inches from my head. Or maybe it’s a ceremonial bowl. Either way, the sound is like a klaxon with the hangover I’m nursing. Another late night, another bottle of too-expensive whiskey, wasted on trying to keep my mind off everything that’s happened.

“Now take a deep breath,” my masseuse announces. “Release all the stress in your chakras.”

She digs into my naked back. Hard.

“Oww!” I blurt in surprise.

“You’re carrying a lot of tension in your fifth eye,” she tells me. I sink back onto the table with an annoyed sigh, as music starts to pipe into the room. And is that…?

Enya.

Motherfucking Enya.

“You owe me, man,” I grumble to Austin, who’s face-down on the massage table beside me, getting kneaded and pummeled by another woman. When he asked me along to scope out a new hot spa, research for his own business launch, I figured what the hell. I didn’t expect wind-chimes, crystals, and a masseuse who could double as a dominatrix.

“Right.” Austin snorts. “Because getting a free massage is such a chore. I figured you could use the break,” he adds, “you’ve been wound so tight, you’re getting to be a liability. I thought you were going to start a barroom brawl the other night.”

“They were ordering a shitty import beer,” I grumble. “We’re a classy joint.”

“Yeah, like I said, you’re going to be bad for business if you keep it up.”

I stare at the ten square inches of floor visible through the table cut-out, and wish I could be anywhere but here, someplace hundreds of miles away from the mess that is my life right now. I could do it, too, just pick up, pack a bag, and be gone by tomorrow. Sure, Zelda’s wrath means my trust may be done for good, but it turns out, my canny investments have set me up just fine. I can easily afford a plane ticket, and a first class one at that. So why aren’t I going right now? Racing a yacht around the Caribbean. Rock-climbing out in Colorado. On a beach with the Russian ballet dance corps.