“Miller lives next door,” I tell her. “His apartment is the one to my right. We share a balcony. Well, we don’t share it, but the wall is so short, we might as well be living together.”

“Huh?” She starts looking around, as if trying to remember something and then says, “Shit.”

“Danielle?” I ask, knowing she did something I won’t be happy about. “Fess up.”

She chews her lip. “Right, he’s the same guy from yesterday. Remember I told you about your hot as fuck neighbor. Oops, sorry. I didn’t know.”

“What do you mean sorry?”

“I broke the sister code,” she confesses. “Yesterday, I was flirting with him.”

She frowns and says, “Dude, you know what he told me?”

I shake my head. “I bet you’re going to give me the 4-1-1.”

Her shoulders slump. She curses under her breath. “He has a girlfriend.”

“Oh,” I say, surprised. What surprises me more is I feel as if something squeezes my heart. My chest feels tight. “That’s so unlike him.”

“What do you mean?”

“I already told you, after he broke up with his fiancée, he swore off relationships.”

“Maybe he has an open relationship,” she suggests and shrugs. “Like swingers—or something like that.”

“Then he would’ve slept with you instead of mentioning her,” I point out the flaw of her theory.

“Well, either way, it’s a good thing we didn’t go too far. I’d hate to say, ‘Sorry I slept with your ex.’”

“Miller isn’t my ex. He’s the guy I slept with during a trip and my ex-boss.”

“Hey, you don’t have to tweak the story and pretend he’s nothing,” she says firmly. “I’ve been with you since you moved to New York, I know what happened and how much you hurt.”

There’s a knock on the door. Flint, one of my account executives, opens it and says, “Breakfast is here, ladies.”

“Thank you,” I say, putting on my shoes.

“Time to celebrate the grand opening,” I say.

“Maybe you should get closure,” Danielle, who just can’t let things go, mentions while we walk toward the conference room. “You can tell the world you’re over, but I know you well. When you’re ready, we can talk about whatever you’re really feeling because he’s too close.”

“I’m okay.” Or I will be once I see him lose everything and he feels the pain I felt.

Thirty-Four

Claire

One day, I’m going to look back on my life and wonder why I thought moving was such a great idea.

“I hate moving,” I complain, as we walk out of the building.

So far, this decision has been a pain in the ass. I’m sleep deprived. It took hours for the IT department to connect the computers, and Miller is still alive.