Page 88 of The Night We Lost Him

The bottom line was that she hadn’t been nice. Not then, and not in their subsequent meetings since.

And now, of all days, Cory had arrived early to her train and saw Liam and Cece having a drink at the Oyster Bar. They were sitting a little too close, drinking their martinis, Cece leaning into him.

“Cory. She made an offer for the company. I had to hear her out.”

“And?”

“And I declined.”

“You think you deserve praise for that?” she asked.

“Of course not.”

Cory shook her head. “You’re wasting time.”

“Hers?”

“Mine.” She met his eyes. “My time. I thought you weren’t getting back from San Francisco until next week.”

That was the plan. He was opening a property not too far from Pfeiffer Beach, a stunning private retreat with twenty treehouses high up over the ocean, offering unparalleled views of the rock and the water and that rugged coastline. And, of equal importance, offering him a place to hide. And he was—in too many ways—hiding at the moment. Most obviously, from Sylvia, his soon-to-be ex-wife, and from the second family he’d failed. He was even hiding from Cory. Which was to say he was hiding from himself.

“I tried to reach you as soon as I landed,” he said. “Check your phone.”

“I’m not checking my phone. If you say you called, you called.”

“I flew in for Sam’s game tomorrow. They made States. I couldn’t miss it.”

She paused, studied him, as if figuring out whether she believed him. This was the worst part.

“We don’t keep things from each other. That was always the deal.”

“It’s still the deal,” he said. “The only reason I didn’t mention Cece is because it’s a nonissue.”

“Because, to be clear, I don’t care if you sell to Cece,” she said. “What I care about is that you’ve told me that you never want to sell to anyone. Especially to a place as corporate as the Salinger Group, which will take everything you built and turn it into something you don’t recognize.”

“I know.”

“You shouldn’t need me to remind you of that. You shouldn’t need anyone to.”

This was going the wrong way. But Liam didn’t know how to stop it. Because this was about Cece and it was about more than Cece. It was about all the choices Liam was making these days, enduring (as he was) the final gasps of his second marriage.

The conductor called out that the train was boarding, and Cory turned to go. He reached for her arm, tried to stop her. She wasn’t having it.

“Would you take the later train? Can we go sit somewhere and talk this through?”

“Are you going to tell me why you were really having a drink with her?”

“What?”

“People say no over the phone, Liam. That’s what the phone is for.”

He didn’t say anything. What was he going to say? She was right. And now he had to acknowledge it to himself. A part of him, a tiny part of him, had wanted to know what Cece had to say.

Cory hoisted her handbag higher on her shoulder and turned to walk down the track. He reached for her arm. He reached quickly to stop her. His skin against her skin. His mouth by her ear.

“Please don’t go.”

He knew she’d say no. He knew it before the words even came out of her mouth. “I’m not missing my class,” she said. “Besides, we aren’t getting anywhere good…”

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