Page 25 of 10 Days to Ruin

I find that hard to believe. Not because Lora wouldn’t be happy for me—she’s the single sweetest person on staff—but because these don’t exactly look like happy tears.

This is sobbing-widow-at-a-funeral behavior. This is…

“Lora,” I say carefully, “did Ethan break up with you?”

She blinks up at me. I can only watch in horror as her huge puppy dog eyes slowly fill to the brim with more and more tears… Then the dam bursts.

Lora hurls herself at me and starts full-on bawling. “I JUSD BISS HIM DO BUCH?—”

“She turned German from trauma,” Gina whispers.

I shoot Gina a withering glare and pat Lora stiffly on the back. “There, there. I’m so sorry. You deserve better.”

I don’t know any of that for sure. I’ve never even met Ethan, or Damian, or Connor, or Brett, or Alan, or whatever letter of the alphabet Lora’s currently on. She is the kind of colleague we exchange gossip with, but not much else. We grab drinks after work if the stars align. And she does such a good job of keeping us up with her love life drama that we don’t really have to go hunting for it.

Some unkind people—read: Gina—might call Lora a chronic oversharer. Me? I’m glad she spares me the trouble of talking about my own life.

“HE WAZ DE BEST THIG OB MY LIBE?—”

I exchange a helpless look with Gina over Lora’s heaving shoulders. “Fire escape?” I whisper. She gives me the thumbs up and we start to shepherd Lora that way.

The sign above the propped-open window saysEmergency Exit, and this definitely qualifies as an emergency. Emotionally speaking, if nothing else.

I settle Lora down on the nearest landing, and eventually, she takes enough calming breaths to speak English again. “It just happened so fast.”

I frown. I was admittedly not paying very close attention when she first started talking about her “new beau,” but I’m almost positive she met him less than six weeks ago. Her tear ducts have no sense of time, apparently. I’ve lent her my shoulder to cry on. I wish I was speaking metaphorically, but my jacket has now become the dry cleaner’s problem. “I thought things were going great between you two?”

“They were! But then he started saying that he—that I—” Fresh tears well up and she dissolves again.

“It’s okay, sweetheart,” I say, patting her back. “We get it.”

Gina frowns. “We do?”

“Yes,” I snap, “we do. We all know the feeling of being dumped out of the blue. Isn’t that right, Gina?”

“I mean…”

“I said,Isn’t that right, Gina?”

Gee nods like a bobblehead on a dashboard. “For sure, yeah. Definitely been there. Happens to the best of us.”

Luckily, Lora’s lie detector skills aren’t the sharpest. “You think I’m the best of us?”

“I wouldn’t quite— Er, yeah, absolutely. Uh-huh.” Gina adds a double thumbs-up for good measure.

“I gave him all these gifts,” she sniffles. “Kept trying to surprise him, you know? Isn’t that what loving couples do?”

I wince. “Surprises are…”My nightmare.“… always a good move.”

“Right?” She sighs deeply. “I got him this huge ragu lasagna from Pacino’s…”

I frown. “I thought you said Ethan was vegan?”

“Lasagnaisvegan.” Lora presses on. “I told him to close his eyes and spooned some into his mouth. I thought that was romantic.”

It takes everything in me not to exclaim,You hand-fed your vegan boyfriend pieces of dead cow!

“So romantic,” I agree.

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