Page 16 of Meet Me in Montreal

Her phone rang and she jerked it out of her bag to see who was calling. Speak of the devil. Scott Malone.

Shit. A gray cloud of guilt cracked open overhead and poured a fresh shower of guilt and anxiety on her. They weren’t exclusive yet. They hadn’t even gone further than kissing. Her recollections of contract law from her classes weren’t that clear, but she did know there’d been no verbal or written agreement that other people were off limits. Until that happened, neither of them owed the other fidelity but damn, it felt wrong that he’d been the last thing on her mind when Santino touched her. What did that say about her? About their future as a couple?

Would he know by the sound of her voice that she’d had her ex’s fingers flexing against her pussy less than fifteen minutes ago? The ex she sort of hadn’t mentioned she was still married to?

Maybe if she’d slept with Scott before now, with anyone else, she would have been satisfied and happy. She would never havebeen so horny that she lost her goddamned mind and let the Toxic Avenger anywhere near her.

The sidewalk along the avenue was busy. Someone bumped into her, and she veered away between the buildings into a small oasis with a flowing wall of water. She found a stone bench between giant potted green shrubs. For the second time that day, she braced herself and pressed the green symbol to call him back.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Malone.” She tried to sound normal, even upbeat, as she stared at a pair of sparrows dipping their tiny beaks in a puddle of spilled soda.

“Good afternoon, Ms. Watson. How was your day?”

“Pretty good,” she lied. “How was your big meeting?”

“We made good progress.”

Scott continued to tell her a little bit about the meeting. His deep voice soothed her, that cadence of the Bronx which felt familiar and comforting. The meeting had something to do with the acquisition of a smaller company by his larger one. Unfortunately, his calming voice soothed her too much because, as usual, she’d lost track of what he was saying and had drifted off in her head to the way her body was still tingling. An image of Santino’s face swam in her head, staring at her with concentration as those damning fingers manipulated her clit and how fuckinggoodthey had felt…

“Anyway, I know how exciting all this sounds. I’ll save some of the details for when we get together,” Scott said wryly, snapping her out of her mental drift. Had he noticed she wasn’t listening? “Hey, are you in the city?”

“W-why do you ask?” she stammered, her head whipping around to see if he was nearby.

“Sirens.”

Fucking sirens, of course. “Yeah, actually, I finished up work early, so I thought I’d come down to meet my girls now instead of risking getting stuck in traffic.”

“Oh yeah, your girls’ night out thing.”

“Yup. A movie under the stars at Bryant Park, a lounge, and a couple drinks. They’re showing —”

“Sounds good. I hope you have fun. Listen, I gotta go.” He paused. Someone spoke in the background, and he laughed. “Sorry. This weekend looks crazy, so I have to cancel tomorrow. Can I see you Monday night instead?”

“It’s fine, I’m going into work tomorrow too. Monday’s good.”

“Cool. Wear something nice.”

“Don’t I always?”

“Yeah, you always look good,” Scott said, and she grinned despite the guilt still weighing on her shoulders. “Can’t wait to see you.”

Her heart knocked a bit under her ribcage at his words, but it wasn’t an entirely pleasant feeling. Not so much like butterflies. More like a soda-drunk sparrow tweaking on caffeine, sugar, and regret.

“Can’t wait to see you, too,” she responded.

The words felt clumsy in her mouth. She wasn’t used to saying things like that to anyone before or since Santino. A worm of doubt wriggled in the back of her mind whether the statement was entirely true, but she pushed it away. It was normal to be nervous about getting closer to someone new. Her ex fucking with her didn’t exactly help.

“Alright, I’ll be ready,” she finished, snapping back to the moment for a second time. She really needed to get out of her own head. “See you Monday.”

6

ABOUT HIM

VANESSA

The distance between Genesis’ office building and the spa where she was meeting the first of the evening’s companions was about fifteen blocks. In anticipation of the walk, she’d packed a pair of comfy sneakers in her bag. Switching out her heels for the sneakers, she immediately felt better, if only a little, and took off for her destination.

When she arrived at Harmony Spa, her sister-in-law, Dani, was coming outside.

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