Page 59 of One Night in Paris

Picking up his sandwich, Trevor took a big bite, contemplating my words as he chewed. Before he’d quite finished with what was in his mouth, he said, “Yeah, man, but I read the article. It’s not all that bad.”

I hadn’t read it yet, that was true. But it wasn’t the article itself I was worried about. It was everything else that went along with it. Articles like this were just the sort of foddersocial media influencers and other people who liked to gossip and write comments fed off. They’d latch onto this with both hands, sinking their fangs into it, and making a huge deal out of everything that could remotely be wrong with Harper—which was nothing. They would find something, though.

Before I did anything else, I opened the magazine to the article and read over it. With each new paragraph, my insides twisted even more. How the hell could the person who wrote this even pretend to be a journalist? All of it was speculation. They thought Harper was probably my secretary—and we probably had sex in my office every day. She must not be very good at her job, since she’d only been a waitress before, but as long as she knows how to treat the boss right, none of that matters. It also accused her of being a gold-digger, saying, “Getting a ring from a guy like Logan Winters would amount to lots of tips from the restaurant where Miss Reynolds used to wait tables.”

Frustrated, I practically crumbled the magazine up and tossed it on the table. I wanted to rip it into shreds, but people were already giving us curious glances. I didn’t need to make it worse.

“It’ll pass, brother,” Trevor reminded me, still eating his lunch like this was no big deal.

“It says that she’s stupid if she thinks she’s the only one I’m screwing,” I pointed out to him. “Not to mention the fact that it drags her name through the mud for not finishing college. It doesn’t mention that her mother has cancer and that’s why she couldn’t finish, though.” Shaking my head, I turned away from him, needing to stare out the window for a moment to try to calm down.

“Yeah, that part was mean,” Trevor agreed. When I looked back at him, I noticed his plate was almost empty, and once again, he had mustard on his face. “You gonna eat your chips?”

Without a word, I pushed my plate over to him. He could have the whole fucking thing for all I cared.

Pulling out my phone, I found Harper’s name in my contacts and pressed down on it, giving her a call. I needed to be the one to tell her this before she saw it in the magazine herself or someone else said something to her. This was all my fault, after all.

When she answered, her voice was quiet, like she was in a library or something. “Logan, I can’t talk right now,” she said.

“Sorry. Not even for a minute?” I didn’t want to be a nuisance, but I had to let her know what was happening. Was it possible she’d already heard and was angry at me?

“I’m with my mom for her chemo appointment,” she explained.

Right. I remembered how happy she was that she’d get to take her mom to this one. Normally, if it wasn’t on the weekend now, she wouldn’t get to go because she was at work. Unlike the diner where she had shift work, being my assistant was less flexible, though I’d made it clear to her from the beginning that she could go to her mom’s therapy whenever she needed.

“Well, I just wanted to tell you that Dave published a photo in one of the gossip rags today. I don’t want you to worry about it, though. I’ll handle it. But I thought you should hear it from me and no one else.”

She was silent for a long moment. I began to think maybe she’d hung up on me. But then I heard her sigh loudly. “Okay. I’ll find a copy of it and call you back later. I’ve got to go.”

I didn’t want to let her go because I could hear the anxiousness in her voice, but I knew she needed to get back to her mom. “Call me or just come over,” I told her.

“Fine.” She hung up without another word. My heart dropped to the floor. God, what if she was really upset about this?

“That seemed to go well.” Trevor had half of my sandwich in his mouth when he spoke. Knowing he was just being stupid, I should’ve ignored him.

Instead, being in no mood for his bullshit, I told him, “Fuck off.”

32

HARPER

Hanging up the phone, I slipped it back into my pocket, taking some deep breaths to calm myself. The last thing I wanted to do was upset my mother. In fact, I didn’t even want her to know that anything was wrong if I could avoid it.

Despite the fact that she was in the middle of her treatment, which always made her sleepy and out of it, my mother did notice. “What is it, Harper?” she asked.

“Nothing, Mom. I’m fine. Just… something to do with work.” Forcing a smile to my face, I prayed that she’d let it go.

The look in her eye as she settled back into her chair told me we’d talk about it later.

Her therapy finished, and the doctor came in to talk to both of us about her progress. The entire time, my mind wandered away from what he was saying and back to this photograph. I tried to picture it in my mind, wondering what it would be like. It wasn’t as if Logan and I had done anything untoward on the bridge. Even at the restaurant, he’d been a perfect gentleman. I just kept telling myself it couldn’t be that bad.

As soon as we’d pulled away from the hospital parking lot, my mom asked me, “What’s going on, Harper? And don’t try to lie to me. I’m your mother. I know when something is going on with you.”

Taking a deep breath, I thought for a moment, wondering how to phrase it without upsetting her more than necessary. “Well, when we were in California, that guy we’d gone there to see—Dave—got angry that Logan didn’t want to work with him. So, apparently, he had some guy follow us and take our picture. I guess he published those pictures in some gossip magazine. I’m sure it’s no big deal.” Glancing at her out of the corner of my eye, I noticed her face paling even more. Apparently, my attempts to keep from upsetting her had fallen short of the mark.

“What does it say?” Mom wanted to know.

“I have no idea, Mom. He just wanted to tell me about it himself so that I wasn’t caught off guard if I saw it.” Traffic was awful today, moving at a snail’s pace. The longing to just be home with my mom and lose my thoughts in a television program or a movie was overwhelming, but we weren’t budging.

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