I absently run my fingers over the fabric of a gorgeous one-piece jumpsuit. Done in a deep charcoal fabric with a thick pearl necklace collar, it looks both edgy and classic; the fabric is so soft that it promises to be a piece that you want to wear everywhere.
It feels surreal to see my creation—a product of my mind—finally take physical form. The whole warehouse that is now the home base of House of Sass glitters tonight, its industrial style mixed with modern accents proudly displaying all of my winter collection designs along with the top designers’ upcoming lines. Satisfaction fills me as I look at every piece—all of them so gorgeous, I can’t imagine a woman not wanting a piece of each—and as I take it all in, a yearning for my parents to have seen this trickles over me.
Kelly’s was a traditional store, and yet this store—their daughter’s store—is for the modern woman. iPads are set up along the walls and next to each piece of display. This way, customers can easily check in on suggestions on body shapes, best colors for their skin tone, and current trends.
On these same iPads, the customers can test the software—which has all of the House of Sass collection uploaded and immediately suggests outfits currently available at the store for purchase. If they spot anything they love, customers can simply click “add to bag” or “try on” and from there, all they need to do is either meet the attendants at the dressing rooms, or meet the attendants behind the cashier, who will bring everything in their requested size to the cash register. They can add to their wishlist and email the list to themselves for future reference, and if they love the software and decide to go for their “personal style advisor” there’s a free version on the iPad where they can try out not only the software’s suggestions and discussing their outfits with their friends, but they can also discuss any pieces or selections with the House of Sass staff—including me.
It’s exciting.
In my dreams, I always imagined having a store—maybe even like Kelly’s. But I never imagined having something so edgy, so new and up-to-date. A Brooklyn store that caters to the entire country? It’s like…wow. That is something Kelly’s, with a lack of internet at the time, could never do. If only Kelly’s had had those advantages, we might have survived. If we had had the same vision Aaric prodded out of me, we could have survived. Instead, Kelly’s is my past, and my future…is House of Sass.
Realizing what will not be in my future, my chest starts to feel weighted down by all my emotions. Pride, disbelief, satisfaction, gratefulness…sadness.
I wander along to the next item—and it is ‘the’ dress, the first dress that Aaric had made for our collection, identical to the one he gave me, which currently hangs alone in a protective plastic sleeve in my closet. I’m struggling to look at it objectively without getting my feelings involved—which is rather hard—when every hair in my arm seems to rise at attention as a large body of warmth approaches from behind.
It’s amazing how aware I am of this man.
How aware I am of his eyes on the back of my head, of the exact position of his stance behind me.
I can feel him—every inch of his six feet-plus behind me—before I slowly turn, braced for the impact of those lovely gold-green eyes and how they always seem to snare me up and put a spell on me.
I find that this time, it’s no different.
Voice…don’t fail me, please…I beg myself.
“Aaric.” Somehow I manage to greet him with a level voice and a smile, meeting his gaze.
He greets me with a brief nod and an embrace, and suddenly I can feel my body trembling against his.
He’s smiling as he steps back, those eyes reflecting the same pride that I feel standing here in the middle of our joint venture. He stands very tall, watchful as he drinks in my reaction. “How does it feel?” he asks me.
I laugh nervously, motioning to all of the clothes hanging from the rafters in the edgiest way possible instead of on mannequins. “I wouldn’t have gone all out if it weren’t for you.”
“No. No.” He shakes his head vehemently, a tender gleam in his eyes. “This is all yours.”
He reaches out to touch me but almost immediately puts his hand back in his pocket, his possessive gaze caressing me instead.
It hurts.
“How is Miranda?” I blurt. “The baby?”
“It’s going well.”
He nods.
“Good,” I say, and force out a smile.
“And how are you?” I ask.
“All right,” he says.
I nod. “I’m glad.”
“Your parents would be proud of you, little bit. I’m proud of you.”
I wish I could feel the pride I always imagined I would when I reached this moment. I see what we accomplished, and him before me. Gorgeous and so familiar, a part of me can’t understand why I can’t touch him. “Do you want to buy me out?”
His eyes widen, then he frowns. “No. This is your vision. It’s nothing without you. The only reason it means more to me than business as usual is because it means something to you.”
I swallow, unsure. “It’s going to be hard walking to work every morning and bumping into you. Are you going to expect me to keep coming to meetings?”
“I’ll ask Cole to look into things with you.”
My throat constricts, and I nod.
“Well. We did it.” I motion around. “I know you do this a thousand times but I’ll only do it once. I don’t have any more left for another.” I laugh.
“You’ll only have to do it once. I believe in it and you.”
“Thank you. It means a lot to me.” I drop my gaze. “I’m sorry I couldn’t inventory your closet. You understand it would’ve been difficult…”
“She’s not moving in with me.”
I start at that, surprised. “Why?”
“Because you’re everywhere.”
“Please stop,” I say, turning.
He catches up with me, his hand squeezing my shoulder, his voice in my ear, “I can’t stop.”
We face off for a moment. I’m torn between sliding my hands in his hair, kissing him senseless, while he seems to be waging his own battle, looking at his hand as if he wants it to let go of me, but it won’t. He’s still holding me, in his grip, his body trembling visibly.
“I can’t. I can’t let you go,” he says, voice tortured.
“You have to stop calling me,” I hiss.
His eyes are as tumultuous as I’ve ever seen them. He watches me as he visibly forces his fingers to start to let go of me, one by one. It hurts…the loss of his grip, so familiar to me now.
He curses under his breath and leads me outside.
I stand here, in the middle of the sidewalk, trembling.
I watch him take a deep breath before his gold eyes lock on mine, and I feel as if the Brooklyn traffic slows, like even the lights around us dim, and it’s only Aaric Christos and I.
Standing a few feet away, but as far apart as when we were states apart.
“Have you given her the ring?”
He shakes his head gloomily. “I’m living a farce.”
He looks at me, his eyes roiling with desire. Lust, pain, frustration. “Are you dating now?”
“What else am I supposed to do? I love you, Aaric,” I yell.
He stares, his pupils flaring wide.
My voice cracks, but I’ve set it loose and now I can’t stop it from pouring out. “I love you. No man has ever pushed my buttons the way you do, has ever inspired me, challenged me, ignited me like you do. What am I supposed to do?”
His mouth tightens, a tensing of his jaw that mirrors the tensing of his body, as if the battle just became more unbearable inside him. His hands fist at his sides.
“Don’t go out with someone just to get back at me,” he rasps.
“I’m not, we just need to let go,” I whisper, pleading with him with my eyes.
He moves closer, until he’s my whole world, his thigh grazing mine. ”Don’t,” he says, his voice low
and broken, his brows drawing together in an agonized expression, “be with another man. I can’t stand thinking of you with anyone.”
I swallow. “You’re with her.”
“Am I really?” he says. “I’m with another woman and I’m so fucking in love with you—I can’t see past you.” He narrows his eyes as he looks down at me. “All I’ve wanted in my life was one fucking chance with you, Bryn…” His eyes are raw with pain. “I wanted to deserve you. I waited years, and even decades later, I wanted to know what it was about you I found so sweet and innocent, and at the same time so damned seductive. I wanted to make you feel safe, special, I wanted to help you make your dreams come true…because you, Bryn, you were my own dream coming true for me. The family I wanted…I wanted to give it to us both. You and me. Our kids would have no grandparents but they’d have two parents who loved them and were madly in love with each other…”
“Stop.”
“I love that when you needed, you came to me. That I was the one you trusted with this dream. I told myself this was our time. Maybe not ideal, but that this man I am now, that this is the man you were waiting for. And now this,” he grates. “Tell me how to let you go when every day all I look forward to is fucking seeing you. Tell me how to let you go when I look in your eyes and see I hurt you.” He looks at me, wondering, frustrated.
“Then choose me,” I breathe.
His gaze flickers in surprise.
“Choose me, Aaric. I wanted you to do the right thing, but I don’t even know what the right thing is anymore. I want you to choose me. I want to love you and love your son or daughter even if it’s someone else’s. I want to be your girl and I want to be by your side. I want you like I want Manhattan. House of Sass. Like I want to have called my parents that night. We have enough regrets, Aaric. Can you tell me you won’t have none if we do this?”
His eyes darken.
“I know you want to be the best father possible, but you can. You can be happy, you don’t have to sacrifice us to be the best dad, we can still do this, we can have an us. Just not if you marry her. This is our last chance, Aaric.”
He drags a hand over his face, his jaw tight, his eyes flashing fire. “Do you realize my child will grow up without a father? Would you wish that on my kid?”
“You can be there! Can’t you see?”
I start to cry, and I drop my head and sniffle quietly because I’m so undone. Christos’s energy is tumultuous as he somehow manages to shift even closer, shielding me from the onlookers.
He lifts his hand and when he cups my cheek, I turn my head instinctively, the touch so familiar, so achingly familiar, the tears stream a little faster. He draws me gently into the back of his car, parked right in front of the warehouse.
He shuts the door behind us and, as if he needs the distance, sits right across from me as I keep crying. He’s looking out the window, his eyes red.
He scrapes his hand down his jaw. He doesn’t seem to be breathing, his jaw set, his posture closed off and tight. It seems to be costing him everything to keep himself on a leash, because he doesn’t even speak.
We stay like that for a while, sitting with our prides, our reality, and holding onto our love as tightly as we need.
“Loving you fucking hurts,” I accuse, trying to stop crying.
He reaches out to take my shoulders, his forehead to mine—his eyes livid with pain. “You think this is easy for me?” He grabs my face, frustrated and trembling, his voice a hiss. “You’re the only thing that makes me feel really alive. I’m not living without you. I’m just here—a money machine, all for what. Huh? When I die tomorrow who would’ve cared for me, really, other than my brother? If I’m in some accident, if something happens to me, who will make me cling to life? Who will make me want to stay here?”
“Stop it, Christos. You’ll have your son, or your daughter.”
“But I won’t have you, love.” He takes my chin and looks at me, at my whole face, and says, “If I have joint custody, would you be there for my child? As if it were yours?”
“I’d love it as hard as I love you,” I sniff, my tears streaming down my cheeks as he rubs them with the pads of his thumb. “I’m sick of feeling like it’s wrong to love you because you’re not mine to love.”
“I love you,” he says. “I want a family, and I want it with you.” His eyes gleam mercilessly as he wipes the rest of my tears. “It kills me to hurt you when that’s the last thing I’ve ever wanted to do. It kills me to let you go because I fucking can’t let you go. I’m choosing you. It’s always been you. Will you choose me too? Choose me and my child too?”
I swallow, and his eyes have all of this tenderness inside them that I can barely breathe. “Are you certain?” I ask, sucking back a breath.
“I’m certain. I have this disjointed idea of being the kind of father I never had. Maybe I even don’t believe I deserve to have a family, a real family, like I’d have with you because I failed Leilani and my daughter once.” He cups my face and sets his forehead on mine, inhaling me. “Maybe why I was settling for Miranda in the first place. Something surface. Nothing real.” He eases back, and I keep getting tears, even though the emotion behind them is woefully different than when I started crying. Because Christos looks all raw, all open, all mine as he keeps the back of my neck in his hand and pins me down with the most glorious eyes.
“We sometimes don’t get the family we choose, even the kids we have, or how they sometimes come. But you choose who you marry. Who you spend your life with,” he says, trailing off.
There’s silence between us, my heart pounding madly as I wonder if we’ll make it work. If Miranda will let him go. Give him joint custody. If he’ll really let me take care of his kid and let me love him like one of mine. Like we would also love ours, his and mine.
We seem to eye each other hungrily from across the car.
I wonder where we stand.
A conversation away from him being mine to hold again, mine to touch again, to love as hard as I want to and can.
“Do you want to take this talk elsewhere?” he asks softly, watching me. “Preferably after I’ve had a word with Miranda?”
I smile shakily, and God, I’ve never been so eager to send him to Miranda, and I nod so fast I almost get dizzy as I wipe away the moisture from my face, and I quickly get out of the car.
I hear Christos step out of the car as Cole and Miranda walk forward.
“Where the fuck were you two? The evening is a huge success and nobody can find you two!” Cole demands.
Miranda and I lock eyes, and she lifts her nose up in the air, gloating. Her eyes saying, who got him in the end, little bitch?
“Hello, Miranda,” I say politely, keeping my gaze away from Aaric as he walks up behind me, and that’s when I notice Cole’s shoes.
My eyes widen in recognition, and as I pull my gaze up, it snags on the ankle of the woman’s leg standing beside him. On the ink tattoo on Miranda’s ankle.
“Nice shoes,” I say as I look up at Cole, and then at Miranda, a little bit too stunned by the snotty look she keeps wearing. “Nice tattoo, Miranda. I have a feeling I’ve seen it before. Maybe at the corporate restroom of Christos and Co.” I smile at her as genuinely as I can, and I look at Christos, who’s wearing a puzzled frown. And then something flickers, and I see it in his eyes.
I walk away, not glancing back.
“You two. We need to talk,” I hear Christos growl behind me.
Christos
Present day
“I’m not marrying you to pretend a happy life. That’s not what I want to teach my child. I will be there for this child, regardless. As an uncle, or as a father,” I tell Miranda.
Miranda purses her lips, too proud to say a word to me.
“I was about to let the girl of my dreams go. Jesus!” I growl. She tilts her chin up, and I glare down at her before I turn to look at my younger brother. “And you. You motherfucker.”
“Come on, Aaric. You didn’t
love her. She’s insisting the kid’s yours because she’s got this idea of you being better than I am. A better father figure. More responsible. She knows you want a family, and I don’t.”
“Yeah, well now you might get one. Fucker.”
I pace, still reeling, before I spin around to point a warning finger at him. “Don’t you ever—ever—fuck in my corporate bathroom again. Lock your damn office door—or take it somewhere else. As long as I pay the rent, you screw around elsewhere.” I glare at them both, then move around to watch the spot where Bryn disappeared.
“If it’s mine, I’ll be the father you were to me. The damn best,” Cole says behind me.
I shoot him my blackest look. “If you don’t, I’ll personally make sure that you do.”
“Miranda, hell, I know I’m a bit more c’est la vie than Aaric, but even if Aaric is the biological father…I can—well, be there for the stepfather role.”
I glance at Miranda as Cole waits for her reply, and she tips her chin up, raises out her left hand, and points at her empty ring finger.
I keep staring out the window, unable to see Bryn, remembering how fast her tears streamed, how warm they felt falling into my palms.
Choose me.
Did I ever not choose her? Can I ever not choose her?
Damn me, did I ever have a choice of anything other than her?
Bryn
I head home and replay the scene over and over in my head, and not only the moment when I realized my secret-restroom lovers were Cole and Miranda. No. Not that mind-boggling, what-the-ever-living-fuck moment.
Also, before that.
Years before that.
Wondering when I sat in the back of his car, fighting for Christos, why I couldn’t have been braver before he even met Miranda, so that things would have not come to be this complicated. Wondering what would have happened if I hadn’t been afraid of falling for Aaric years ago. Wondering if I could have rescued us from heartbreak, like I’ve wondered for years what would have happened if I’d called my parents that night.
I’m retracing all the steps I have taken—and all the steps that led me here—trying to figure out where I went wrong, which step is preventing me from achieving the one outcome I want and seem to be waiting on bated breath for. The outcome where Christos and I finally have a chance to be together.