Mine to Lose (12 page)

“Emogen?” Trey says, a smile playing in
his eyes. “I thought that was you. What are you doing here?”

 Holy crap! What in the hell is he doing
here?

“Oh,” I stammer, still coughing from the
shot. “Mr. Miller, how are you?”

The look he gives me at the use of his
title is one of amusement, but he covers it well. “Just enjoying a night out
with Vivien,” he says, wrapping his arm around the woman who appears at his
side. She doesn’t seem fazed by the gesture, perhaps even numb to it. She’s
about my height, thin and muscular, her dark black hair pulled into a tight
ponytail. She reeks of superiority, and barely looks in our direction when he
attempts an introduction.

“Nice to meet you Vivien.” I try to meet
her eyes, but she looks in every other direction. “I’m sorry,” I add and step
back next to Ryan, realizing that everyone is watching this exchange. “Mr.
Miller, this is my fiancé, Ryan, and our friends, Dean, Joss, and you already
know Cam.”

“Please, call me Trey,” he rushes, giving
me a sideways glance. Everyone gives him a polite nod, except Ryan.

I begin to worry that he remembers Trey,
but then he extends his hand to him. “Nice to meet you, Trey.” His tone isn’t
as convincing as the words.

I’m still reeling from the realization
that Trey is standing here in front of me. He asked what Ryan and I had planned
for the weekend, and now I can’t remember if I told him where we were going or
not. Whether it is unintentional or not, my dream floods my memory and my neck
is suddenly hot. I step back and wrap an arm around Ryan’s waist, feeling
exposed, but his arm at my waist protects me.

“Hey, babe,” Ryan’s voice breaks my
thoughts, “You ready to head out? I think everyone’s coming over for a bit, if
that’s okay with you.”

“Yeah, that’s great,” I lie, anything to
get me out of this situation.

Ryan holds me against him with one hand
and reaches out to Trey with the other. “It was nice to you meet you, man.
We’re heading out, but y’all enjoy the rest of your night.”

“Same to you,” Trey answers and then
looks at me. “See you next week, Em-Emogen.” I give him a curt nod and allow
Ryan to take my hand and lead me away. I don’t bother looking over as I pass
him, because I can feel Trey’s eyes on me.

I hear his date snap at him, “What was
that all about? You take me to a club and then flirt with some other girl?”

“She’s a friend,” he bites back.

“Looked like more to me.” I hear her say,
and it’s the last thing before I’m out of earshot. I look up at Ryan to see if
he heard their exchange, but he only looks down and smiles at me lovingly.

Standing out in the cool night air, our
small group lingers in stale conversation. Cam and Dean decide to go get some
coffee and talk some more. Joss looks at me with a raised brow. “I’m not going
to be a third wheel. Love you guys, but I’m out.” She walks over and gives me a
quick hug. “Call me tomorrow when your man leaves.” She walks over to Ryan and kisses
his cheek. “Have a safe trip home - and, try to come home a little more often,
this chick is crazy when you’re gone.”

I give her a playful ‘I’m gonna kick your
ass’ glare, and she returns a similar look before heading off in the opposite
direction.

Neither one of us drank too much, but we
don’t want to drive either, so we decide to walk the short distance to our
apartment. Ryan’s fingers are entwined with mine; our stride is slow and easy.
The wind picks up, and an involuntary shudder escapes me. Without a word, Ryan
lets go of my hand and wraps his arm around me, bringing me close to his side
as we continue to walk.

“So that was your client, huh?”

“Yeah,” I yawn, sounding bored with the
topic trying to buy time. “That’s him.”

“He’s younger than I thought,” he admits,
and I know there’s a question in there.
Why didn’t I tell him?

“I was surprised to see him there,” I
offer, because it’s true. “That doesn’t seem like the type of place he’d go
to.”

“Too good for it?” he asks, trying to
find a flaw in Trey.

“Not ‘too good,’ maybe,” I pause, trying
to find an accurate description. “Too uptight?”

“Seems like a nice guy, I guess. His
girlfriend seemed a little pissed,” he scoffs.

“I don’t know anything about her, but
yeah, he’s pretty nice. Been an easy client to work with so far, but I don’t
want to talk about
my
work. Did you and Alex get that project
completed?”

The arm that’s around me tenses, and I
know that work is stressing him out. He exhales a loud breath and groans,
“We’ve busted our asses this last week, but we got an extension. It’s only a
couple of days, and that doesn’t really help. I’ll just be pulling more long
hours this week.”

“What’s the issue with it?”

“There’s a few key details missing, and
our boss is insisting that we get those by Tuesday, or he will get involved.
That’s that last thing Alex and I want; this is ours,” he adds, sounding as
though it’s personal if it ends up being taken from him.

“Is he easy to work with?”

“Mr. Jameson?” he asks with a shrug. “I
guess he’s alright.”

“No,” I correct, “Alex. Does he pull his
own weight?”

He looks at me and cocks his head in
confusion. “Yeah, pretty much.”

He gives me a squeeze before letting me
go to walk up the stairs to our apartment. He opens the door and closes it behind
me, and the silence has become too much to bear. I turn around to say
something, but Ryan is leaning back against the door, staring at me with sad
eyes.

“I hate that I have to leave you tomorrow.”
He finally speaks up.

My eyes shut tight, willing the tears
back, because I can save them for when he leaves. But when I open, they’re
still there, below the surface, waiting to erupt. I take a deep breath and walk
over to him, stand on my toes and wrap my arms around his neck. He lifts me up
and squeezes tight, and I feel all of his love in this embrace.

“I don’t want to talk about you leaving,
okay? Let’s talk about what else we have coming up. I need good things to focus
on, otherwise I might just spend the next twenty-four hours in tears.”

He kisses my nose and winks before
setting me on my feet. “What other wedding plans to we need to nail out?”

“Hammer, Ryan,” I correct with a laugh,
“the saying is hammer out.”

“No, I meant nail,” he says, lunging
toward me, “as in nailing you, on our honeymoon.”

I laugh and try to get away, but he
reaches me too fast. He drags me to the couch and pulls me on top of him, and
all I can do is gaze into his eyes. “I don’t think we can afford a honeymoon,
Ryan.”

He narrows his eyes, no doubt trying to
come up with an argument, but he knows it’s the truth. It’s already hard for us
to afford the tickets to fly out to see each other.

“Vail,” he says, making a decision.

“We can’t go to Vail,” I insist, because
all of the resorts will cost an arm and a leg.

“I’ve already talked to Dean,” he smirks
at my confusion. “Remember that place we went to after graduation, before I
started working? He’s got a cousin who manages that resort. He said he could
get us a deal. It’s not free or anything, but this is our honeymoon, and trust
me when I say I plan on taking one and getting all the advantages that come
with it.”

I lean down and kiss him, pouring every
emotion into that single kiss. “Why wait for the honeymoon?” I get up and pull
at his hand, leading him to our bedroom.

* * *

“Don’t cry, Em,” he says into my hair,
holding me close. “We’ll see each other in a few weeks, I promise.”

 “I know, it’s just, this is the
hard part - well, this and then the next few days,” I admit.

His hands move to my shoulders and he
pushes me back, dropping his head to look into my eyes. He lifts his hand to my
chin, urging me to look at him, “You can handle this. Hell, you’ve already
handled it, and I love you so much.”

“I love you, too.” The words escape past
the tightness in my throat. “Have a safe flight.”

He kisses me one more time and grabs his
luggage and heads into the airport. I watch as he disappears through the
sliding doors before getting into my car to head back home. I’ve barely moved
before my phone buzzes a text from Ryan.

You’re still the most beautiful girl I
know. I love you.

That’s all it takes and the tears spill
from my eyes. I find Langley’s contact information and call her cell. She
answers on the first ring, “How you holdin’ up, Emmy?”

“Not so good,” I say through my tears. “I
just left him at the airport.”

“How was the visit?”

“We had a really great time.” I smile,
remembering our first night.

“Ew. Gross. Spare me the details,” she
gags, eliciting a laugh from me that I’m thankful for.

“Then don’t ask questions you don’t want
answers to,” I remind her.

“What’d y’all do?”

“We-” She interrupts and makes weird
noises.

“Aside from the bedroom, what did y’all
do?”

“We hired a florist for the wedding,” I
beam with excitement. “Then we went out to a bar with a few friends last night.
That was- eventful.”

“What happened last night?” she asks in a
hurry.

“What do you mean?”

“You tell me,” her tone turning nosey.
“You’re the one whose voice just sounded all down and mopey.”

“Nothing happened, necessarily. We just,
happened, to run into my client.”

“At the bar?” she clarifies with shock.

“Yeah, it was weird, Lang. I don’t think
I told him I was going there, but he didn’t seem shocked to see me. In fact, I
think he liked watching me squirm. I dunno. But luckily, Ryan didn’t seem to
remember him from that night, so I guess that’s good.”

“Wait, what you do mean,
he liked
watching you
squirm
?” I can totally picture her using air quotes,
even though no one is there to see them.

“Well, he knows who Ryan is from that
night, he’s the one who reminded me, but obviously Ryan doesn’t remember him,
and he seemed to be enjoying that little tidbit.”

“Why don’t you just tell Ryan, and get it
over with? The longer you keep quiet, the more it looks like you did something
wrong.
Did
you do anything wrong?”

“No, of course not!” I protest.

“Then stop acting guilty, dumbass!”

“Thanks, Lang. I needed this.”

“Anytime, sis.”

It’s amazing how simple she can make
everything appear. But Ryan is living in another city, I’m working with my first
solo client, and we’re planning our wedding, which is supposed to take place in
less than a year. We don’t need any more road bumps messing with us. And to say
anything at this point would just be stupid.

The drive back to the apartment is quiet,
and upon entering the empty home we shared this weekend, I feel tired and
lonely, all at once. I still feel him here; our coffee mugs side by side on the
counter from this morning, his towel hanging on the rack after our shower and a
note? I see a folded piece of paper on my side of the bed that simply reads,
‘Open when you go to bed.’

There’s no way I can wait until tonight
to read his words. I force it open to read the contents, laughing when I read
the first line.

Em,

I knew
you wouldn’t wait to read this like I said, you never can. Guess that’s why I
love you so much. You can’t wait for
anything
. (Kidding)

I know
this is messed up. I don’t like being away from you any more than you like
being away from me. I still wish you’d pack up and come with me, but I know you
have things to do there, and I’m proud of you for doing what you love. We’ll
get through all of this in the end, but this year assignment came at a bad
time, and I’m sorry for that. I hope you know how much you mean to me and how
much I love you.

When
you go to sleep tonight, just imagine me next to you, holding you, because that
is where I want to be. And if you need to, I’m always ready for a ‘phone call.’
Kidding. Unless you’re up for it. Just kidding. I love you, Emogen Rae Tate. In
case there was any question, you are taking that name, because you belong with
me, forever.

I love you,

Ry

When I finish the reading his note, my
heart swells with love, and my eyes fill with tears. Why does he do this to me?
He knows that I’m going to be a mess until I hear from him tonight.

Nope, can’t wait. I decide to call him
right away and don’t even wait for a greeting when he picks up. “I love you so
much.”

“You caught me just in time, we’re about
to board in a few minutes.” Hearing his voice now feels like it’s been years,
not just hours since I last talked to him.

“Thank you for my note,” I say through a
tear.

“Impatient, aren’t you?”

“You already know that about me, which is
why you left it in plain sight.” My giggle lightens the mood.

“It’s one of the things I love most about
you. We probably wouldn’t be together if you were actually patient.” A voice
sounds over the intercom and Ryan stops talking to listen for a moment. “Hey,
babe, that’s me. I gotta go now, but I’ll call when I land. I love you.”

“Me, too.”