I should have feltrelieved that the Blake family vacation was over. I hadn’t wanted to take Danielle in the first place. But relief was the last thing on my mind. I felt more like I was going through withdrawals than anything.
I hated falling asleep in my king-sized bed alone, waking up without her hair in my face or her body pressed against mine. I hated dragging myself out of the apartment in the morning without seeing her face or kissing her. Every second I spent at the office was torture, but coming home was even worse. She was there, but I couldn’t touch her, couldn’t taste her. Because here there was no one to show off for. No lie I could tell myself to excuse my behavior.
It turned out space and distance weren’t the cure to losing my mind at all. It didn’t matter if I couldn’t see or hear her. She was in every thought I had, drenching every moment with her lack of presence.
I missed her.
But that was ridiculous. We lived together, for goodness’ sake. Except it was easy to forget that when I hardlysaw her. She was constantly disappearing into her bedroom, leaving me alone to stew in my misery.
What the fuck was wrong with me? Ilikedliving alone. Sure, I threw the occasional party when Freddie or Orlando convinced me to, but I preferred the quiet. It should have worked out perfectly that Danielle kept to herself and stayed out of my way.
But nothing felt perfect.
My penthouse had never felt so cold and lonely. I was honestly debating calling Orlando and asking if he wanted to throw a party at my place just so I could drown in the noise and forget about the girl living at the end of the hall.
It had gotten bad enough that I regularly checked the security cameras at my place throughout the day from the office. Most of the time there was nothing to see since I’d killed the cameras in her room—I did have some level of respect for her privacy. But I lived for the time she spent in my kitchen and the rare occasions when she’d curl up on my sofa to talk on the phone or read or sketch new dress designs in her notebook.
Today she wasn’t in my kitchen or either of the living rooms or anywhere in my penthouse. She was out with my mom and sister for lunch and whatever else they’d decided to do. I didn’t know because I was attempting to keep my stalker tendencies to a minimum and didn’t keep tabs on everywhere she went.
Attemptingbeing the keyword here.
She’d left the penthouse at eleven and it was now three thirty, and I was getting dangerously close to texting Caleb to ask for their location.
Instead, I pulled up my conversation with Danielle. I’d managed not to text her since the day of our wedding, but that streak was ending today.
Me
Are you having fun?
Danielle
So much fun. Your mom and sister are the best.
I feel like I should be worried. What are they telling you?
Your life story.
Ha ha.
What’s up? Do you need something?
We got the wedding pictures back. Thought you’d want to see them.
I’d actually gotten the pictures two days ago and had been keeping them to myself. Interrupting her afternoon to send them was nothing but an excuse to talk to her.
Danielle
Yes, I want to see them!!!
A smile stretched over my face. This woman had clearly cast some kind of voodoo spell on me. There was no other explanation for why I was grinning at my phone like a fool simply because she’d deemed pictures from our fake wedding worthy of three exclamation points.
SIXTEEN
Danielle
Hayden
