I blinked, adjusting to the light streaming from the window. Cocking my head, I noticed something peculiar about my bookshelves. An empty space that hadn’t been there before. I shuffled out of my bed, still stark naked, and padded barefoot to my shelf. My hand ran over the spines, arranged in alphabetical order. My fingers stopped at the empty space. I knew what was missing. It was a book imprinted into my DNA. My most precious possession.
Atonement.
This was why he hadn’t left a note or a message. Why he hadn’t stuck around. He knew I’d be the one to make the first move. After all, he held something of mine hostage.
Bastard had stolen my favorite book.
I held myself together.
I didn’t call or text him.
At the office, Jillian examined me from behind her cup of coffee, arching a knowing eyebrow and leaning against the printer while I waited for it to spew a contract for a new client.
“Long night?” She hmmed.
I felt myself burning scarlet, realizing I wasn’t even sure whether she had come back home or not. At least I knew I was on top of work these days, so this wasn’t a dig.
“This space is a nonjudgment zone.” I picked up the warm papers, motioning to the space between us while holding them.
Jilly put one hand up in surrender, taking another sip. “I’m not judging; I’m curious. And a little jealous, obviously. Is it serious?”
“Nope. The relationship’s doomed from the start.” I stapled the pages together, making my way to my seat. She followed me like a piranha, smelling blood.
Just because Christian and I hadn’t addressed the elephant （or rather, lawsuit） in the room didn’t mean I wasn’t aware of it. The only thing that had changed was I no longer craved to hang his indiscretions over his head.
“Why bother, then?”
“Life’s too short.” I shrugged, taking a seat in front of my laptop, uncapping my Sharpie to go through the contract one more time.
“How very un-Arya of you,” she laughed. “Fine. I’ll revisit this again when we get back home. But Ari?”
“Yes?”
“Be careful if you see Christian. Charming as he may be, you know nothing about one of the most eligible bachelors in NYC.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHRISTIAN
Present
I tucked the hard copy of Atonement under the loose floor plank beneath my bed. You’d think a brand-new building in Manhattan, with real parquet, wouldn’t have slack tiles, and you would be absolutely correct. The reason it was loose was because I’d ripped it with my bare hands so I’d have somewhere to hide all the legal documents I never wanted anyone to find. A safe was highly predictable. It practically screamed to be opened. But no one was going to unglue the floor pieces under my bed.
I wondered why Arya hadn’t called yet. Or better yet, barged into my office with a machete and every intent of using it on my neck.
I was going to hell, but not before making the most out of my time here on planet Earth. What I was doing to Arya was, for lack of legal terminology, a dick move of gigantic proportions.
The lie grew larger by the day, fed by time, intent, and emotions that had no business getting thrown into the mix. I’d spent my whole life cherry-picking my partners. I had the looks, the aura, the job, and the bank balance to lure anyone into my web. But with Arya, even when I had her, she didn’t truly feel mine, and that was a problem.
Someone knocked on my bedroom door. Riggs’s head, freshly （and wholly） shaven after another successful trip to God knew where, popped in the space between the door and the frame. “Food’s here.”
I waltzed through my bedroom toward the kitchen, where Arsène was unloading take-out boxes full of sashimi. Riggs sat next to Arsène on a stool.
“Back to the subject at hand, before Christian had to go back to his room to listen to his Sinéad O’Connor album while crying over Arya not calling.” Arsène hit ignore on his phone when the name Penny flashed across it, accompanied by a picture of what appeared to be a goddamn supermodel. If I had a penny for every time he rejected a perfectly good Penny, I’d be able to buy this entire building, not just a one-bed apartment. “You have two choices here—either you cut her loose, seeing as you’ve had your fun, and that was the original plan, or you tell her the truth and face the consequences. Dragging this out is volatile.”
“Are you crazy?” I spit out, digging through the containers. “It’s too late to tell her. I’ll be dropped from the case, disbarred, possibly face legal action—no, definitely, considering this trial is a sure goddamn win for me—not to mention I’ll lose her anyway.”