Stay With Me Read online

“No, he’s huge. He’s never been a small cat. But basically, you just nailed it about everything else,” I say.

  “Jesus, I’m sorry, Briony.” He shakes his head. “I took the ‘pretend this didn’t happen’ thing a little too seriously. Seems like all I do is fuck up when it comes to you, even after all this time. I promise to keep things at a reasonable, friendly level.”

  “I accept your apology,” I reply, giving him a smile. Warmth tingles down to my toes. Even if he does fuck up a lot, I like that he’s quick to apologize.

  Even so, part of me that developed way back when I was 18 is still wary. Believe actions, not words, Briony, my mom’s advice rings in my head. I need to remember that, no matter how nice being around him feels sometimes.

  “The next stop is Bergen Street—stand clear of the closing doors,” the train conductor shouts over the intercom under the white noise of static.

  “That’s my stop,” Ash says, pulling out his phone. “Let’s exchange emails. I wanted to incorporate some edible flowers into the cocktails, if you can help with that.”

  “Sure.” I can always ignore an email if we start fussing. I type mine into his phone, and he puts his into mine.

  “We’re good?” Ash asks, giving me a friendly pat on the back.

  “Yep,” I say, soaking in the warmth on my phone from where his hands held it.

  He gives me a nod and slips out of the doors.

  My stop is only two after his, though the price of his rent is probably a billion times higher than my own. When I get home, I find Zara stretched out on the couch, her laptop in her lap and Chunk behind her ankles. The amount of light we get throughout the day is a blessing in winter, but in the summer, it’s absolute torture. She has a fan blasting directly on the two of them, and she’s wearing the bare minimum amount of clothing to stay decent—a tank top and boyshorts.

  “What’s up? How was dinner?” she asks, fiddling with her bun.

  “Ash was there,” I say, going into my bedroom. Thankfully I have the window open, or I would have passed out from the humidity alone.

  “What? Tell me more.” We’ve been best friends since our freshman year in college, and I know her face is probably lit up with excitement. Zara doesn’t love being a part of drama but she does love to hear about it. Luckily, she knows how to keep a secret and gives good advice. She has two older sisters, so she’s used to hearing everyone’s business anyway.

  I change into a flowy tank dress and free my boobs from my bra before I go back into the living room. As I sit down with my laptop and get settled, I fill her in on everything that happened. She nods along, taking it all in. She makes a few ‘hmm’s and ah’s’ when I mention some things, then stays quiet for a second.

  Finally, she says, “Honestly, it kind of sounds like you’re into him.”

  “Physically, yeah. Everything else? Still no. Pretty much.” I reach out for Chunk, who ignores me and closes his eyes, snuggling deeper into his spot between Zara’s ankles and butt. The little traitor.

  “Let me explain.” She sits up a little more. “First, you guys had that hot moment, and I’m guessing he still wants more of you. Second, he sounds like he’s become a better person—he apologizes to you and everything.”

  “He wouldn’t have to apologize if we could stop having misunderstandings,” I point out.

  “Ok, sure,” she sighs. “But what I’m getting at is why not try? You can always get better at communicating. Also, point three—he’s a fucking billionaire. Point four—he is a fucking billionaire, why do I have to explain the pros of this? You could quit your job and go live on a yacht off the coast of Monaco or whatever it is super rich people do.”

  I lean my head against the side of the couch. “A billionaire who took the train with me.”

  Now that I think about it, he isn’t flashy with his wealth, not that I know of. His clothes look expensive, but they aren’t all designer labels, from what I can tell. I know that he and his company donate to charity quite a bit, so he’s willing to spend for a good cause. Maybe he has expensive properties or cars or something.

  Still doesn’t mean that he’s worth my emotional energy and time. Voluntarily going after a guy who doesn’t do relationships with the hope that he’ll magically change for me is the definition of insanity. And I’m not sure if I can just sleep with him, especially after our history and my inability to casually date. I catch feelings way too easily.

  “I’m just saying,” she shrugs, then looks down at her laptop. “Oh! I forgot to tell you—we got to the next round of interviews for a place in that startup incubator.”

  “For real?” I nearly scream, but I don’t care. “Why didn’t you lead with that? Here I was, blathering on and on about some fuckboy—”

  “I’d say he’s a fuck-man. Fuckboys are usually broke messes. He played you a bit, but he has his life together.”

  “Zara, I swear to God. If we weren’t best friends, I would kick you right now.”

  She smirks as if I didn’t threaten her and this interview isn’t massive news. “We started talking about Ash and got off track. You know I love hot gossip. Email’s in your inbox.”

  I check the email and open it. BloomBrightly has been selected out of about a hundred small businesses. The interview will be with the head of the incubator, and we have to show him our business plan and executive summary. We already have them, but now we need to make them even better.

  This is huge for us. If we get into an incubator, our business can grow a hell of a lot faster than it could on our own. And that means I’m closer and closer to never having to work at a job I’m not passionate about. It’s only Saturday, and I’m already dreading going back to the office, with my bitchy boss and the unending wave of bullshit that comes my way.

  I know a lot of businesses never get off the ground, but I know somewhere deep in my gut that this is my calling. I just hope my gut feeling about this isn’t as off as it is about guys.

  Chapter Four

  Ash

  It’s 5:30 in the fucking morning. A lot of CEOs go on and on about how waking up at early in the morning makes them infinitely more productive and happy, but they don’t mention how much it sucks in reality. It’s always dark, and in the winter getting out of a warm bed is like climbing Mt. Everest.

  I didn’t even like waking up early when I was in the Navy, where the punishment for waking up late is more dire than getting stuck in traffic or on a crowded train car. And yet, here I am again, shuffling into the gym with my bag over my shoulder before the sun. I can’t help but push my body to its limits, even when I’m exhausted.

  “Good morning, Mr. King,” the cheerful guy behind the counter says as he scans my card. I give him a nod since my vocal cords hardly work at this hour.

  As always, Ben is in the locker room before me, stuffing his bag into his locker. He gives me a low-five and sits on the bench while I put my things away, his eyes closed. We wordlessly go into the cardio room and choose two treadmills right next to each other, starting our warm-up—I’m on the left, and he’s on the right. Ever since our first season of wrestling in high school, we’ve worked out just like this time and time again. The familiarity of it is soothing, even when we’ve ended up doing it in different places over the years. Our gyms have gotten progressively fancier over time.

  After our warm-up, we go to the weights, still not speaking. My body is warm, but I’m still in no mood to talk. After two sets of deadlifts, though, the social part of my brain finally turns on. Ben’s takes a little bit longer, but soon we’re exchanging a few words here and there.

  “You don’t want to throw in a few extra sets for that groom bod that you’ll cover with a tux?” I ask, as Ben wipes down the machine we used.

  He shoots me a look. “I can hardly handle our basic workout today. Daisy dragged me along to Pilates yesterday, and it kicked my ass. And besides, we have our honeymoon, too. Gotta look ripped, even if I do cover it with a tux for a bit.”

  “Yikes.” I
went to a Pilates class once at a friend’s request, thinking it would be easy because I’ve lifted weights regularly since I was fifteen. Yeah, no. It worked muscles I didn’t even know I had, and it hurt to even walk the next day.

  “Daisy’s going to outlive us all.” He shakes his head, that warm, lovey-dovey expression coming across his face. What a sap. I’m a little jealous and more than a little happy for him. “Speaking of Daisy, she said that you guys had a good chat over dinner about the pre-wedding stuff?”

  “Yeah, we did.” I wander over to the squat rack and start to add more plates to the end of the bar.

  I immediately think of Briony. I know I took notes about what Daisy thought for each of the events, but I hardly remember any of them. I’m good at keeping my emotions close to the vest, but Briony is threatening to undo me. The pure irritation in her expression when I came up to her was like a hard slap in the face. I spent half the meal trying to tamp down my annoyance and figure out what I had done.

  How did I not realize how I’d practically run from her after our hookup? Am I so out of practice dealing with women for more than one night that I didn’t even think about how I’d made her feel? I could have at least played it cool and walked next to her to where Ben was giving his speech instead of darting off and pretending I hadn’t seen her at all.

  At least I knew I had to man up and apologize when we were on the train, even though I technically did what she asked me to. I’d hurt her feelings, and I had to fix it. It’s never a fun thing to do, but I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t.

  Plus, I want to get to know her again. I avoided talking to her directly at dinner, but I nodded along with a lot of what she said. We’re into some of the same things, like bad action movies and trying new foods, but she’s into some things that intrigue me, like botanical science. And then there’s her business, which I’m curious about just from an entrepreneurial standpoint. Ben has been engaged for all of a week and a half, and I already know how much money could be made as a wedding vendor.

  But if I get to know her, will I be able to control myself? I have one female friend who isn’t connected to me through business, and that’s Daisy. And I don’t shit where I eat, so I never, ever sleep with coworkers or employees. Any time I’ve tried to be friends with a woman in the past, it ended up with us sleeping together.

  Just the thought of maybe sleeping with Briony has my thoughts spiraling in a dirty direction, so I have to pivot. I do my set of squats, then step out of the way for Ben to do his.

  “How’s work?” I ask on our break. Any topic would do besides the wedding or Briony.

  “Good. Busy.” He pours water into his mouth, getting half of it on his shirt. “It’s going to be nuts with the wedding planning on top of everything.”

  “You know, there are these people called wedding planners who do all that shit for you,” I offer.

  “You know how I am,” Ben says, grinning. “If I’m not going balls to the wall, did I even go at all?”

  I snort. Ben was valedictorian of our high school class and a member of a ton of clubs, on top of doing two sports. He graduated from Stanford in three years for no good reason besides the fact that he wanted to get a jump start on grad school for his Ph.D. in biochemistry. Before long, he was poached from the program to come work at the company where he still works long hours. He doesn’t understand how to slow down unless he’s literally cut off at the knees. “If you say so.”

  “You know I like to plan shit.” He goes to do his next set, grunting at the last chest press. “We’ve gotten another round of funding, so I’ll be stretched super thin. We’ve got a lot of good stuff going on at the company, though, so it’ll be fun.”

  “Congrats.” I take his spot, pumping out five chest presses.

  “Oh, speaking of—we’ve got something that I think could work for your father,” he continues. His face is as neutral as possible, even though I know he’s just as big of a fan of my father as I am. But he understands me like most people don’t—he knows why I go to Long Island so often to visit, even if doing so is a miserable experience. He knows the sick hold Dad has over me and doesn’t judge me for it.

  “Another medication?”

  “A trial.” Ben raises one shoulder in a shrug. “It’s still super early but based on the requirements for these in-human studies; your dad might be a good fit. From what you said, the doctors seem to think it’s autoimmune, right?”

  “Right.” Autoimmune diseases are more common in women, but it’s not unheard of for a man to be ravaged by one. The doctors have ruled out systemic ones like lupus, but they still think they’re on the right track in their investigation. Maybe he has something they haven’t seen before, even though I’ve gotten him some of the best doctors in the region.

  The idea of something finally working genuinely excites me—Nora sends me updates about Dad’s condition based on what he tells her after his appointments, but he still isn’t responding to any treatments. I wouldn’t have wished the suffering he deals with daily on my worst enemies. He’s gone from an athletic, robust man to a weak one who has to use a walker just to cross a room.

  “It’s still pretty risky, though,” Ben adds. “But it’s worth a shot, I bet.”

  “Definitely,” I comment, even though the realization has taken me down a notch. I want him to get better, sure, but I don’t want him to risk getting worse on a long-shot treatment. If I suggest something that makes him worse, he’ll likely never trust me again. Not that he trusts me much now, despite not having a reason to distrust me, but still. Our relationship is on a tightrope, and any breeze could throw us off.

  I wipe down the machine and move on to the next one. I need the gym to clear my head, not act as a place where I stew in my thoughts. So I throw myself into the next set, letting my muscles burn.

  I love my work, but some days are a little rough if they’re packed with back-to-back meetings like today. At least there’s the beautiful view—our offices are in Dumbo with views of the water and Manhattan. Even with the summer haze, our view is stellar, the warm sun streaming into the building. All of our conference rooms are bright and inviting, which I did on purpose. I’m in meetings day in and day out, and like hell am I going to sit in a dark room for all of them. As the boss, I can shape the office into anything I want.

  Sometimes I even bring my little mutt, Sarge, into the office if my meetings are mostly internal. I miss the little punk when I have long days like this, but he’s living it up at the doggy daycare. They send me text updates of what he’s doing a few times a day. Usually he’s running around with a ball in his mouth or sleeping, his two favorite things.

  I can’t believe I’ve turned out to be one of those Brooklynites who’s obsessed with his dog, but Sarge was an unexpected comfort after I left the service. I struggled with nightmares, though not nearly as bad as some people I knew and having him nearby brought me back to earth. I went to one therapy session, realized that doing it was the most uncomfortable thing I could ever imagine, then decided that Sarge would help more. And he doesn’t talk.

  “Mr. King?” My assistant, Malcolm, catches me on my way out of a meeting with our front-end development team. “Your lunch meeting got canceled, so you’re free until 2 p.m..”

  “Thanks, Malcolm. And seriously, you don’t have to call me Mr. King.” He’s one of the best assistants I’ve had in a while—serious and focused on making sure I’m where I need to go, though he can be a little too formal. Too many of my past ones spent half of the time they should have been working kissing my ass and trying to get ahead. If they just did their jobs like Malcolm does, they would have gotten ahead easily.

  I wander over to the cafeteria area one floor down and pick up a wrap before heading back into my office. Normally I try to catch someone and go out for something, but I need a little time to myself. I go back upstairs to my office, which has floor-to-ceiling windows on all sides and bask in the light for a moment. Maybe going to the beach would help me
feel better. I haven’t felt quite on-base since Ben and Daisy’s party.

  I sit at my computer and open my personal email, deleting spam and sifting through various newsletters I’m subscribed to. In the left-hand corner, I notice Briony come online to chat. I almost click over to say hi but pause. We’re alright again, sort of, but that doesn’t mean we’re suddenly best friends. We weren’t even close friends when we were younger. She was firmly in the ‘Ben’s little sister’ corner of my brain most of that time. We carpooled together, and she hung out with us when we let her. And besides, I don’t have anything to ask her for yet—I’m not sure what I want to do for the cocktails.

  But do I really need a reason? I can talk to her for fun. I can keep myself under control, for fuck’s sake. If I can go into combat, I can keep it in my pants.

  AshJK: Hey

  I stare at the open chat box, hoping the reply bubbles will appear. I start in on my wrap, tearing at the wrapper a little harder than necessary.

  BrionyMc: Hey, what’s up?

  Relief surges through me. But what can I say next? The cardinal sin of starting any online conversation is just leading with ‘hey’. Am I fifteen again, before my growth spurt and ability to flirt appeared? Jesus.

  Thankfully Briony fills in the gap.

  BrionyMc: Does your username mean ‘Ash Just Kidding?’

  AshJK: Did you forget my middle name, Little B?

  BrionyMc: Oh no, how could I have forgotten this necessary piece of information? Whatever will I do?

  She includes a gif of a cat covering its face, almost like it’s ashamed before it flops over on its side. I smile a little.

  AshJK: J stands for James. K for King. I forgive you for your terrible mistake ;)

  Her reply bubbles disappear for a moment. Shit, did I lose her that quickly?

  BrionyMc: This is you -

  I click on the link she sent me, and it’s a video of a donkey braying at the sky as it rains, almost in defiance. My smile turns into a grin.