She Played His Perfect Girlfriend, He Couldn't Let Her Go novel · Chapter 2 of 32

Chapter 2: Clause Twelve

Mara signs the wind-down addendum and returns her wardrobe item by item, then Lydia asks her in an elevator to say Cain is single.

The next morning my sister and I stood outside my father's hardware store and read the same sign for the ninth time.

For sale. Price firm. Inquiries to the agent.

Bell & Daughters was still painted over the door in my father's careful yellow letters, under two years of plywood.

June had come straight from her hospital shift, so she was still in scrubs, eating a gas-station donut.

"He fired you," she said.

"I was laid off with severance."

"Did he cry?"

"He doesn't know how."

I had called the agent twice. The owner was a holding company, and the price was a hundred and forty thousand dollars.

"I have fifty-two in the bank," I said. "The severance is ninety. That's a hundred and forty-two."

June chewed.

"That leaves you two thousand dollars."

"Two thousand is a cushion."

"Two thousand is a lunch." She wiped her hand on her scrubs. "Mara, you realize you're about to spend every cent you made being nice to a scary man on a building."

"Not every cent. I'm keeping two thousand."

She laughed so hard she had to put her donut on the windowsill.

I touched the door handle once, the way you touch something to say you'll be back, and we went to catch the bus.

At nine I was on the fourteenth floor of the Rourke Marine tower, in a conference room with a lawyer who had never once looked directly at me.

He slid a printed addendum across the table.

"Thirty days' notice under clause twelve," he said. "Severance of six months, paid on the second of November. In addition, Mr. Rourke asks that you make three more appearances so the parting looks quiet."

"Read it to me," I said.

"You can read it."

"I read everything out loud. It's how I catch the numbers."

He sighed and read it. I followed along with my pen, and I corrected him once, on a comma.

The addendum said I would attend the Dolan wedding, the Mayor's Harbor dinner and the Harbor Gala. It said my salary continued until the end of the month. It said that nobody, including Ms. Lydia Shaw, was to learn the arrangement had been an arrangement.

"Why Lydia?" I asked.

The lawyer studied the ceiling.

"I was not told why."

"That's fine. I'll sign. It's a good addendum."

He blinked. "You don't want to negotiate?"

"I'd like to return the wardrobe."

I had brought it in a hatbox and two garment bags. I set each item on the table and the lawyer wrote it down.

"Green silk gown, worn nine times. Hugged twice." I paused. "Don't write the hugs."

He crossed it out.

"Navy coat, cashmere. Worn eleven times. One cocktail olive on the left sleeve. It was not mine, but it was on my sleeve."

"I'll note the olive."

"Diamond bracelet." I laid it on the table very gently. "Worn every appearance. Never worn alone. I put it on a pillow on the nights it stayed at my place, because it seemed like it was lonely."

The lawyer put down his pen and looked at me for the first time.

"Ms. Bell, is there anything you want from Mr. Rourke?"

I thought about it honestly.

"A reference letter," I said. "For the next job."

He wrote it down.

I signed in blue ink on three lines. My hand did not shake. I would like it noted that my hand did not shake.

What I kept feeling, all through the signing, was the place on my back where his hand had been before it lifted.

That was an observation. I wrote it nowhere.

The elevator was empty when I got in. At the twelfth floor it opened again.

The woman in the dark red dress from the Ball stepped in, in jeans now, with her auburn hair tied back.

She pressed L, though L was already lit.

"You're Mara," she said.

"I am. You're Lydia. Hello. It's lovely to meet you."

She smiled, and it was a real one, which was unfair.

"Last night Cain told me he was single," she said. "I'd like to hear you say it."

The addendum had a line for this. I had read it aloud twenty minutes ago.

"We're taking some time apart," I said.

"Until when?"

"The second of November."

Her smile stayed where it was. Her eyes did not.

"That," Lydia said, "is a very exact date."

← Chapter 1 · All chapters · Chapter 3 →

Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend