Surrender Your Love (Surrender Your Love #1)(11)

His hand wrapped around mine, and he looked straight into my eyes. “You know you’re amazing, and under different circumstances I would have never let you go. But this is what I’m supposed to do. I can’t focus on both my career and this relationship. You deserve better than that.”

“Your calling, I get it.” You can still follow your calling while remaining in a relationship with the one you once claimed to love, I felt like shouting. And yet I remained composed, ignoring the sharp stab piercing my chest. Since Sean was breaking up anyway, now was the time to tell him about my cheating, but for some reason I remained quiet. Maybe it was selfish for me to want to part ways in good light, even if that light was nothing but a sham.

He gave my hand a light squeeze. “I want us to stay friends.”

I nodded. The pain in my chest grew stronger.

“So, you got a new job. Tell me about it,” Sean said, suddenly changing the topic. I smiled bitterly and waved my hand.

“Compared to yours it’s nothing special really.”

He smiled, not pressing the issue. His eyes sparkled again, and in that instant I felt a strong urge to get up and leave him behind. I had been wrong to think what Sean and I had was special. He wasn’t ‘the one’. He couldn’t be. ‘The one’ would never leave me behind.

“I’ve got to get packing,” I whispered, jumping from my seat. A forced smile played on my lips.

“Sure. Want me to—”

I held up my hand to interrupt whatever half-hearted offer he was about to make. “No, I’m fine. And congrats on finding a sponsor. It must have taken you weeks, if not months of hard work.” Hard work he failed to tell me about.

He straightened to kiss me on the cheek. I somehow managed to dodge him, grabbed my bag, muttered a ‘see you around’ and ran for the door, eager to get away from him as fast as I could. I didn’t hate him, but I also didn’t feel the way I knew I should have felt.

Once I reached my car and I dared take a deep breath of cold New York air, my heartbeat slowed down, and my hands stopped trembling. I drove home more carefully than usual. My cell rang once, and then beeped a few times with incoming messages. I looked at the caller ID and switched it off. I couldn’t blame Sean for following his dreams, when I was about to do the same. But I sure as hell couldn’t bear listening to him talking about it the way he did—with that sparkle in his eyes that told me he had found a passion greater than our relationship. My insides felt numb, but my brain was surprisingly lucid. So this was it. A year with Sean wasted, gone in the blink of an eye. The pain might come later. Right now I felt stupid for ever believing we had a future together. This job couldn’t come at a better time, and I was determined to get over Sean by focusing my whole energy on it.

Sylvie wasn’t in, for which I was grateful. I didn’t feel like company and even less like bitching about Sean, which was the only way Sylvie knew how to get over a breakup. I locked myself in my bedroom and texted Mom, telling her I couldn’t make it tonight because of my new job, and promised to call her as soon as I landed in Italy. For a minute I considered texting Sylvie in case she didn’t make it home before I left for the airport. It wasn’t unusual for her to find some guy and then spend the next forty-eight hours shacked up with him, oblivious of the world outside their bedroom. Eventually I decided to wait until ten p.m. in case she found her way back home after all.

I made myself a cup of hot chocolate and settled on my bed to flick through my contract. So far it looked better than expected. Great perks like health insurance, a brand new smartphone with two lines, one being mine and one belonging to Mr. Mayfield, and even a bonds package. A ten per cent pay raise once I got through the initial trial period of three months, company traveling with all expenses paid, and even a Christmas bonus. I liked what I saw and signed it right away, then spent an hour flicking through my wardrobe to choose what to take with me. I had clothes, lots of them, but I didn’t feel they looked like something a senior assistant would wear. Living in New York wasn’t cheap. After nine months of unemployment right before I landed my job—previous job, I reminded myself—my credit cards were maxed out, and I was still repaying my debt, so getting out there to buy new stuff was out of the question.

In the end, I borrowed Sylvie’s navy Jil Sander suit, and from the same collection a tailored, long-sleeved dress that ended just above the knee. They were the least expensive clothes in Sylvie’s stuffed-to-the-brim wardrobe, so I knew she wouldn’t mind me borrowing them. She usually preferred a riskier style anyway, think short and sheer, so she’d probably not even notice them being gone.

I was still flicking through Sylvie’s wardrobe when her key turned in the lock, and she walked in a few moments later.

“Are you ransacking my stuff?” She lifted the navy suit I had decided on earlier and smirked. “You could have picked something less—”

“Boring?” I prompted.

“I was about to say matronly, but boring will do.” She tossed the suit aside and sat down on the bed, tucking her nak*d legs beneath her. Her skirt was so short I could see her frilly Victoria’s Secret panties.

“I hope you don’t mind.”

“Actually, you’re doing me a favor.” She shot the suit a dirty look like it was about to steal her purse.

“I got kicked out of the department,” I said, ready to share my big news.