He Thought I’d Beg, Until I Cancelled Our Engagement Chapter 07

Ethan arrived in Pittsburgh at noon the next day.

I was downstairs at the branch office checking project materials. When I came outside, he stood at the foot of the steps.

A few nights of poor sleep seemed to catch up with him. Dark stubble shadowed his ching

His custom suit was rumpled, too.

When he saw me, he held out an insulated food carrier.

“Your stomach’s sensitive. You shouldn’t live on takeout. I got this from that little restaurant on

the east side. It’s still hot.”

I didn’t take it.

He set it on the stone steps.

“I’ll clear some time next week. We’ll go back to Chicago and have another family dinner.”

“I’ll redo the seating chart. You get the seat of honor at the main table. I already talked to both

families. No one will object.”

“I’m not going back.”

“After dinner, we can sit down and talk through the wedding.”

“There’s nothing to talk about.”

“Then what do you want me to do?”

He kept his voice down.

“I already told Nat off. She knows she was wrong. She won’t cross the line again. Can’t we all meet

halfway?”

“What if I hadn’t left?”

He blinked. “What?”

“If I’d canceled our Thanksgiving reservation but stayed at the apartment waiting for you to come home, would you have thought you were wrong?”

He had no answer.

Daniel Reed came out of the lobby and handed me an urgent contract.

“Claire, Legal cleared the addendum. Want to go over it together at lunch?”

“Sure.” I took the folder.

Ethan’s eyes dropped to the ID badge on Daniel’s chest. He frowned.

“You’re the one showing her the ropes here?”

He moved half a step closer. “Thanks for looking after my fiancée. I can take it from here

Daniel didn’t argue. He looked at me. “Claire, do you want me to call security?”

“No.”

“Let’s go.”

Those two words changed Ethan’s expression completely.

Daniel turned and went into the lobby first.

Ethan reached for my wrist. I stepped out of his reach.

“Claire, you disappear and take a transfer all this way just to find some guy to make me jealous?”

“Back off!” I looked at him. “What were you doing when I needed you?”

“You were at a midnight movie with Natalie.”

He opened his mouth. Nothing came out.

“You all kept telling me to learn my lesson.”

“Well, I learned. I don’t ask. I don’t wait. I don’t look back.”

I turned toward the elevators without another word to him.

Behind me, he drew a deep breath, took a black–and–gold card from his pocket, and slid it under the

food carrier.

“It’s the Whitmore’s top–tier gold card. I booked the biggest private dining room again, in your

name.”

He stared after me. “I’ll wait for you to stop being angry. As long as it takes.”

On my way up, I took the card.

I left the food on the steps.

That afternoon at the branch office.

Our cleaner was clearing out the shredder when it jammed.

She opened it and looked at me in surprise. “Claire, what’s a restaurant gold card doing in here? It aven has your name on it. It’s all shredded.”

I looked at the pieces without reacting.

“It’s expired. I don’t need it anymore.”

The shredder’s roar drowned out every sound from outside.

Ethan didn’t leave.

He stood outside and saw black–and–gold plastic scraps in the waste bin the cleaner wheeled out.

For a long time, he didn’t move.