The Girl He Promised to Hate

Julian's personal phone went off while he was still kissing me. He pulled back with a curse and grabbed it off the nightstand. No name on the screen. Just a number he didn't have saved. We both already knew who it was. Molly Reed. The woman who'd spent ten years chasing Julian Halstead, and gotten shot down cold every single one of them. He picked up, his voice sharp enough to draw blood. "What do you want now?" A woman's muffled sob came through the speaker. "Julian, there's a man hanging around the front desk. He's drunk. He won't go back to his room, and he keeps asking when my shift ends." "Call security." "I'm the only one working tonight. My manager isn't answering." "Then call the police." "The police said he didn't lay a hand on him, so they can't take him away." Julian shut his eyes. A muscle ticked in his jaw. "Molly, I'm not a cop. I'm not your dad, either. Just once in your life, you think you could handle your own mess?" He hung up and tossed the phone aside. "She's still working at that motel?" I asked. "Apparently. Four jobs in three months, and somehow every boss is the problem but her." He leaned down to kiss me again. But his head was somewhere else. A few seconds later, the phone rang a second time. This time, I could hear some man drunk and yelling before Molly ever got a word out. "He came behind the desk." Her voice shook. "Julian, I'm scared." Julian rolled away from me and got out of bed. "Send me the address." He snatched his shirt and pants from the floor. Only after buckling his watch did he seem to remember that I was still there. "Vivian, I'll be back soon." "Send someone from hotel security." "It'll take them 40 minutes to get from Manhattan to Brooklyn." "The motel has a manager." "Who isn't answering." His patience was already thinning. "I'm going to get her home. That's all." The bedroom door closed behind him. I sat against the pillows and stared at the half-finished glass of wine beside the bed. How many times had Julian gone to Molly now? I couldn't remember. They had met 10 years ago at an expensive private school outside Boston. Julian was the heir to the Halstead Hotel Group. At 17, he had already appeared in a glossy business magazine beside his father. Molly attended on financial aid. Her mother worked in the school cafeteria, and Molly stayed after classes to help wash dishes. Her uniforms were always secondhand and slightly too large. She wasn't pretty. Her grades were average. Whenever anyone spoke to her, she stammered and turned red. At a school filled with the children of senators, bankers, and old-money families, no one wanted the cafeteria worker's daughter at their table. One afternoon, Molly stood in the dining hall with her tray, unable to find a seat. Julian kicked the empty chair beside him away from the table and told her to sit. It meant nothing to him. To Molly, it meant everything. After that, she wrote him letters. She washed his soccer jerseys. Every winter morning, she left a cup of coffee in his locker. Julian never encouraged her. The first time she confessed, he returned the letter in front of his friends. "I don't like you. Stop doing this." Molly cried for the rest of the day. The next morning, another coffee was waiting in his locker. After graduation, Julian moved to New York for college. Molly didn't get into a university, but she followed him anyway. She took a job at a coffee shop near campus and rented a room with three other girls. When Julian joined the family business, she found work at a restaurant across from corporate headquarters. When the restaurant closed, she moved to the Brooklyn motel. She was always there, a shadow he could never quite shake. He blocked one number; she called from another. She left breakfast with the receptionist at his office. She mailed him cheap ties for his birthday. Whenever her pipes leaked, her wallet went missing, or a coworker upset her, she called him. Julian hated it. Once, he had security escort her out of Halstead headquarters. "Don't you have a life of your own?" he'd snapped. "Stop following me. I will never want you." I had been there that day. Molly stood in the lobby clutching a paper bag of homemade cookies, her face red and wet with tears. I had felt sorry for her. But I had never considered her a rival. Molly and I lived in different worlds. I had graduated from Wharton and become the youngest brand vice president in Halstead history at 24. I had negotiated the acquisition of three historic Vanelle hotels and stood beside Julian through the ugliest three years of his fight for control of the company. The press called us New York's most perfectly matched power couple. I had the education, the family connections, the career, and the face people expected to see beside a man like Julian Halstead. Molly couldn't afford a dress for one of our company galas. More importantly, Julian loved me. Seven years ago, at the opening of our Paris hotel, he had confessed that I was the only person in his life who never cared about his last name. "Everyone else tells me what I want to hear," he'd said. "You're the only one who'll tell an entire boardroom that I'm being an idiot." We had been together ever since. Our wedding was one month away. What could Molly possibly have that I didn't? That was what I had always believed. But somewhere along the way, Julian had stopped blocking her numbers. He still sounded irritated whenever she called, yet he answered every time. When her pipes broke, he sent a maintenance crew. When her wallet was stolen, he had his assistant deliver cash. Now, because she said she was afraid, he had left me alone in bed and driven across New York in the middle of the night. I watched snow gather against the window. Tomorrow was our engagement party. Julian couldn't truly want Molly. He was proud and exacting. Weakness irritated him. Incompetence disgusted him. Molly was everything he claimed to hate. I was simply nervous before the wedding. That was all. I kept telling myself that until morning. Julian never came home.