Page 20 of A Taste of Vanilla

My mind flashes to the late meetings. The dinners he missed and all the times Elise had answered his phone after hours. Every moment I told myself to trust him.

I look down. The diamond on my engagement ring has cream on it. A tiny smear of almond cream from the pastry box sticker.

I stare at it.

And it almost breaks me.

Not Grant or Elise or the desk, but the frosting. I had made something beautiful because I thought that love meant trying harder.

I twist it once, and it slides free.

Grant goes still. “Halston.”

I hold it between my fingers. It looks small off of my hand. Beautiful, but the more I look at it, the more I hate it.

It’s not me.

Grant takes a step forward. “Don’t.”

The words hit me.

“For the first time in this room, you don’t get to tell me what to do.”

His face turns white.

I walk past the spilled coffee, past Elise, and the desk where my apology croissant sits. Grant reaches for me, his fingers brushing my wrist.

I stop.

Slowly, I look down at his hand. Then up at him.

He lets go.

I move to the little coffee station in the corner of his office, where he keeps the expensive machine he pretends to not understand so assistants make him drinks. A clean mug sits in the middle of the marble surface. White, monogrammed with a silver W for Whitaker.

I drop the ring inside, closing my eyes as it makes a delicate little sound. It’s final.

“Halston, stop,” Grant says.

I walk over to where his remaining iced Americano sits on the floor. The one that hadn’t exploded. Light ice. No sweetener. Exactly how he liked it.

I pour it into the mug over the ring.

The coffee swallows the diamond, and for a second, I don’t feel anything.

And then it hits so hard I nearly double over.

I set the cup down.

“There,” I say. “Something borrowed.”

Grant’s mouth opens, but nothing comes out. Maybe because there is nothing polished enough. No phrase for this. Noinvestor-ready explanation. No gentle correction that made him the reasonable one. Just me.

Just the ring at the bottom of his coffee. Just Elise crying silently by the desk, and the croissant I had wasted my morning on.

I turn to leave.

At the door, Grant finds his voice. “You’re being dramatic.”