Page 28 of Fighting Gravity

“They escorted me out,” Rosie told Tate, back in the present. “I didn’t get to defend myself. I was instantly branded a racist. That was the longest walk of my life.”

The confused and angry gazes had felt like stab wounds. Her mind could not grasp that Chad would stoop to that level for a promotion. Jeremy, the man she’d recently hid from at the grocery store, had approached her as Linda escorted her out. Besides Lizzie, he’d looked the most concerned. “Linda, you know this isn’t like Rosie. There has to be an explanation here.” He’d stood up for her in a way she couldn’t. Linda had ignored him. She’d walked Rosie to the elevator and rode down to the first floor with her in total silence.

“Fuck, Rosie.” Tate’s voice sounded pained.

“I never got to apologize to Solange. I never got to flay Chad for screwing me over. I never got to tell Frank how much it hurt that he didn’t even give me an answer when I asked repeatedly what was going on.”

Luckily, she’d worked through all of that hurt with Selah over the past two years. They’d come to the conclusion that Chadhadwanted the promotion badly enough to frame Rosie. He was smart. He knew that the company’s executives would have to terminate her immediately; there were zero-tolerance policies in place. She’d expected more from her bosses. Her team. She had been devastated to find that years of hard work and welcoming behavior could be wholly ignored.

“That’s why you opened your own firm?”

Rosie nodded. She was afraid the racist reputation might follow her somewhere else. Everywhere else. She wanted to think that opening her own firm had been brave, but the move had been cowardice. It had been a way to control her environment, to pretend she hadn’t been steamrolled by someone she’d trusted.

“I’m in counseling, working on my trust issues. I don’t want to spend the rest of my life mistrusting people’s motivations.”

She also told him that during the mayhem, her sister had started stealing from both Rosie and their dad.

“Did last Friday set you back?”

There was anguish in his eyes as he brought her hand to his mouth and kissed her knuckles, his soft lips lingering on her skin. He wanted to fix her problem. He was trying to fix last Friday with this weekend away. She straightened the shoulders that now felt unburdened. Telling him had been the right choice. “I’m here, aren’t I?”

His lips were on hers in a kiss that was only a shadow of the emotion she saw on his face. “I don’t even know what to say. I’m shocked anyone who knows you thinks you’re capable of that kind of behavior. Please tell me Chad has met with Madame Karma.”

“I have no idea.”

She’d deleted all her social accounts and LinkedIn profile that same day. She’d moved to the other side of town. Changed her number. She’d shrunk her little world to just a handful of people she could really trust. Then she’d started rebuilding. She was still rebuilding. The man with the aqua eyes and dream project was adding brick and mortar to her new foundation. She hoped she continued to let him.

16

The Geier villa sat like a heavy rectangular spaceship of white concrete in the hills. Fitting that the place housed a family working to get people into space.

So much of the structure was concrete: walls, floors, courtyards, even the counters. The spaces were wide open and connected so the flow felt natural, but it was chilly unless Rosie stood right in front of a sun-facing window. The expanses of windows with views to everywhere helped brighten the place up.

It looked like Tate had tried, too. The décor was cozier than she expected, all soft textures and warm colors and real plants. He’d added rugs everywhere. His art collection was divine, and all French. She spotted what could be originals of Monet and Morisot. One long, sloping corridor looked to be filled with Rodin sculptures.

“These aren’t…?”

Tate smiled. He’d been following a few steps behind, answering questions as she examined, touched, and muttered her way through this existing piece of Le Corbusier’s mind.

“Rodin? Yes. I just got these and one other collection back from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. It’s been on loan for three years.”

They turned a corner. “Fitness room and guest rooms are down this way.” He gestured to the first open door. “Your room for the night.” She stepped inside. Whoever had decorated had done a nice job offsetting the hardness of the home’s materials by adding natural textures. Soft rugs, fabric bedframe, suede conversation set. And her bag was already in there.

“Lovely.”

“Quinn’s room is down this hallway, too, way at the end.”

Rosie brought her gaze to his. “Is she around this weekend?”

“She is, surprisingly. I hope that’s okay.”

“Of course.”

Rosie liked Tate’s spunky cousin. She didn’t have a lot of girlfriends, but Quinn seemed easy to like, if one could capture her attention long enough.

“I’ll show you my bedroom and my favorite spot in the house, then you can do what you want for the rest of the day, like scour every inch of the house without me watching. We have a pool out back. You could borrow a suit from Quinn if you didn’t bring one.”

Rosie snickered. She was half-a-foot taller than Quinn. A one-piece would cut into her like an ’80s aerobics outfit and a two-piece would fall off. Quinn was made of curves, whereas Rosie’s body was narrow and lean. She had to fake curves through clothing.

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