Page 97 of Body Shot

“Well. We finally sat down with Danny and Sid today to talk about our food.”

“That’s good.”

“Yeah. Sid is going to step things up a bit, try making some fresher things from scratch.”

She nods absently, using chopsticks to lift a bite of the spicy chicken Dakgangeong.

“So we talked about changing the menu. He’s going to come up with some ideas.” I grimace. “I’m not sure he’s really got the skills, but we all agree we should at least give him a shot.”

“I suppose.” She lifts her water bottle to her lips to drink. “What else did you do today?”

“Had a meeting at the Trident Foundation this morning.” I drop my gaze to my food. I haven’t talked much about the foundation to her.

“That’s the organization that you do the skydiving for, right?”

“Right. I do some other volunteer stuff for them as well.” I should tell her . . .

She seems to be barely paying attention to what I’m saying. She sets down her half-eaten plate of food and picks up the water bottle again, plays with her hair, and rubs her face. Finally I say, “Okay, baby, enough fidgeting. What’s going on?”

She lifts her chin and licks her lips. “We didn’t get the funding grant from NHI.”

My stomach drops. “Oh, no. Well, shit.”

“Yeah.” She swallows. “Exactly. Well, shit.” She sighs. “It’s pretty disappointing.”

I feel her disappointment like it’s my own. “Their loss,” I say bluntly, but she doesn’t smile. “You were doing another presentation today, right? How’d that go?”

“It went fine. But I thought the NHI one went fine too. We won’t know about this one for a few weeks.”

“Ah, hell. I knew something big was bugging you. C’mere, baby.” I set down my plate and reach for her.

She shakes her head and pushes away from me. “No.”

I go very still and my eyebrows rise. “What’s wrong?”

She closes her eyes briefly, her lips tight. “We can’t do this anymore.”

“Do what? Eat Korean food?”

She looks like she’s going to cry. “No! This.” She waves a hand back and forth between us. “Us.”

My head goes kind of cloudy and I shake it. “What do you mean?”

“I mean . . .” She grips her plastic water bottle. “I mean we can’t see each other anymore.”

“Huh?” My jaw drops. I sure as hell didn’t expect this. “Why not?”

“Because I need to focus on work!” She meets my gaze, anguish in her eyes. “I let everyone down by not getting that grant. Now we could be in trouble. I can’t let that happen again. I told you . . . you know what my goals are. You know how important this is to me. I can’t be running around having sex all over the place and . . . and . . . doing crazy things.”

“Crazy things? Baby, all we’ve done is had some fun. Everyone’s entitled to have fun sometimes. That doesn’t mean you’re not dedicated to your goals.”

“It takes time away from them. And with Aunt Gina needing help lately . . . I can’t do it anymore. I have to help look after them, and I have to commit to my research and my goals. So I can’t see you again.”

I stare at her. “That’s bullshit.”

Her shoulders slump. “Don’t make this harder than it is.”

“If it’s so hard, why are you doing it?”

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