Page 36 of The Likelihood Of You

Wow. Just… wow.

She giggled at me before dipping her head, connecting our eyes only a second later. “So… should we get going?”

“Yeah… but you should maybe leave the bag here,” I said, trying to keep my grinning to a minimum.

“Oh really? Why?” She asked, moving past me to grab her keys.

“Everything you need is already there… where we’re going.” She stopped and turned to me as she opened her door, her eyes narrowing. “Trust me.”

Chapter fourteen

Florence

If there was ever a feeling I’d never want to wish on somebody, it would be guilt.

True, gnawing guilt that sits in the pits of your stomach and eats you away is something I wished I could make my body not recognise anymore. Thanks to Hugo, that feeling has become a part of me, just another strand of my DNA. Working through the shame becomes a part of your morning, and justifying the person who inflicted that feeling becomes the soundtrack to your day. Sleep becomes a distant memory at night thanks to the tossing, turning, and aching.

It takes over your life before you even have a chance to crack open your eyes in the morning.

I’ve launched my phone around my room so much in the hour I’ve been home I’m surprised it still switches on. But every time I pick it up to text Jacob and cancel tonight, I stop myself.

Getting comfortable with the side effects of guilt buys you a one-way ticket to never overcoming it. And if I was finally going togrow and slip away from the grasp Hugo and his lies still had on me, I needed to do this.

But it’s hard. All my brain saw right now was me being a damsel, sponging off the rich boy who wanted to help me. What it failed to see was that Jacob bore no resemblance to the man who painted that picture in the first place. It forgot how, when I saw him, smiling like he was truly happy to help me, it was like I’d never known what it was to feel guilt.

It’s only since baking with Jacob that I’ve begun to feel this way again, and I know it’s what Hugo did to me, how he treated me when we were together, that I ticked this way now.

I’ve asked him this hundreds of times, thousands, and yet, I still hope that this will be the time he says yes.

“I’d only need you for ten minutes tops. I just need another opinion on which recipe to stick to.” I shouted to him from the kitchen. Hugo was in his office.

A second later, his office door swung open, with Hugo standing in the door frame wearing the same white button-down and navy trousers he’d worn this morning when he left for work. The scowl on his face made all that hope slip from my grasp like fine sand.

“I’m busy, Florence. You know I am.”He dropped his head and sighed.“Call Sydney, or go see your Nanna. Tea needs making anyway; it’s almost seven. Are we using that salmon?”

“You know I don’t like it, Hugo.”

He looks down at his phone, illuminating his face.“So?”

I squeezed my eyes closed and made every ounce of anger drain from my body. I didn’t have the strength to start another argument about him still not knowing what I liked and didn’t like.“It’s already in the oven,”I said reassuringly. “I just need you to try these pastries.”

“I’m busy, Flo.”He drops his arms, and his head falls back.

“Okay, well, could we talk about those business plans I showed you…months ago?”

“Not right now.”

“But you said you thought—”

“I said I’m fucking BUSY!”I let out a small gasp. “What fucking part of that don’t you get? I’m busy because I work for us, Florence. I work so you can piss about in the kitchen all day because that’s what you want. You wanted this sodding bakery…which doesn’t even exist yet. So excuse me if I’d rather focus on my job, rather than make you more delusional than you already are! If you want it, you make it fucking happen.”

He stalked back into his office and slammed his door closed, and I tried so hard not to let him make me cry for the second time this week. It was only Thursday.

I always found a way to convince myself that he was right for feeling that way. Because hewasthe one who worked, paid the bills, and provided me with the disposable time to bake and perfect my recipes. Asking for anything more from him was unreasonable.

That the rest… fulfilling my dream…was up to me.

Then there was the other part of me that knew this was a power move from him.

---