Page 92 of Fifth Avenue Fling

I feel sick.

“Are you going to look at me?” I cry.

When his gaze meets mine, regret stares back at me. He almost looksdisgusted.It’s painful and ugly and… heartbreaking.

“I’m sorry, Clodagh,” he repeats, his voice thicker this time. “I’m really fucking sorry.”

He leaves me propped against the wall with sticky thighs and tears in my eyes, feeling more shit than I ever have in my life.

Luck of the fucking Irish.

TWENTY

Clodagh

“You’re an idiot,” I whisper to the bathroom mirror.

My bare, pasty face stares back at me with its red-rimmed eyes, blotchy cheeks, and a charming new zit as the cherry on top. Lack of sleep, sleeping with your boss, champagne sweats, and being rejected by your boss equals hormonal meltdown.

Blasting hot water over my skin in the shower for twenty minutes did nothing to cleanse my shame.

Fucking. Idiot.

I can’t believe I fucked him. I’m the stupid nanny maid who drops her pants for her boss less thantwo weeksinto the job.

I wish I’d never invited him to yoga.

I wish I’d never stormed into his bedroom.

And I really wished I hadn’t let him use me for a convenience fuck.

I wish the whole damn day had never happened.

Now he has all the power. He marched into my studio, made me beg for him to fuck me, then discarded me like a moldy, rotten spud. He had barely pulled out of me before the revulsion took over.

Bastard.

I twist my wet hair up in a bun with a towel, then walk out into the bedroom and curl up on the bed with my hands wrapped about my knees.

I stare at nothing, feeling my eyes well up with tears again. All I can see is the disgusted look on his face, his words repeating in a loop in my head.

Besides the advice of using rubbers, Granny Deirdre warned me never to let a man control my emotions. I thought I was smarter than this.

I swore I wouldn’t let another man make me feel worthless again. My ex walked away with most of my savings and chipped away the self-esteem that I had built up since leaving school. He threw a huge grenade into my life and left a big, ugly hole.

Now Killian has the power to do the same.

What if he doesn’t want to see me again and gets rid of me?

My phone pings. Mam on the family group chat. It’s dinnertime back home.

I stare at the picture of Mam, Granny Deirdre, and my brothers eating dinner until my eyes are too wet to see it properly.

It’s my youngest brother, Mick’s, sixteenth birthday.

For the first time since I landed in New York, I feel homesick.

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