The Intern: Enemies To Lovers

I downed the rest of the beer and set the empty on the table. “I didn’t lie.”

“I’m not saying you did.”Please check at N/ôvel(D)rama.Org.

I didn’t want to fucking admit it, but she had a point.

I could have said something.

I could have told her what had happened.

Fuck.

I tore at my hair, pulling it from both sides. “This is a goddamn mess.”

“Declan …”

I heard my name.

Her pleading.

Her emotion.

“Declan, please look at me.”

I looked at the ceiling, like the answer was written across the blades of the circulating fan. “I need time, Hannah.”

Time to figure this shit out.

Time to come to terms with everything I’d heard tonight.

Time to get my fucking head straight.

“You’ve said that to me before.”

I fixed our stares. “And I’m saying it again.”

She moved through the living room and didn’t stop until she was a foot away from me. “What does that mean? What does that even look like? That we’re-” Her voice cut off as a cry came through her throat. “That we’re over before we even really got started?”

I’d never seen her cry before today.

It killed me to see the tears start up again, soaking her cheeks, running over her lips.

I wanted to wipe them away.

And I wanted to scream that this never would have happened if she hadn’t lied.

“It means, I need a minute to think about this,” I barked. I just wasn’t able to control my tone anymore. “I don’t have an answer right now. I’m pissed as hell, and I need to cool off before I say something I’ll regret.”

“Declan …” she begged as I turned around and headed for the door. “Please, just hear me out.”

I halted and faced her.

“I care about you. You have to believe that. You have to feel that. I want to make this right.” She hugged her chest, giving herself the comfort that I wouldn’t. “No one has ever made me as happy as you have over these last few weeks. I don’t want to lose that.” Her lips quivered as she said, “I don’t want to lose you.”

“Hannah …” I raked my fingers through my hair, taking in the intensity of her stare. “I feel the same way, but I’ve been carrying around this guilt, thinking I had sex with a girl who was too drunk to remember and then finding out she was my intern and the cousin of one of my best friends.” I hissed air through my mouth. “It’s just too fucking much for one night. I need time to sort this out.”

If I stayed, we would only go around in circles-a shape that wouldn’t help our situation.

This situation needed an end … whatever that end looked like.

“I’ll see you at work tomorrow, Hannah.”

As I gripped the doorknob, she released a sob. “That’s it? You’re just going to leave? Don’t you realize I’m not fighting you, Declan? I’m fighting for you.”

Her words echoed through my chest.

Through my throat.

Through my head.

I stayed there, holding the handle, frozen.

Debating.

Weighing each side.

And then I twisted the knob to open the door, I walked into the hallway, and I let the door slam behind me.

There was always a fierceness in my body after I delivered my closing statement to the jury and left the courtroom.

A lightness in my step.

An emptiness in my chest from having purged every thought, every bit of research, making room for my next case.

I didn’t feel that way now as I stood with my back to the door, hearing her sob before I walked to the elevator.

In fact, I felt even more fucked up than before we talked.

As I got into her lobby, I pulled up Dominick’s number and held the phone to my ear while it rang.

“Declan,” he answered, “can I call you back? I’m in the middle of something and-”

“No need to,” I replied. I was going to pour myself some scotch when I got home, and I needed to be of sound mind when I had this conversation with him. “Just make room in your schedule for me tomorrow morning. First thing. I need to talk to you.”

“Are you all right, buddy?”

I got into my car and started the engine. “I’ll see you at eight tomorrow.”

I hung up and placed my phone in the cupholder and pulled onto the street, weaving my way through the cars. I wasn’t more than a hundred yards from Hannah’s building when a text came across my screen.

HANNAH

Nothing has hurt me more than seeing you walk out that door …

TWENTY-FOUR

HANNAH

I

sat in the chair across from Dominick’s desk and crossed my legs, holding the to-go coffee mug in my lap even though I was leery about whether my stomach could handle the strong brew. “Thanks for coming in early to see me, Dominick.”

Long after Declan had left my apartment, I’d texted my cousin, asking if we could talk in the morning. He’d told me to meet him in his office at seven thirty.

“Declan called me about an hour before you did last night and also requested a meeting,” Dominick said. “Tell me, does one have to do with the other, or is this merely a coincidence?”

My chest hurt.

It had been hurting since Declan had told me his side of what had happened at the bar. That was twelve hours ago, and he hadn’t replied to my text. He hadn’t called. But he’d phoned Dominick and requested a meeting. There were only a few days left of my internship; Declan wouldn’t try to reassign me at this point.

Would he?