Page 74 of The Compass Series

AALIYAH

E verything was perfect, from the gold vase centerpieces filled with roses to the floodlights used to make the dance floor shine. The place settings were beyond stunning, and the dessert table held all of my favorite things.

Brownies.

Cookies.

Lemon bars.

A cake that took my breath away. Gold ribbons dancing across the tiers of fondant, the letters J and A written in the most beautiful frosting. One layer was red velvet another deep chocolate. His favorite flavor and mine…

All of it was perfect, a reception built for a forever kind of love story, and all of the workers were tearing it down. How was I ever going to be okay after this?

I stood frozen in the doorway as Connor stayed near me, staring as they all took the pieces away.

My chest tightened as two individuals were about to recklessly place the fifty-pound masterpiece onto a cart with wobbly wheels.

They’d probably push the cake into the back room, grab a fork, and dive in like animals.

“Wait! No!” I shouted, rushing into the space with my long train following me. “Don’t touch that!”

They turned to me with narrowed eyes. They looked like dang teenagers, obviously too young to be handling such a prize. “Uh, what?” one muttered.

“I said don’t touch that cake!” I probably looked wild in the eyes because I felt completely wild in my heart.

“Don’t move it.” I turned toward the other caterers and ordered them to stop breaking down the place settings.

I shouted for the DJ to stop unplugging his equipment.

I cried for the bartender to stop wiping everything down.

I just needed the perfect room to stay that way for a little bit longer.

“Aaliyah…” Connor’s voice was low and sad.

I cringed at the sound. It was worrisome when the happiest man in the world looked sad.

“Connor, make them stop. Please. I just—make them stop. Make them stop,” I pleaded, staring his way as if he was my only ally.

“They have to do their job…”

I took a deep breath and swallowed hard as tears began to fall down my face. “I just need more time.”

He narrowed his eyes. He didn’t understand me. He didn’t know where my irrational emotions were coming from. If there was anything Connor didn’t understand, it was others’ emotions. He never stayed around long enough to witness them.

“You’re being unreasonable,” he told me. Not rudely, just matter-of-factly. It seemed Connor didn’t have a rude bone in his body.

“I know, but please.”

He rubbed the back of his neck, and defeat deflated his shoulders as he turned to the crew. “Leave everything as it is,” he told them.

“But, sir, we were ordered?—”

“Everything is paid for,” Connor said quickly. “The room, the time, your services. So the least you can do is let the bride partake in the festivities.”

“But…she’s not a bride,” another said. “The wedding was called off.”

She’s not a bride…

I hadn’t known words could sting until I heard those ones fall against my eardrums.

Connor gave that individual a look and then narrowed his eyes. He reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet. “I’ll pay you each three hundred dollars to continue the reception activities.”

For the first time that afternoon, guilt found its way to me. “No. I’m sorry, Connor, we can go?—”

He held a silencing hand up to me, pulling out the cash.

The workers all glanced toward one another, then shrugged their shoulders as they walked over to Connor and began collecting their payment for keeping a wannabe bride from having a mental breakdown.

Or, well, for helping a wannabe bride partake in her mental breakdown.

Because nothing about what I was doing was sane.

The DJ started playing music, and I moved to the middle of the dance floor.

The lights flashed, and I swayed back and forth, staring at the almost life I’d missed.

Then the wave of emotions came crashing into me as a slow song came on.

My knees began to buckle, and my eyes began to flood with emotion.

The second I began to fall, with the aim of hitting the floor, I was surprised when Connor stopped me.

He pulled me up, and he held me in his arms. He swayed back and forth with me. “I got you, Red. I got you.”

When I began to fall, he was there to catch me.

“I broke my promise to you,” I said. I rested my tired head against his shoulder as he moved back and forth.

“What promise?”

“You said to never fall for a man who wouldn’t dance with me. He wouldn’t have done this,” I whispered, crying onto his shoulder. “He would’ve never danced with me.”

“Then why did you choose him?”

I sniffled and didn’t reply because my answer felt too pathetic to face.

Because I was alone and scared of being alone and scared for the small remainder of my life that would’ve been experienced alone.

“Why did you say that the last time we saw each other? Why did you tell me not to marry him? Did you think I wasn’t good enough for him?”

He arched a bewildered brow and shook his head. “No. Of course not. I just knew he was nowhere near good enough for you.”

I wanted to believe those words, but still, it was hard.

We kept dancing until the crew had finally had enough and kicked us out.

“Where would you like me to take you?” Connor asked.

“I don’t know. I have nowhere to go. I can’t go to Jason’s penthouse. It’s not mine. It’s his, and I have no one, nobody to…I have nowhere to go and?—”

“You’ll stay with me tonight,” he said, cutting into the panic rising in my chest. “You’ll stay with me.”