Page 1 of Seale the Deal

Prologue

Wrenley

ONE YEAR BEFORE THE 90 DAYS

The night I decided to move to Alaska started with me pouring a bottle of very expensive red wine into a mermaid-themed sippy cup. This was not a lifestyle choice. This was a consequence of living in my last remaining friend Kay’s kid-centric condo in the suburbs of Vancouver because I stopped sucking my boss’s cock.

Also not a choice.

He decided the new administrative assistant was better at both sucking off and sucking up.

Which felt unfair, considering I’d spent eight years loving him through often less-than-satisfying sex. The man wasn’t badly equipped. He was just kind of selfish in bed.

Look, if orgasms were the foundation of a lasting relationship, straight women everywhere would be doomed.

But I hadn’t stayed because the sex was good. I stayed because together we felt unbeatable. Me, an ambitious designer with talent to burn. Him, a bold business executive with creative solutions to mundane problems in the fashion industry.

He promised me a future as bright and colourful as a Versace runway.

Turns out the man lied as easily as he breathed, and now I’m left with a broken career and permanent Cheerio marks on my thighs.

I set the sippy cup and bottle on the coffee table and set up my phone for the only thing that has been holding my sanity together since my entire life imploded: my weekly video call with my best friend, Remi Seale, where we get sloppy drunk and watch 90 Day Fiancé like it’s the therapy I can’t afford and probably need.

The call comes in as soon as I sink onto the couch, brushing aside a scatter of more crushed Cheerios Kay’s child must’ve been eating earlier. Proof I now live in a toddler’s kingdom, and I am very much a guest.

The bright blue eyes of my best friend light up the screen. Her long blonde hair is tied up in a topknot, her Taylor Swift–inspired winged eyeliner on fire as always. She blows her bangs out of her eyes.

Wrenley! She narrows her eyes. What’s with the cup?

Only clean one I could find. I take a sip, but there’s something incredibly unsatisfying about wine filtered through cheap plastic.

Your life has gotten very sad since you left your job.

Fired, I correct. I was fired.

It’s not that Remi doesn’t know this. It’s that I can’t stop repeating the sheer absurdity of how my job ended, like if I say it enough times, it’ll finally make sense. I didn’t expect to be in my mid-thirties, suddenly radioactive in my industry and essentially starting over from scratch.

Actually, less than scratch. Scratch implies there’s somewhere left for me to go, and my ex made sure there isn’t.

Apparently, getting fired from one of the biggest fashion companies in Canada after sleeping with the CEO makes you not fit for hiring, I add. And somehow simultaneously overqualified and underqualified for everything else. You know, I even applied at the diner down the street. A mouse literally ran across the floor while I was there, so, what? A rodent can work there, but I’m unemployable?

I don’t think the mouse works there, Remi says. This isn’t Ratatouille.

That’s not the point.

Then what is?

I blow out a breath. The point is, I didn’t spend eight years clawing my way through one of the most brutal industries in the country just to end up serving pancakes in a rodent-infested diner.

Remi’s face gentles.

I’ve been considering moving to Montreal, I admit.

Her eyebrows shoot up. Isn’t that on the other side of the country?

I nod. There’s a theatre there looking for a costume designer. The pay is terrible, and the contract’s only six months, but at least it’s still design work. And Quebec doesn’t care nearly as much about Vancouver fashion politics. Or at least I hope not.

And if that doesn’t work?