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“Is it too early for a drink?”

“At your place or mine?”

“Ah—”

“You down the street at Mav’s office?”

“Yeah.”

“I’m on my way.”

We go to my place.

I sit on the couch.

My home still has his shape in it.

It hurts.

God, it hurts.

Joy pulls out a bottle of Bollinger from her bag.

“That’s some good stuff there, Joy.”

“I heard Mason left town,” she says in response and opens the bottle with the softest pop. She pours two glasses and hands me one, takes hers, and sits next to me. “You wanna talk about it or do you want to cry about it?”

I drink the Bollinger down like a shot, and then a sob escapes me.

Joy refills my glass.

I tell her, slowly. Everything.

“I…I really didn’t think he’d leave, Joy. How dumb does that make me?”

“I think the dumb asshole in this equation is Mason, who obviously is head over heels, but like some other men I know may have hangups about commitment.”

“Hunt?”

She shakes her head. “We do that another time with another bottle—for him I’m gonna need whiskey…you know something stronger.”

“He didn’t look cold.” My eyes fill with tears. “That’s the thing. He looked like a man who had made a decision he hated.”

Joy takes my free hand in hers. “I’m sorry, babe.”

“I don’t know why…he can’t stay…why he can’t let us…you know, explore this amazing chemistry, this love, this….” My chest locks up like I’ve been branded hot. “And I can’t—I can’t file it. I can’t provide evidence of it. He left, and he didn’t look like he wanted to, and I have no legal theory for what that means.”

Joy pours more wine into my glass. “Bottoms up, babe.”

I stare at the glass of golden bubbles. “I don’t know if getting drunk in the middle of the day is going to help me.”

“You get your heart broken, you gotta drink. The hangover will make the heartbreak feel less painful…for a minute, at least.

I let out a watery laugh. “You’re good at this.”

“I’ve had my heart broken a few times.”

We drink, talk, and eat ice cream—and when we get hungry, she makes Mav bring food.