No Ordinary Love (High Rise Novella Three) Read Online Free Page A

her glass. “Because I’m weak. And foolish. And only half the woman you are.”
    “I did everything you asked me to.” Alex’s voice cracked. “Everything.”
    “I know, baby. I know. I’ll never forgive myself for hurting you. Never.” Rita wiped the beginning of a tear from her eye.
    “I presume you stopped taking Mandarin classes.”
    “Peggy and I are no longer seeing each other.” Rita sat her glass on the coffee table and inched closer. “She had nothing on you. It was a silly infatuation. I certainly never loved her the way I loved you…still love you.”
    “You loved her enough to cheat on me for weeks.” Anger swept through Alex’s bones. Months of frustration trembled in her voice. “You were the one for me, Rita. The only one. I’ve never loved anyone…” Tears took over from words. They streamed down her face and landed with fat thuds in the wine Rita had poured her.
    Rita took the glass from her hand and deposited it on the floor. She grabbed Alex’s hands and buried them in hers. Warmth spread across Alex’s skin and she looked up until her eyes found Rita’s.
    “I know.” Rita’s voice broke as her hands crept up Alex’s arms. “I’ll do whatever it takes.”
    Alex couldn’t speak. After her initial anger over Rita’s infidelity had made way for deep sadness, she’d dreamed of Rita saying those words. Now she was sitting in front of her uttering them, her eyes brimming with tears and her nails digging into Alex’s biceps, they felt so meaningless and empty.
    “Fuck you, Rita,” Alex whispered, but it was loud enough to startle her ex-girlfriend. “When you destroy something as pure and powerful as the love we shared, it’s gone forever. There is no going back and there is absolutely nothing you can do.” Alex shook Rita’s hands off her. “You can sit here and shed a little tear and feel all remorseful, but it doesn’t change anything. You broke my heart and my trust and I will never feel the same way about you again.”
    “I don’t expect you to. I just want—”
    “I don’t care about what you want.” Alex rose. “And by the way, I’m seeing someone.”
    Alex cast one more glance at Rita’s flabbergasted face before heading for the door and banging it shut behind her. She had to steady herself against the wall while waiting for the elevator and, adrenalin pumping through her blood, prayed Rita wouldn’t come after her.
    Once inside the safety of the steel lift cabin, she exhaled, taking in the red patches of skin on her face, and thought of Maddie. Sweet Maddie who had rescued her from the post-Rita blues. Alex looked her mirror image in the eye and wondered if Maddie could ever be enough.

    MADDIE

    The signal beeped in Maddie’s ear. She launched the receiver back into its cradle with a loud sigh of frustration. Alex’s evening class was finished by now and it wasn’t like her to ignore her phone, let alone a call from Maddie. She just wanted to hear Alex’s voice for a few minutes while waiting for her ten p.m. conference call with the New York office. She should have gone home and taken it there instead, but by the time she realised her call was only half an hour away, she figured she may as well stay in the office and get some more work done.
    It was five to ten and she tried again. Long, taunting beeps rang in her ear. Maybe Alex forgot her mobile in the gym. Or perhaps she had better things to do than answer a call from her girlfriend. That’s what they were now—girlfriends. Their affair was not a slow burn. It was full on from the beginning. Both of them desperate to leave mistakes from the past behind and launch themselves into this new romance as if everything depended on it. As if new love could undo former heartbreak.
    She watched the clock as it ticked into ten. Forty-five minutes later the elevator spat her out into the bank’s ornate lobby. Maddie refused to count the hours she’d spent in her office that day. She didn’t have to