Tessa offered to split the check, but Julia was adamant that this was her treat, plunking down a credit card casually.

“Thank you, Julia. Not just for lunch but for letting me cry on your shoulder. Not literally, of course,” added Tessa with a little smile.

“But pretty close, huh? It was my pleasure. Look, I want to give you my cell number, okay? And I really do want you to call me if you ever need to talk or want to hang out. We can go have coffee or get a drink or just take a long walk. Do you like yoga?”

Tessa took the business card Julia handed her, the cell number written on the back. “I love yoga. I can’t really afford it, though, so I mostly look for places that offer free or demo classes. What about you?”

“Yeah, it’s kind of my obsession. I go to class almost every day. You should come to my studio with me some weekend soon. My weekend teacher Sasha is awesome. She kicks my ass every single time I take her class. I can get you a complimentary pass if you’d like.”

“I’d love that,” beamed Tessa. “I, um, don’t really have any girlfriends so I appreciate your offer to – you, know, hang out.”

“Well, I don’t have very many myself,” confessed Julia. “So I’d really, really like to call you my friend. Okay?”

Tessa felt just a little bit less lonely – and alone - as she smiled at her new friend. “Okay.”

Chapter Twenty-One

November

Despite the fact that her abs were already quivering in protest, Tessa forced herself to do another set of crunches on top of the hundred she’d already completed. She was using the slant board today, which was always tougher for her than the fitness ball, and thus had to push herself hard to finish the grueling workout. Besides the core work, she’d done an hour of cardio, split between the stationary bike and the elliptical machine, then lifted weights, focusing today on her biceps and shoulders.

She had been especially diligent these past couple of months about her workouts, rarely missing a day, and often spending close to two hours here in the employee fitness room. The extra training hadn’t been to get herself in better shape, or lose a few pounds. If anything, she was probably a little on the thin side right now, having unintentionally dropped some weight by skipping meals and working so many hours. The additional hours she’d spent working out had helped some to fill the otherwise lonely hours back at the apartment, had meant that much less time she had to spend there and be constantly reminded that she was now very much on her own.

Peter had gradually begun to contact her less frequently, his emails now only arriving once a week or less, and becoming shorter and shorter in length. Tessa knew that was his subtle way of letting her down gently, of forcing her to accept that he wasn’t a part of her life any longer, and that she needed to get on with things.

She finished her crunches, too wiped out now to consider doing even one more, and reached for a towel to wipe the sweat off her face and neck. As she drank from her water bottle, Tessa knew deep down that she was happy for Peter – happy that he was finally getting to live his dream – and she was really trying hard not to resent him for it. She couldn’t be Peter’s responsibility any longer, the weight that dragged him down, and was determined to finally grow strong enough to stand on her own two feet and not depend on anyone else to take care of her. It was hard, the toughest thing she’d ever had to do in a life that had been filled with hardships, but she was getting through it a day at a time.

The nights were by far the worst, the times when she was all alone in her tiny apartment with no one to talk to or hang out with. Julia had been wonderful, calling several times a week to chat, and they’d met for coffee a few times already. But at present Julia was still recovering from a near-tragic assault she’d suffered at the hands of Nathan’s jealous – and emotionally unhinged - ex-fiancée. Tessa had thought about dropping by her new friend’s flat for a visit but hadn’t wanted to intrude, especially since Julia’s parents had just arrived for a visit.

And now Thanksgiving was only about ten days away, and she knew Julia was flying to Michigan to spend the holiday with Nathan’s family. Tessa hadn’t even begun to think about what she might do herself, since she’d always spent holidays with Peter. The last couple of years they had gone to dinner at the home of one of his former co-workers at the news agency, but this year everything was different. She would most likely be alone on Thanksgiving, just as she was every day now.

As usual, she’d had the fitness room pretty much to herself at this time of the day. One of the women from Accounting had been here when she’d arrived, walking on the treadmill, and then two geeky IT guys had stopped in to use the weight machines for a few minutes. The room had been empty for the last forty-five minutes, the only audible noise coming through the earbuds of her tiny iPod shuffle. Peter had bought the device in Japan for her last birthday, and had loaded a bunch of songs on it that he knew she liked. It was one of her most cherished possessions, despite the fact it was really only worth about fifty dollars. Even now as she was cooling down before heading off to take a shower, she was tempted to sing and dance along with the throbbing beat of Bruno Mars’s Locked Out of Heaven.

She had the volume of the iPod cranked up so loud, in fact, that she didn’t hear the door to the fitness room open. It was only when she turned away from the water cooler that she realized someone else was in the room, and gulped in alarm when she saw who it was.

Jason Baldwin was smiling at her in what he likely thought was a seductive manner, but it more closely resembled a leer in Tessa’s mind. Reluctantly, she turned off her iPod and removed the earbuds, all too aware of how closely he was standing. A shiver of alarm traveled rapidly up her spine, and she instinctively took a step or two backwards.

But Jason wasn’t easily deterred and merely moved even closer, enough that she could smell the lingering scent of alcohol that clung to him. Tessa belatedly remembered that there had been some sort of cocktail reception on the schedule today, with most of the management team in attendance. In addition to the fitness room and showers, this floor held the employee lunch room, a few smaller conference rooms, and a large reception room complete with its own kitchen and bar that was used for entertaining clients and other such functions.

“Well, if I had known the most beautiful woman in the office was in here working out alone, I would have left that god-awful party a long time ago and joined you,” Jason told her in a very suggestive voice.