The Kiss That Launched 1,000 Gifs by Sheralyn Pratt

relationship.”
    Tears stung Grace’s eyes. She had no idea why. She wasn’t feeling sad at all at the moment. Yet there they were. “That is one twisted ultimatum, Phillip. Especially when you’ve already told me that you were planning on breaking up with me tomorrow morning anyway.”
    For the first time, his mouth curved up. “There have been plenty of nights when I was planning on breaking up with you where you changed my mind by morning.” He took a couple steps forward. “C’mon, Grace. We’re good together.”
    “Stop!” she said, her voice stone cold. “You want to do this right here and right now? Fine. Then let this be the end, Phillip. Right here. Right now. We’re done. Does that work for you?”
    He studied her in the darkness for a few moments, then nodded. “Yep,” he said, then walked to his car as if it was as simple as that.
    Seriously? Yep? That did not just happen. It had to be a dream.
    Three years of Grace’s life… and it all ended with a yep ?
    She slammed the door before angry tears flooded out of her eyes. When she took a step to storm off to her room, the sharp pain had her tossing her shoes and slumping down to the floor in an undignified heap. Her bed would have been much more comfortable, but once the tears started coming, the cold floor of her entryway held her in one place until her eyes were hot and cried out. Then she rolled over and slept on the carpet.
     
     

There was not enough coffee in the world to make Grace’s day not feel like a surreal time warp. She’d woken up with a cry hangover. The alcohol from the wine tasting she’d attended the night before probably hadn’t helped. Between that and sobbing herself to sleep, a lightning storm had made a home in her brain by morning.
    If ever there had been a day to call in sick, Grace had pressed snooze on it eight times before the chirp of her dying phone battery had put her at full alert. She’d skipped out on her morning workout and decided that a fix up of yesterday’s hair would have to do. And as Grace had walked into work—half human, half zombie—all she could think was that it must have been a dream.
    There was no way she and Phillip had actually broken up, especially not like that. They never fought like they had last night. Disagreed? Yes. Bantered? Yes. But thrown out the I have other options card or descended into ultimatums? Never.
    It must have been a dream, Grace kept thinking in a loop as she stared at her computer screen and accomplished exactly nothing. Well, unless she counted categorizing Phillip’s female restaurant staff in the order of least appealing to most appealing an accomplishment, because she had definitely been doing that all morning.
    When it came to hiring servers, Phillip had a type. He liked petite girls who wore bras for decoration purposes only. Grace had noticed the trend, of course. She’d even asked Phillip about it a few years back, but all he’d said was that people were likely to feel better about the food they were eating more when it was served by petite people. The explanation made sense, so Grace had let it go.
    But what if petite, narrow-hipped women were really Phillip’s type?
    The thought ate at her all morning. She obsessed over it as she did a report from the courthouse for the noon news. And when she came back to the office, heard distinct giggling, and spotted petite little Emily leaning up against Ashton’s desk, Grace nearly lost it.
    Grace slumped into her seat, glaring at the romance budding across the room. The longer she watched Emily and Ashton, the more her depression was replaced by rage.
    They were at work, not at some single’s bar, for crying out loud! The way Emily was leaning up against Ashton’s desk… the way she smiled down at him… the way she moved in closer than necessary to show him things on his phone? Flirtation. All of it. And Ashton was playing along every step of the way—smiling back and making room for Emily to lean in as