“There you are,” a voice purrs from inside the room. “I was starting to think you’d never return.”
I go cold.
I turn my head toward the voice. A dark-haired woman is sprawled naked across his sheets. She’s smiling until her gaze lands on me.
The smile falters. “Oh,” she says. “You didn’t mention you had company.”
Antonio’s arms tighten around me. I feel his chest expand with a breath he doesn’t release.
“Dani.” His voice is dangerous. “What the fuck are you doing here?”
She sits up slowly, making no effort to cover herself. She has the kind of body that comes from daily exercise and calorie counting. Everything I’m not right now.
“You said I could come by whenever you were in the area.” She tilts her head, studying me with open curiosity. “I saw your car while I was driving by and figured you’d want company. The front door was unlocked.”
He has a history with her. This woman knows this house and knows him. She expected to find him alone, waiting, the way he’s apparently been before.
In the same bed he was about to lay me down in.
“Put me down,” I whisper.
“Jasmine...”
“Put me down.”
He lowers me to my feet, but his hands remain firm at my waist as if he’s afraid I’ll bolt. He’s not wrong. Every instinct is screaming at me to run.
But I can’t stop staring at her, and the way she looks at me like I’m an inconvenient nuisance.
“I told you this morning I wasn’t interested,” Antonio says. He’s moved in front of me now, partially blocking my view of her. “You need to leave. Now.”
This morning. He saw her this morning.
Dani laughs. “Antonio, don’t be dramatic. You always say that.” She swings her legs off the bed, standing without a shred of modesty. “And you always change your mind.” Her gaze slides past him to me, appraising. “I can wait my turn.”
My turn.
Like I’m interchangeable. Like we both are.
I think about Vegas. Waking up alone in that hotel room, the sheets still warm from his body. The time I spent convincingmyself he’d come back. The humiliation of finally accepting he wouldn’t.
“There’s nothing to wait for,” Antonio says.
“If you say so.” She reaches for a silk robe draped over a chair and slips it on, tying it loosely at the waist. Her unbothered smile is back now. “I’ll let myself out. But you have my number.”
“Get the fuck out of my house before I call the cops. And don’t ever come back.”
“Cute. Enjoy him while you can, sweetheart.” She sweeps her gaze over me before returning it to Antonio. “Have fun. Call me when the novelty wears off.” With that, she’s gone.
The silence that follows is unbearable.
I look down at myself. Half-naked. Standing in the doorway of a bedroom where another woman was waiting for the man who was just about to make love to me.
A woman who clearly knows the routine. Who expected to be in his bed tonight because that’s how it’s always worked.
I am so stupid. “I need to get dressed.” My voice doesn’t shake. I’m proud of that.
“Jasmine, wait.” He reaches for me.
