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Dahlia put her hands on her hips. “Dodo promised he’d give a gracious sendoff speech so the guests would know they could hang out or take off.”
Piper shook her head. “Dodo’s not there, I just looked.”
Dahlia frowned. “He’s always checking on the arrangements. Maybe he’s speaking with the workers?” She pivoted and stepped toward a door marked STAFF. She opened it.
Holy shit.
On the floor, there was a stiletto, a loafer, trousers, and….Dodo’s big-ass belt buckle squatting on top of a strawberry red G-string. Scum bag behavior was catching tonight. What had been in the wine?
Willow sat on the end of a table with Dodo between her legs. She pumped his cock. “Applebaum. Applebaum. Red and delicious.”
Dahlia bent and lifted her fiancé’s lucky belt from the floor, while her gaze was on her cheating man. She turned away from the cheating pair, moving like a newly formed zombie.
What a shit show. He knew how she felt. Here was a second man who needed a punch to the face.
Piper’s eyes teared up, and she grabbed his arm. “Let’s go.”
The beast with two backs turned their heads toward the open door, and their audience. Dodo cursed, and his sweaty face blanched.
Willow looked defensive but also smug. She widened her fingers, keeping a good grip on Dodo’s balls. “See. Your Anne Boleyn holding out for a wedding ring manipulations don’t work on virile men.”
Mikah corralled Piper and Dahlia from the room and shut the door. Dahlia looked frail and miserable. This was messed up. He would never be responsible for putting that look in a woman’s eyes.
One of Dahlia’s sorority sister’s waddled by. She was nine months along if she was a day. “Hey, girls.” She waved at them. “Bathroom. Again. This one’s sitting right on my bladder.”
Pieces fell together. Every bit of gullibility he had fled tonight. He looked at Dahlia. “Did that pregnancy stick from the conference room belong to your friend?”
Dahlia stared blankly ahead. His words clearly weren’t processing. He shouldn’t even be asking, but the guys had been sick over that positive pregnancy stick in the locker room. He hadn’t thought his body could get any tenser. Had Dahlia framed the team? Why?
He repeated the question, his voice harder, demanding the truth.
“Yeah.” Dahlia blinked. “That’s Coco, she’s pregnant. Piper and I were making a point, helping the guys out.” She stared at the door where her fiancé was doing his own form of deception.
Dahlia wasn’t his problem.
On the other hand, Piper had known. Was no one remotely honest in this crap organization? “That was pretty shitty,” Mikah said, looking at Piper. He put his lips to her ear. “That why you waited so long with me? Were you Anne Boleyning me?”
He strode away.
* * *
Okay, Piper froze. She could only handle one person falling apart at a time.
She turned to her cousin. “Give me one minute.” When Mikah had needed to talk, he’d been like a statue; now he was an athlete-in-motion. She chased after him, walking double-time to catch his long stride, and reached him just before the entrance to the banquet hall. “Why are you walking away from me? We need to talk about this.”
He stopped, turned, and looked at her. “I need the team, I need focus. Girlfriends. Holidays. I don’t need. This is all fucked up.” His voice was choked, his gaze on the door.
Pain wiggled through her, from her heart to her toes. Perspective. He was hurting too. She could see that from the dull light in his eyes and the hard edge to his jaw. She understood him, and she knew about his dad’s indiscretion. She went for rational. “You’re okay, your rankings have never been better.” Wasn’t that what was most important to him?
“I think about you when I need to focus.” His body was tensing like he was forming a barrier against her.
“Your stats say you’ve never played better.” That was true and should calm him down.
“You need me. A place to live.”
Whoa, Piper backed up a step. Where had that come from?
Mikah shook his head. “You’re confusing lust and convenience.”
