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Anxiety curls in my stomach like a timid animal, eating away at my nerves as I make my way to the bar. Blair seems blissfully at ease amongst the crowd, flirting and laughing with the small group that’s gathered around her like moths to a flame. I try to tell myself she doesn’t intimidate me. I’ve faced much scarier people, especially in my father’s world.
I decide to just go right up to her and rip off the band-aid, so to speak. Sidling up close to her, I reach out, tapping her arm. She turns, a smile still lighting up her face as she takes me in.
“Sorry, do you need something?” Blair asks, tossing her hair over her shoulder.
My mouth goes dry, my heart nearly beating out of my chest. “Yeah, uh. Hi.”
“Hi?” Her brows furrow as she studies me a bit more closely. “Do we know each other?”
“No, not really.” I try to think back to what my plan had been. “I mean, sort of. I know you—er, I mean, I know Killian.” The words just rush right out of me, so completely at odds with what I’m normally like.
Her head tilts at Killian’s name, something flashing in her eyes too quickly for me to decipher. “You know Killian?” There’s a change in her voice, but I’m too nervous to notice that much.
“Yeah. He’s…sort of reached out,” I say quickly, finally remembering what my friends and I had rehearsed. “Talking to me and everything, but I don’t know much about him. I saw you over here and recognized you.” She looks a bit weirded out right now, and I scramble to try and save the conversation before she shuts me out. “He’s mentioned you once or twice.”
Her eyebrow quirks up. “Once or twice? I’m surprised he’s even mentioned me at all.”
“He hasn’t said much,” I assure her. Or at all.
“You said he’s talking to you?” She frowns. “Last I heard, he was getting married.”
How the hell does she know that?
“He is…” My brain scrambles for another plan. She knows a lot more than I thought she would. “He’s marrying me, actually.” It just pops out before I can stop it.
Now her eyebrows shoot up. “A little weird that the fiancée tracks down the ex, don’t you think?”
And, apparently, she’s a lot smarter than I thought as well.
I sigh. “Yeah, I know. The thing is…our marriage isn’t exactly normal. Our families want this to happen for the businesses. But I hardly know anything about him.”
“So you came looking for me to find out more,” she finished.
“Exactly.” I shot her a sheepish look, hoping she’d just take pity on me and help rather than retreat to the usual catty ways of women like her. This is why I stuck to numbers.
She smiles. “I can help you with that. Follow me.”
I glance over my shoulder as she heads toward one of the empty VIP sections. Kimmy and Sadie give me a thumbs up, the latter just a tad bit less enthusiastic than the other. Feeling a bit relieved, I follow Blair through the crowd. One security guard unhooks the red rope, letting us through. It’s not any quieter than the bar area, but at least there’s no one else around.
“So,” she says, gracefully sliding onto the velvet couch wrapped in fake vines, “what do you want to know?”
I almost say everything, but stop myself just in time. “I’m not exactly sure. What happened between you two?” I cringe as I hear myself. That might have been a bit too personal, but Blair seems unfazed.
Her hand waves in the air lazily. “I might be his ex, but I’m just one of many,” she says breezily. “He never really cared about me, even if we did date for a while. I was just another fling to him, I guess. It just took me a while to realize it.”
“So, what happened?” This isn’t exactly a promising start. I tentatively sit on the edge of the couch beside her.
Blair sighs, tossing her perfect hair over her shoulder. “I thought we’d get married, you know. He never really respected me. He’d never tell me where he was…who he was with. Any concerns I had, he’d just brush off. I never felt…heard. So when I found someone else who promised all that and more…well, could you really blame me?”
“You cheated on him?” I stare at her, something twisting in my chest. The mafia might be opulent and powerful—but we still had a code. Loyalty meant more to us than money. I couldn’t actually think of anything more important. So, if Killian’s girlfriend had betrayed him…
Did Killian even care about something like that? If he’d been just a normal guy who didn’t really love Blair, then he might not have cared. But he’d been born into the family, and she’d betrayed him. Something told me Killian wouldn’t put up with any sort of betrayal, whether he was in love or not.
“I was…lonely.” Blair blinked, her eyes wet. “It didn’t really feel like dating at all. He used me and then ditched me countless times. And I thought he would change, you know? But he never did. And then when this other man came around promising me a ring, the white picket fence…how could I say no to that?”
My stomach drops just a bit. I do feel sorry for her, desperately believing the man she had strong feelings for could be what she needed when he never could. And for Killian to string her along like that…I can’t say I’m surprised. Just disappointed.
“I’m actually impressed you managed to tie him down.” Her eyes glitter in the shadows as one finger curls around a lock of bright red hair, lips pouting slightly. “I didn’t think he was the marrying type.”
