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Four sickening minutes later, I close the app, darken my phone. After watching Bethany use her moves on the suit she seduced, there’s a gaping hole in my chest where my heart used to be. I’m in danger of throwing up what little lunch I managed to choke down. The emptiness of my future without her stretches out before me. Her perfidy is going to leave a scar for decades. God, she’s an amazing liar. I believed everything, all the way down to the boo-hoo stories about how her father used her.
This video proves she’s more than capable of using someone for her own ends without anyone coercing her at all.
I feel so fucking gullible and stupid.
But I’ve got to detach myself from her and turn over this evidence. It may burn her—if the feds choose to open the investigation against her again. But if I won’t be walking away happy, then I should get the justice for Dad that I came to Maui for.
Slowly, I rise. Weariness beats me down. Fury bubbles under it all, simmering dangerously. I put a lid on it. Sure, I could be mad at her, but I’m far angrier with myself. Bethany was only being who she is deep down. I’m the dumb ass who fell for it.
When I make my way out of the break room, Andy is standing in the hallway, looking all too ready to point out that I wasn’t behind the bar at four o’clock, which makes me late. Instead, he takes one look at my face and frowns.
“Do you need the night off?”
I drag in a breath. Even that’s excruciating. My whole body feels ready to crumble. Goddamn it, I hate this thousand-pound weight of defeat crushing.
“I think…I need to quit. I wasn’t really here to work. I was here for Bethany.”
Andy heaves a sigh. “I kind of figured. You look like shit so I hate to ask, but can you stay for this shift? I’ll get Terry to cover you tomorrow. He owes me some extra time after being so sick. After that, I’ll find a replacement.”
I’d like to help a guy out, and I hate to think I’m too whipped by one lying bitch to perform a function as simple as pouring drinks with a smile, especially when the bar isn’t particularly busy, but I don’t know if I have it in me tonight. “I’ll do my best.”
“Thanks. I actually came back here to tell you that the tall blond guy who visited your girlfriend—or maybe ex-girlfriend—the other day is back. And whatever he said made her cry. She ran down to the beach. He followed. They’ve been gone a few minutes.”
I don’t care what Stephen said to her. Well, I try not to care. Did she bamboozle him, too? Or are they in on this scam together? It would be a sly but clever move for her to take advantage of the fact that her father has a vengeful enemy determined to see him locked up. Once Barclay was in prison, then she could make off with her lover and all the money. And that would conveniently set them up for life. Nice.
I murmur a thanks to Andy, who nods and wanders off. When I look up, Ash motions me over with a frown.
“What?”
“You look terrible.”
“It’s even worse than I thought.”
Watching Bethany work James Braden over with her mouth, then her lithe little body… Granted, she didn’t look as if she was enjoying being naked with the pompous windbag. But that’s neither here nor there. She’s not the prey wrapped up in her father’s web. She’s the fucking black widow.
“Jesus. I’m sorry. What are you going to do?”
I shrug. “What I should have a long time ago. She’s on the beach?”
“With that Lund dude, yeah. He came in all full of righteous anger and acted super protective of Beth. He murmured a few words to her in the corner, showed her something, then she fell apart.”
The smart thing to do would be to leave. Turn and walk away from her drama and her lies. Not give her another chance to sink her hooks into me because I have this terrible feeling I’ll take one look at her and my heart will ache to make excuses and I’ll be too fucking weak to resist her. I can’t let that happen. And I can’t let her have the last word. I want to look at her, face to face, and tell her what she’s done to my family. I want her to understand what an amazing man her greed killed. I want to show her pictures of my brothers so she’ll know the faces of boys orphaned before they were ready to be men. I want her to feel some fucking guilt for once in her life.
Is she even capable?
