AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I raised aSuch as?brow.
Sighing, she scratched at her scalp. “I didn’t mean what I said to Dax. I would never talk to the tabloids about him. I was just …”
“Feeling pissed and jealous because he married someone other than you,” I supplied.
A hardness slid into her eyes. “You can’t know what it’s like to want someone and hate yourself for it.”
Maybe not, but I was entirely positive that I wouldn’t have handled the situation in the same ways that she did.
She licked her lower lip in an awkward gesture. “When Gracie died, I felt like he’d be the only one who really understood how bad it hurt, so I often came to him to talk. He loved her so much. I don’t think I realized how much until after she was gone. And the more time I spent with him, the more I came to care for him.” She paused, twiddling her fingers. “And the more I grew to loathe myself.”
“Yet, you keep putting yourself in his path,” I pointed out. “Why do that? The rest of your family aren’t in contact with him. There’s no reason for you to be either.” I, personally, would have removed myself from the equation for the sake of both myself and Dax.
She shrugged one shoulder. “Maybe I’m punishing myself for feeling what I feel.”
I inwardly snorted. “You can’t feel that bad about it if you keep trying to seduce him.”
A pink flush crept onto her face. “You’ve seen me when I’m plastered. I don’t exactly have many inhibitions in that state.”
I scoffed. “If that was all it was, you’d just avoid drinking around him. But you do the opposite. Probably because you need some good ole Dutch courage to make a move, but also because you can then blame the alcohol if he turns you down.”
“No, I—”
“You might resent what you feel for Dax. You might wish you could switch it off. But what you wish most of all is that he returned your feelings.”
Her brow furrowed. “You think I have the slightest hope he’d ever love me?” She let out a derisive snort. “I’m very much aware he’ll never feel for another woman what he felt for Gracie. Losing her took something out of him. Orshetook something out of him when she left. He isn’t whole without her.”
“Of course she took a piece of him with her. It was hers to take. That’s how it goes.” It didn’t mean he was broken or had some gaping hole inside him, but Mimi persisted in seeing him as if he was half a person.
“Maybe, but he’salwaysgoing to cling to his perfect little Gracie,” she clipped, bitterness dripping from every syllable. “A Gracie who wasn’t really so perfect.”
I felt my eyes narrow. “If you have something to say about her, say it. Don’t hint at it.”
Shifting in her seat, Mimi averted her gaze. “I just meant that, you know, nobody’s all good.”
Maybe. Maybe not.
When she’d first insinuated there was something Dax didn’t know, I’d thought that she would have surely told him anything that would break his connection to Gracie. But … I had two sisters who I loved with everything in me. Sisters I’d doanythingfor. Sisters whose secrets I’d protect.
Mimi might be a tool, but she had loved her twin dearly; she would surely keep a secret for her. Especially if exposing it would taint others’ memories of her.
I could push for more information, but it wasn’t my right to do that. And the last thing I wanted was to learn something about Gracie that had the potential to hurt Dax. We’d promised each other honesty, so I’d feel obliged to tell him, and it would suck large to have to do it.
As such, I let the matter drop and instead asked, “Why are you here?”
Mimi poked her tongue into the inside of her cheek. “I figured you of all people would understand how it is for me. We’re in the same boat. We love Dax. Love a man who doesn’t, and never will, love us back.”
Oh, she just relished taking any opportunity possible to drum the idea into my head that he felt nothing for me.
Her head very slowly tilted to the side as she studied me. “Or are you thinking that will change for you some day? It won’t, you know. Others held that same hope. It was crushed every time.” She paused. “There was one woman I thought he might grow to care for. She was technically a bed-buddy, but they had something. Emotionally, I mean.”
And I was apparently supposed to feel upset and jealous on hearing this—that was the reaction Mimi was so obviously looking for. She craved that response from me because it was howImadeherfeel—she wanted to level the playing field.
The thing was … yes, it stung hearing he’d cared for others. But at the same time, I would never wish he’d been alone all these years feeling nothing for no one.
“I don’t know if her name is really Angel or if that’s a stage name,” Mimi continued. “She works as a stripper in the club he used to own. That’s how they met.” A sly smirk pulled at one corner of her mouth. “I heard he was like a sex addict with her. It was as if he just couldn’t stay away from the girl. Some said he was obsessed with her.”
Okay, yeah, that made my gut twist painfully.
