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My eyes connect with his. They’re closed off and cold. This has me raising my brows in question as I look back and forth between the two of them, and then it seems my body recognizes before my brain does what he’s about to tell me, and ice water plunges into my stomach.
“There’s no real easy way to break the news to you other than just getting it over with. Adele and I are getting married.”
From somewhere in the house, the ticking of a wall clock echoes through the silence that has taken over the room. After that, it’s like a freight train as everything in my brain screams.
Jaxon reaches for Adele’s right hand and intertwines their fingers as her left hand comes up and clutches the string of pearls around her neck. That’s her tell of when she’s distressed, and it’s then I spot the ring. She’s wildly uncomfortable with this, as she should be. What a bitch. As I stare at the ring, the only thing I can think of at this moment is that it’s obnoxious in size and unnecessary, and although I shouldn’t, deep down, I hate them both.
Adele and I dated for over three years. I knew the type of girl she was when I met her, but I was still drawn to her. We ran with the same crowd. Our families had worked together for years, and I was bewitched by her laughter and ability to go with the flow. She didn’t seem to mind that I had just bought the orchard and split my time between Charlotte and Horizons Valley, and she even told me she liked spending time in the mountains. But it was after my mother died that things began to change.
I knew she wanted to get married. We’d been together long enough, but I just couldn’t. I was grieving the loss of my mother, I’d officially given up my position with the firm and became a silent shareholder, and much to her horror, I moved to the orchard full time. She thought I would sell the orchard and move home after my mother passed, but she was wrong. She tried giving me an ultimatum to get me back to Charlotte, and I did consider it for a split second, but then I picked up her iPad one day, as it was lying on the island in the kitchen, and text messages from my brother flashed across the home screen.
Did you talk to him yet?
Remember our deal.
I didn’t even need to know what the deal was, but I did know that speaking to him about anything was a betrayal. She knew I wasn’t on board with how he and my father had been doing things. There was a rift between my family and me, and whether she thought she could close it, I didn’t care. It wasn’t her place. In addition to taking a good long look at my life in Charlotte, I had been taking a good long look at what a life with her would have been like too. And as the days dragged on, it became less and less of what I wanted. She wanted my name and what being married to me would mean for her, but only if I was going to keep up with the Warren society image. Those texts were the final push I needed to firmly sever everyone from that life.
“You’re fucking joking,” I say to both of them, but my eyes are firmly on her. Jaxon is my younger brother. He’s always felt he had something to prove and wanted to get ahead. I understand his reasoning for wanting to marry her, as really he is marrying up, but what is hers? First off, he’s breaking an unspoken brother code where you don’t double dip, and second, her because she always expressed to me that he made her uncomfortable. From what I remember, she never really liked him, but then again, maybe she did. Maybe that’s just what she told me. Perhaps they always had something, and I just didn’t see it.
A disgusted shiver works its way through me.
“No,” he says, breaking the intense stare down she and I are having. Jaxon has to feel the tension in this room. It’s pouring off me, and my hands tighten into fists. “Here is your invitation to our engagement party. I don’t need to express how poorly it would be for the family if you chose not to attend.”
And the hits just keep coming.
“How poorly does it look for you both to be the sloppy seconds? I mean, really, Jax, what the fuck?”
Adele gasps.
He doesn’t answer but instead holds up the invitation for me and forces me to take the few steps between us to get it. The envelope is thick and silver. My name is calligraphed perfectly on the front, and then it hits me. Everyone knows about them but me. Everyone in the meeting, including my father and who knows who else.
Once an asshole, always an asshole. I shake my head in disappointment as my arm drops.
Returning to the bar, I lift the bottle, pour another finger, and toss it back. The sound of crystal almost breaking echoes through the room when I not so lightly slam the glass down.
“Was any of it ever real?” I ask her as I turn to face them again.
Instead of responding, she keeps her chin high and angles her face toward my brother to dismiss me.
There’s my answer.
Over three years.
Of. My. Life.
I think some part of me always knew the real reason she was with me, but seeing the proof of this confirms my suspicions.
I’m surprised to feel pain from this.
It’s not that I’m not over her because I am. I just feel betrayed by both of them.
“You understand she will never love you, right? This is only about the money,” I say to Jaxon, and he just smirks at me.
“Who said anything about love?”
And it feels like he’s slapped me. I was in love with her. Love wasn’t just a fairy tale. It was a real thing I had hoped I had found but unfortunately didn’t.
Then again, if this is her version of love, no fucking thank you.
