Page 25 of The Breakup

She lifted her phone up and started texting. “I need to tell Sophie that I’m gone and safe.”

“Did you tell Bradley?” I asked, curious.

“No.” She winced. “Does that make me a horrible person? I just couldn’t. I didn’t want a scene. Then my mother would know and flip out and everyone would have an opinion…”

“I don’t have an opinion,” I told her as I drove back through town. “And I don’t think you’re a horrible person. Maybe if he wasn’t fucking around behind your back you wouldn’t have stood him up at the altar.”

She made a sound in the back of her throat. “Holy moly, I stood Bradley up at the altar. I’m going to hyperventilate.”

But she didn’t actually look as shaky as she had when she’d first gotten into the car, and there was color back in her cheeks. Then she actually laughed. She looked over at me and grinned. “I have never in my entire life done something so insane. I feel lighter already.”

I couldn’t help but grin back at her. “Good for you. That took balls, Bella.”

“I have balls,” she said in amazement. Then she ripped her veil off her head and hit the button to send the window down. She pitched the veil out of the car and watched it fly backward.

“Now you’ve littered too so you’re breaking rules and the law.” I thought it was funny.

But she seemed to have instant second thoughts. “Stop the car! Go back, go back. Please.”

“Are you serious?” I raised my eyebrows at her.

“Yes! I could sell that veil and give my father the money back. That tiara alone cost three grand.” She shot me a pleading look. “Please?”

“Sure.” I turned into a parking lot and spun back around. The thing had probably been run over already, but if it made her feel better to sell it, whatever. I had to give her props for wanting to give the money back to her father. “I’ll get it.”

“No, I want to do it.”

Amazingly, it had landed on the sidewalk and appeared to be untouched. Bella ran over in her heels and snagged it, waving it up in the air triumphantly. I noticed several cars slow down and rubberneck. This whole runaway bride shit was bound to be all over town by the end of the night. Locals liked to gossip about the rich outsiders who had built all over the coast.

Bella got back in the car and sighed. “Whew. That was close. Okay, so maybe I’m not good at impulsive.”

“I think you’re doing just fine.” I hit the gas again and headed out of town. “Your phone sounds like it’s blowing up.”

She must have turned the ringer off, but it was buzzing like crazy on the dashboard.

“Where are we going?” she asked, ignoring my comment.

“My family has a camp. It’s a dump, but no one will think to look there. You can stay there for a few days.”

“Can you stay with me?”

That gave me pause. I glanced over at her. “What do you want from me, Bella? I asked you that last week and I’m still not sure.” I wasn’t her fucking therapist. I had no answers to her problems.

“I don’t know.” She smoothed her wedding dress. “But I do know that I’m not in a relationship anymore. You told me to call you when that happened. So I did. And I want you to stay with me. Overnight.”

That turned me on. I couldn’t help it. “Bella, are you flirting with me?” I asked her.

She smacked my arm and made a sound of protest. “I don’t want to be alone.”

I felt the urge to rub my temples and resisted. Shit, what the hell was I doing? This was such a bad idea. I was not good friend material for women.

“So you want a counselor? A friend? I think your sister would be a better bet than me.” I didn’t have a lot of advice to give to a pampered princess who had ditched out on her wedding. I had zero experience with that, and I wasn’t sure she would like my advice anyway if I could muster some up. Because it would be along of lines of just cut the guy off and never speak to him or of him ever again.

But did I really want to go there?

Even if she was beautiful. Even if I did feel bad for her. Even if I did feel a strange pull toward her.

I didn’t even need to get laid. I’d done that twice in the past week with the brunette Christina. It had been a decent release, even if she was no Bella in the beauty department. She was a woman who knew how to fuck. Unlike Bella, allegedly.

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