Page 39 of Just Can't Fall for the Enemy

Sophie leaped to her feet, fists clenched. She sent me a seething glare. “You were engaged? You didn’t think that would be important for me to know?”

I opened my mouth to explain, but my brain refused to cooperate. “I was waiting for the right time.”

“And the right time was after I agreed to go with you.” Her beautiful eyes flashed. “Or after we’d already left?”

I wasn’t sure what to say to that. She was right. I hadn’t intended to tell her for a long time, and I wasn’t sure what that meant. “I didn’t want to ruin this.”

“And you wouldn’t have. Not by telling the truth.” Sophie folded her arms. “But a lie would definitely do it.”

“I have never once lied to you.”

My words had been sincere and soft-spoken. It was that fact, perhaps, that made her lower her voice. “Maybe not intentionally. But there are all kinds of lies. Tell me this. If I look you up online, will I find more about what your friend here is talking about?”

We both knew the answer to that question. So did Olivia, by the victorious smirk she now wore. My name was linked with years of celebrity gossip adding up to several hours of reading material. Jill and I had done our job well—the world wanted Tanner Carmichael to be a player, so we’d given them what they wanted. Frankly, it wasn’t all that different from the truth.

I’d presented Sophie with a different version of myself—the Tanner I wanted to become. The Tanner she deserved. But she didn’t deserve this.

“That’s what I thought.” Sophie shot an ice-cold glare at Olivia before leveling it on me. “Have a nice trip.” Then she stalked away.

“Sophie!” I called, a note of desperation in my tone. “I’ll come over soon to explain. Just let me take care of this.”

“I have no interest in hearing any more lies from you.”

“But—”

She whirled to face me. “I’m going to pick up Grammy from the airport. Don’t drive over to visit me, and don’t call me ever again.” Then she marched off.

“Ooh,” Olivia purred. “Maybe she knows more about you than I thought.”

I watched Sophie disappear around the corner, feeling a part of me leave with her. This couldn’t be happening. “Olivia, I let you find your happiness. Don’t you dare encroach on mine.”

“You think that’s happiness?” she asked, waving in Sophie’s direction. “You can’t have known her longer than a few days, just like all the others. I counted at least six since we dated.”

I turned to face her, my voice low and cold. “Dated? We wereengaged. I asked you to be my wife, and you said yes. That isn’t something you throw away over a soccer career, especially one so terrible you’d hunt me down and destroy my life to help revive it. How dare you.”

To her credit, she actually looked stung. “Tanner—”

“No.” It was a word I’d never told her before for fear she would leave. Now that I wanted her gone, it came easily. Then again, I was a different man now, and I’d experienced what a relationship could be—and it wasn’t this. It wasn’t anything I’d ever experienced before.

“Are you serious?”

“If you’d asked nicely, I might have put you in one of the clips. But when you try to manipulate me into helping you, the answer will always be no.”

She pursed her lips. “We had something special once. Surely that’s worth one little TV appearance.”

She was still stubborn as ever. But this time, I wouldn’t back down. Never again. “If what we had was special, you wouldn’t have thrown it away so easily.”

Olivia sighed and dropped her little act. “You’re such an idiot sometimes. I didn’t end it because it wasn’t real. I ended it because you wanted me to be something I wasn’t.”

I turned to face her. “What?” She hadn’t said this before.

“You wanted someone who would make you dinner and greet you at the door with the kids when you walked in from work. Someone who wanted to live in the same house her entire life and serve in the PTA at the kids’ school. I couldn’t be that woman no matter how hard I tried.” She touched my arm, stroking her finger along my bicep. “And I did try. Did you know I baked you a cake for your birthday once?”

I shook my head, surprise rendering me speechless.

“It came out hard as a rock and tasted like cardboard. I threw it away before you came over and pretended the burning smell came from the neighbors’ next door.”

“I think I remember that,” I said softly. Then I remembered that Sophie was likely sobbing on the drive home, and I snapped back to the moment, yanking my arm away. “And then you chose your career over me, just like always.”

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