Page 2 of The Revenge Bride

I shouldn’t respond but I can’t help myself. We have years of sarcasm between us and he knows how to push my buttons. I chomp on that bait. “I don’t fix myself up to go paint a house,” I say.

“I wasn’t teasing you.”

My mouth snaps together and I frown, unsure now what to do with the volley of comebacks in my head waiting to be unleashed. I shoot him a suspicious look. “Why not?”

“Do youwantme to tease you?”

I open my mouth and then close it. Wait a second. There’s no gleam in his eyes. No indication he’s waiting to pounce. So unlike him.

Maybe this is his new tactic. Getting me to think he’s into me before he laughs and says that wouldn’t happen in a hundred years.

He’s waiting to reject me. Not that I ever offered myself but he once thought I did. The closet incident with him still sticks under my skin like a giant splinter.

I take the maple syrup I need and move around him. “Do I want you to tease me? In your dreams.” My heart gallops as I stride down the aisle away from him. The butterflies in my stomach are wildly unsettled but I don’t pay them any attention.

It’s always been like this with Rhett. He ties my stomach in knots. He makes my mouth go dry.

Around him I walk a tightrope, wondering what the hell he’s going to say or do to try and get a rise out of me.

Damn it all to hell and back. Why does he have to be so hot?

He hasn’t changed a lick since high school. Well, except for the tattoos snaking along his arms. And that wide chest. With the bugling muscles. Then there’s the way he fills out his ripped jeans. Also?—

Why in hell am I thinking about him this way?I look over my shoulder. He’s not there and I relax.

The relaxation is short-lived. I round the aisle and there among the rows of bread and muffins stands my ex-boyfriend with the woman he cheated on me with. His very pregnant girlfriend.

She’s dressed to the nines. Makeup perfect. Hair, same. Her skin glows.

In comparison, I feel like little orphan Lucy.

A fat diamond engagement ring flashes on her finger when she links her arm with his. A stole-your-man smirk is pasted on her lips and it…sucks.

Clyde sweeps his gaze over me, and his lip curls with disgust. “Hell, Lucy. Given your status, I’d think you’d put effort into yourself.”

“My status?” I can barely make my mouth move to answer him. I’m frozen from the inside out.

He sighs. “You represent the radio station here. Granted, you’re not as good or as well-known as I am at the other station, but still, a DJ should be aware of her public image.”

Girlfriend taps his arm likethat’s enoughthen clicks her tongue against her teeth, oozing fake sympathy. “We were seeing each other for almost a year before the engagement.” Another smirk.

I’m reeling from that new information.

She continues, “I know you must hate me?—”

“I don’t give you space in my head to feel anything about you,” I say, lying through my teeth. I’ve lost sleep dreaming up get-even scenarios.

Her gloating drops a notch before she rallies back. “Like Clyde is trying to point out, if you’d taken care of him or if you’d been there for him things could have been different.”

The ex nods, his expression one of longsuffering and I wonder how many years I’d get if I bludgeon him with the syrup bottle.

“You never made an effort because you’re a selfish person, Lucy. Why do you think I went looking for someone else? I got tired of you being frigid. I didn’t understand until I dumped you that it’s because you’ve got issues.”

“I dumped you,” I correct through stiff lips.

“Anyway…that’s all in the past.” He smiles down at his girlfriend. “My little goddess and I are getting married at the end of the year. We’ll send you an invitation. I think we can squeeze in just one more guest. I’m sure you won’t have a plus one by then.”

My fingers close around the neck of the syrup, and I start to lift it. I don’t care how many years I get.

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