Page 6 of A Different Husband

“I don’t think she sees it that way.” I glared over at my cousin before I ripped my t-shirt over my head and grabbed a nicer button-up shirt out of my closet.

“She’s a little miffed that her ‘dream wedding’ was hijacked and that it will have to be different when we eventually get married. Courtney will get over that and come up with an even better theme for our wedding.” I wanted to punch him for the way he put the words ‘dream wedding’ in air quotes, as if it was a trivial thing.

He sounded so confident, but the asshole hadn’t seen the way she broke down in my arms. The poor thing hadn’t even realized she was in my lap when I sat on the couch with her in my arms a couple weeks ago when I went to talk to her about everything. She was having a hard time wrapping her mind around the situation, not that anyone could blame her. It wasn’t every day that the man you were supposed to marry offered you up to someone else instead. Part of me still wanted to call everything off, but Courtney needed to go through with it. I was certain that she wanted to see if Beckett would eventually step up and stop it from happening. Unfortunately, for her, I didn’t think that was going to happen. My cousin seemed pretty eager to get to my bachelor party, and I could only imagine why.

I was shockedthat the bachelor party wasn’t being thrown in some downtown Atlanta strip club. Instead, we went to a bar closer to home that most of us frequented when we wanted to go out. In all honesty, that should have been my first indication that things would go to shit by the end of the night.

“Hey man,” Ky, my sister’s best friend, said as he clapped me on the back. “This is weird, right? It’s not just me?”

I chuckled in response. “No, man, it is definitely not just you. I had no clue this was even going down until Beckett showed up at my door.”

Ky stepped back and looked shocked. “What the fuck is he thinking?”

“No clue. He ruined a good woman, though. Courtney is holding it together, but she’s heartbroken.”

“I can see that. It’s a complete betrayal. This was supposed to be their wedding, and that asshole has been in the bar for five minutes and he has a woman in his lap.” I turned to see where Ky pointed his beer bottle.

“You have got to be kidding me,” I growled before I glanced around to see who else was in the bar who might eventually make sure the news got back to Courtney.

“You had to know. Bea told me you suspected that he had a wandering eye months ago.”

“I didn’t think it would go further than that. Now, I wonder if that was why he pushed for her to marry me instead. The asshole had cold feet and wanted it to look like there was another, more noble, reason for backing out of their wedding.

Ky and I watched in complete disgust as my cousin and the woman sucked face. It was obvious, by their comfort level, that this was not their first time together.

“That’s not hard to watch at all.” I spun at the sound of her voice and turned to see Courtney there with my sister, Bea.

“Ky told me where he was going and why,” Bea said automatically as she threw her hands up in surrender.

“I made her bring me here. I needed to see for myself.”

Just as I was about to usher my future wife and my sister out of the bar, we heard a woman shriek. I turned to see the woman Beckett had been making out with scream as another woman yanked her off his lap by her hair. “You crawled out of my bed this morning and now you have some other skank in your lap at the bar for everyone to see?” The second woman yelled at him. His eyes lifted and searched the area, maybe in an effort to find someone to help him out of his situation. When they landed onme, he looked relieved until he noticed who was with me. What color was left in his face drained as he realized Courtney was there to witness everything.

“It’s not what it looks like,” He shouted to her.

“Who in the hell are you talking to?” The second woman yelled as she followed the direction of Beckett’s eyes. The minute she noticed Courtney, she growled. I took that to mean she knew exactly who Beckett’s former fiancee was. “You told me you were done with that bitch.”

That got Beckett’s attention. “Don’t talk about her like that.”

“Screw you, Beckett Robeson! You made promises to me that you wouldn’t go through with the wedding. I thought I could trust you when everyone started to talk about how she was going to marry your cousin instead, but then I found you here with someone else.”

“Oh shit!” Ky muttered.

Courtney stomped closer to them, despite me trying to grab for her, so I could get us all out of the club and spare her more hurt. “Just how long have you been screwing Beckett, Ashley?” She asked the woman.

The woman, Ashley apparently, turned and grinned. “For a month.”

“A month?” Courtney whispered, but the bar had gone so quiet that we all managed to hear it. Courtney turned to Beckett and repeated the two words louder. “A month, Beckett?”

“We weren’t screwing for a month. We were talking and then after…”

“You were talking about screwing her and didn’t bother to go through with it until you dumped me onto your cousin?” Courtney asked. Beckett didn’t even bother to answer besides the slight nod of his head.

“Good to know.”

“I swear, nothing happened before,” He hurriedly explained again.

“He’s not lying about that,” Ashley confirmed as she threw a shitty look his way.

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