Page 72 of The Wedding Deal
The tears were going to spill, no matter how much she blinked against them.
“I saw the text. You don’t have to keep denying it.” Lance pulled her phone out of his suit pocket and shoved it at her. “Your dad thanked you for the tip.”
She lowered her eyebrows, trying to put it together. Somehow she managed to reach for the phone. She saw the text, the one Dad must’ve sent after listening to her voicemail message about how one of the local construction companies was hiring. She’d added that it should keep him busy enough that he wouldn’t be tempted by his phone or his computer as much, since he’d said he had to be careful about ending up on gambling websites.
The sides of her cell dug into her palm as she squeezed it, her lungs flattening as betrayal burned up what little oxygen she had left. “You went through my phone?”
“Don’t turn this back on me,” he said. “It was in my pocket. I felt it buzz and pulled it out, thinking it was mine. But when I saw that text, knowing what I now know about your father, you’re damn right I read it. I have an obligation to my team.”
“You didn’t think you had an obligation to talk to me instead of jumping to conclusions?”
“I don’t have the luxury of trusting someone, especially when proof that I can’t lands in my lap. And when I saw your roommate congratulating you on my net worth, I figured that made it pretty clear our relationship was never about just you and me anyway.”
Her throat tightened to the painful point while her heart formed a knot she wasn’t sure it’d ever come undone from. Every organ was working at self-preservation, and they were all too late. “How can you think so little of me?Shecares about your net worth. I cared about who I thought you were, but clearly I was wrong about that.”
Charlotte stormed into the bathroom, shoved everything she owned into her suitcase, and grabbed the bathrobe off the hook on the door. Once she’d secured it over her nightie, the belt tied tight, she forced herself to walk out of the bathroom instead of lock herself inside it to cry.
Lance was still just standing there, anger wafting from him, his expression shuttered off and his walls up.
“I told you I was raised by a dad who gambled a lot and how often I ended up hurt because of it,” she said. “I figured that was enough information, especially since he’s been working hard to change. Not to mention there was a big complicated legal battle and his lawyer warned me not to talk about it. Most of all, I wanted to hold on to that hope that the program he was enrolled in—the one I also told you about—was going to help him get better.
“But if you want the ugly truth, he’s called me several times through the years, asking what I know. Asking about the draft, asking who’s starting or injured before the reports go out. Wanting me to rattle off stats and give him percentages. I haven’t given him anything since I was a naive teenager. Since I realized that I was enabling him and making it worse—that his calls didn’t mean he loved me, but that he loved using me— I became a vault when it came to information he might use for gambling.”
It hurt to admit it aloud. To feel that same shame and pain she’d experienced when the truth had hit her hard. “After that I clung to the rules, determined never to dabble in any gray areas that’d send me down the path I’d seen him go so far down. Every time he called to ask me for information, I’d tell him he had a problem and that he needed professional help. It took eight long years and an offer to pay for it to get him in that program.
“You can’t control what people think— That’s your thing, right? But you can control whatyouthink, and you’ve chosen to go with the worst.” How could she have been so wrong? About him, about stupid fairy tales—about any of it. “If you would’ve simply asked instead of jumping to conclusions, I would’ve told you my dad checked himself out of rehab early, and while that scares the shit out of me, he seems to be doing well and wanted help finding a job. I put out a few feelers and found a company that was hiring, so histhanks for the tipwas in response to that.”
“You expect me to believe that? If you didn’t tell your dad about Gavin Frost, and you didn’t tell Simms at the reception, how exactly did the press find out, Charlotte?”
“I don’t know! I wouldneverdisclose any of what we’ve been working on. Not to my dad, not to reporters, and not even to my best friend, who’s currently obsessed with guys’ salaries because she had a freeloader boyfriend who bled her dry. Not only because it’s not who I am, but I signed a nondisclosure agreement. Don’t you remember what a stickler I am for the rules?”
“And yet you still slept with me.”
Everything inside of her shattered apart. The only thing that kept her knees from buckling was sheer force of will. She wouldn’t let him see how easily he’d destroyed her. “You asshole,” she said, her voice shakier than she would’ve liked, but at least she’d managed to force out the words.
Each step was a challenge, but she made it to the door. She didn’t allow herself to look back, doing her best to ignore the fact that the distance she was putting between them made her physically ache—how stupid for her body to hurt so much when he clearly didn’t care about her.
By the time she made it down the hall, her heart was nothing more than a mangled mass that bled misery. But she made it inside the safety of her room before she dropped to the floor and allowed the tears to overtake her.
As she cried out every ounce of saltwater she had in her, she told herself that it wouldn’t hurt this badly forever.
Even as a tiny part of her whispered it’d be impossible to fully get over the loss of what she thought she’d had.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
That had to be the worst night of sleep Lance had ever had, and he’d had plenty of bad nights in his day. Nights in physical pain and hours spent tossing and turning before a big game. Lumpy mattresses and bumpy flights and countless other things had kept him awake and miserable.
But this…?
Every inch of him ached, and it felt like someone had punched a hole clean through his chest. Rolling over only reminded him Charlotte wasn’t next to him, regardless of it being something he’d already known.
Over and over her hurt expression flickered through his mind on a torturous loop.
The news about who her dad was had sent him spiraling, stirring up his trust issues and making him doubt everything, and that damn text had pushed him over the edge.
The fight spun out of control so quickly, words spewing from his mouth before he could check himself. A pounding headache loomed as he recalled that retort he’d made about how she’d slept with him despite the rules.
Hewasan asshole.
