Page 123 of The Fiancée Farce
Only this was worse.
Her shame wouldn’t be restricted to a private school with a hundred-some-odd students. No, her name, her face, her lies, herdesperation would be splashed across every local tabloid. She’d be whispered about and laughed at and—
Tansy dragged in another mouthful of air and blinked fast, refusing to let her tears fall, to add insult to injury, showing just how humiliated she was.
Tucker handed the phone to a shell-shocked Mr.Barnes. “It’s all there. The messages between Gemma and Tansy and the recordings. I also sent them to you and the rest of the board via email.”
“Youson of a bitch.” The fire blazing in Gemma’s eyes promised violence. Teddy had the brilliant foresight to step forward and wrap his hand around Gemma’s arm, holding her back, keeping her from doing something brash like lunging at Tucker. “You bugged my phone? How fucking dare you? That’s illegal.”
“Me?” Tucker feigned innocence. “Do something illegal? No, no. I would never.” He smiled. “I had a source.”
How utterly unsurprising that Tucker had someone else do the dirty work for him.
“Asource?” Gemma scoffed.
“Yes.” He nodded. “A source who would like to remain anonymous.” His eyes slid past Gemma and—stopped.
Tucker was staring directly at Lucy.
Recordings of conversations.
Text messages that only someone with access to Gemma’s phone could’ve screenshotted and sent.
Information only someone Gemma had trusted could’ve known.
Confusion gave way to comprehension, then denial. Gemma shook her head in disbelief. “No. No. That’s bullshit. Lucy, tell him it’s bullshit.”
Lucy shot Tucker a look so scathing he’d have dropped dead if looks could kill. “Gemma, I can explain—”
“Tell him it’s bullshit,” Gemma demanded, voice rising, desperate.
A sharp pang of sympathy for Gemma stabbed at Tansy’s heart. She knew all too well how it felt to be betrayed by someone you thought you could trust.
Lucy’s mouth opened and closed on at least half a dozen false starts.
Gemma’s eyes were damp, gleaming in the chandelier light. “Go on. Tell him.”
Tansy tried to make her feet move, to step closer to Gemma, but she was frozen. Even her heart suddenly sounded sluggish inside her head, the deafening roar of whispers muted like she was under water. Drowning. Couldn’t breathe.Couldn’t—
A hiccupping sob escaped Lucy seconds before she bolted down the aisle, disappearing around the corner.
Face set with fury, Gemma gathered up the bottom of her dress and took off down the aisle after her.
“Gemma, wait!” Brooks turned to the man seated beside him and glared. “Move.”
With Gemma gone, all eyes in the room trained on Tansy, whispers turning into a roar.
“Can’t say I didn’t warn you.” Tucker tucked his hands inside the pockets of his trousers. Nonchalant. As if he hadn’t just ruined everything. “Just think, if you’d have taken the deal I so generously offered you, we could have avoided this whole mess entirely. So, really”—he smirked—“this is all your fault, Tansy.”
If she never saw that smirk again, it would be too soon.
“But don’t worry,” he added, tongue tracing the contours of his front teeth, suggestive, turning Tansy’s stomach. “You might’ve missed your chance, but with the rightincentive, you and I could probably work something out.”
A scoff rose above the rest of the noise, exactly the encouragement Tansy needed to stand a little straighter, to unflinchingly meet Tucker’s eye.
“I would rather take a long jump off a very short pier than have any part of you anywhere near me ever again.”
A flush of adrenaline tingled through her veins and white noise filled her ears as she hiked up her skirt and shouldered past him, retracing her steps down the aisle, through the vestibule, and down the hall.
