Page 21 of Not Your Shoe Size

“She’s not,” Ty said flatly. “I’d have remembered.”

“Does she have older guy friends? Cousins? Uncles?”

Ty wracked his churning mind. “Not that I know of. Her office is full of people her age and she doesn’t see her family.” And he would have remembered if she had an attractive older male friend. He would have fucking remembered.

“Shit,” Georgie hissed. “They’re going into Choukette.”

“The fuck’s that?”

“A French bakery.”

Ty growled into the phone. Fucking France, fucking him over yet a-fucking-gain.

“Hmm, I haven’t been there in ages. They do really good raspberry croissants.”

“I don’t give a shit. Follow them inside.”

“I can’t! The place is tiny, Kate’ll see me.”

“She hasn’t already?”

“No! I’m stealthy as fuck. Oh God, they’re sitting in one of the booths. I think they’re going to have brunch. What should I do?”

Ty paced the length of his desk. “I don’t fucking know. This guy could be no one, this could all be a misunderstanding.”

“It totally could. They could just be getting a coffee for totally acceptable reasons you don’t know anything about.” Another pause. “Although it’s weird this guy is exactly her type. And they don’t look like they’re meeting for work.”

Ty growled into his phone.

“How are things between you guys lately?” Georgie asked.

“Fine,” he said automatically, then remembered the Paris thing and Kate rejecting his proposal. His stomach flipped over. Was his refusal to move to Paris sending Kate into the arms of another man? Had she reactivated her Kinkworld account and met this guy? Was this a first date or had she been having an affair like Veronica?

“What are they doing now?”

“Ordering,” Georgie whispered. “I can’t keep standing here, man; they might see me through the window.”

Ty clenched his phone tight. “Okay, get going.”

“Are you sure? I can pretend I want a croissant and see what the deal is?”

“No, you can’t. Kate’s not an idiot. She knows you’re the one who caught Veronica. She’ll think I’ve got you tailing her. I don’t want that.”

Georgie gasped. “You think she’s cheating?”

The question was heavy as a ball bearing, rusty and slick with slime. “I don’t know. But she’s lied to me about where she is. And you said it looks like she knows this guy?”

There was a pause. Ty pictured Georgie, small, long-haired, Vietnamese, raising herself on her tiptoes and peering through the window.

“I think so,” she said finally. “They look pretty flirty. And he’s definitely her type.”

Ty’s stomach churned acid. He pictured himself bursting into the café, grabbing this strange asshole by the throat and laying him out. But even as he fantasised about the crunch of bone under his knuckles, he saw Kate’s horrified expression. Even if shewason a date, had stepped outside their relationship, how was punching a guy going to help? Five years ago, he’d have done it, wouldn’t have questioned the impulse. But this wasn’t five years ago. He needed Kate in his life, and he needed to figure out why the fuck this was happening before he burst into a Brunswick bakery like Rambo and expected Kate to be impressed.

“Ty,” Georgie said. “What do you want to do?”

He closed his eyes. “Nothing. Get out of there.”

“What are you planning?”

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