Page 119 of What About Love

Chapter 27

ANGIE SLEPT LITTLEthat night and in the week that followed, tossing and turning restlessly, while riding a roller coaster of emotions from sadness to anger. She had spent half the first night cursing T for breaking her heart. The other half, she cursed herself for allowing him to do it to her three times, each one more painful than the last. But most of her tears were for him, for all that he’d lost and what his bitterness was still costing him—costing them.

She figured he’d left town on the mission he’d mentioned because she hadn’t seen him. He also hadn’t called to apologize as she hoped he would, or come over with a peace offering of Iron Cactus takeout, begging her forgiveness for being a colossal ass. Oddly enough, no one mentioned him at work and although she wanted to, despite curiosity hammering at her relentlessly, she didn’t ask about him, either.

She went to the office on time, ate at her desk or grabbed something on the fly, and at the end of the day, went home alone to brood and lick her wounds. She knew she couldn’t go on like that indefinitely. Her cousins wouldn’t let her. Still, she tried, ignoring calls from Elena, Mara, and both of the twins. Joanna and Lexie came by the office one day for lunch, but she’d snuck out the back stairs and avoided them. She wasn’t proud of that move, but she wasn’t ready to face them. While she didn’t begrudge them their “I told you sos,” what she couldn’t bear quite yet were their sympathetic looks, or their pity.

By Thursday, almost two weeks following the implosion of her love life, she couldn’t stand it anymore and needed to vent to someone. She called Megan who had been through something similar with Tony.

Pulling up in front of Meg and Cap’s north San Antonio home, she rolled to a stop behind Joanna’s Jaguar. Idling with her foot on the brake, she stared at the line of other cars parked in the circle drive. She almost slammed the gearshift into reverse and fled, but a blue Miata pulled up behind her and blocked her in. She sat there trying to shore up her defenses, which had been vastly depleted over the last twelve days, until a sharp rap on her window made her jump.

“You can’t hide forever, Angie.” Lexie’s voice through the glass came out muffled. When she didn’t budge, she held up the bakery box in her hand. “C’mon, I stopped and picked up the next best thing to liquor or Novocain for a wounded heart, Meg’s chocolate eclairs.”

Her choice was to abandon her car and walk the fifteen miles home or get drunk on fat and sugar. The eclairs won, and she opened the door and got out.

“Sure. You don’t respond to my phone calls, but for chocolate, custard and melt-in-your-mouth pastry, you open the door.”

“I’m easy. A fifth of tequila would have done the trick, too.”

“I’m sure Megan has something fruity with a kick to guzzle while you spill your guts. In fact, I think I hear the whirr of the blender already.”

Holding the white box with the Decadence logo by the string—the bakery, not the sex club. There was a funny story behind that—Lexie put her arm around Angie’s shoulders and steered her toward the front porch. As they walked slowly, she dropped her head on her friend’s shoulder and murmured, “It hurts, Lex.”

“I know, sweetie, and although it doesn’t make things hurt any less, we’d all like to kick Lil T’s ass. And that collective all includes the guys.”

“I knew better.”

“No. You were new, like a babe in the woods, and did not know how charming and seductive these doms can be. And Lil T has both skills down to an art form. We all spent considerable time with him while he played bodyguard for each of us during all the cartel crap. We love him like family, but that doesn’t mean we don’t blame him for hurting you—”

“I don’t want that.” She straightened and wiped away the single tear that had tracked down her cheek. Through the open front door, the unmistakable whirr and loud crunch of a blender crushing ice greeted them. “What I do want is mass quantities of sugar and carbs. Oh, an éclair would be good, too.”

***

HER OVERINDULGENCEshowed the next morning when she came to work in dark glasses. No amount of Visine could erase her bloodshot and once again tear-swollen eyes. As she stopped by the front desk to pick up her messages, the receptionist gave her one verbally from Cap.

“The boss called a meeting with the team at 9:30 sharp.” Trish, the very attractive, fifty-something, platinum blonde, was nearly bursting with curiosity. “He emphasized sharp. It must be something big.”

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