Page 3 of Double Pucked

I’ve got the evidence though and I confronted him with it when I walked in the door two minutes ago, wagging a ziplock bag and asking him coolly, calmly, “Any idea why another woman’s panties were in my dog’s belly?” Because damn straight I took that evidence from Dr. Lennox. “I would really,reallylike to know what the explanation for this is.”

Jasper backs up against his living room wall, right next to the framed tickets of the first ever hockey game his dad took him to. Hair from his man bun falls loose, framing his guilty face. He gulps so visibly it’s like a bullfrog just crawled up his throat.

“I was d-doing laundry,” he begins. “The other day. Down in the basement of the building.” In case I don’t know where the washer and dryer are, I presume. “And our neighbor—you know the redhead from the second floor?”

I growl. The one whose ass I caught him staring at the other week when she walked up the steps in front of us, asking how Nacho’s weave-pole classes were going. Gah. I’d been bamboozled by dog talk. “Delilah,” I supply, anger lacing my tone, but I’m angry with myself. Why didn’t I realize that his ogling of her was a sign? “Continue.”

With a rough swallow, he soldiers on. “All the machines were full so I said that she could wash her clothes with ours.”

“How noble.”

He breathes a clear sigh of relief, missing my sarcasm. “Right? I just wanted to help her, Trina,” he says.

“Naturally. Sharing a washing machine is neighborly.”

He hazards a smile. “I’m glad you agree.”

This guy. He thinks he’s getting away with fooling me. But actually…I think for a few seconds. Yes, maybe this’ll work. Yeah, I’ll let him think I believe him.

I adopt a warmer expression, like I’m buying this bill of goods he’s selling. “So, you opened your washing machine to her. Let her share in a full spin cycle.”

“Exactly,” he says, a bigger smile lighting up his handsome face. What a stupidly handsome face. It tricked me.

But he’s not tricking me now. I’m feeling all kinds ofLaw & Order. “So the dog got the undies from the clean laundry then?” I ask, innocently, leading the witness.

Jasper’s smile is so damn bright. “Exactly. I did her laundry. And her underwear must have fallen into our laundry basket at the end,” he says, letting out a laugh. Like, can you believe the laundry room shenanigans? Right, right. Those panties had a mind of their own just jumping into our basket. “Then I brought it back upstairs and the dog got it.”

I breathe in deeply. I can work with his song-and-dance routine. “So you’re a Good Samaritan,” I say, affecting my bestthank god my guy isn’t a cheatergrin before I sling an inquisitive, “Not a fabulist?”

He blinks, scrunching his brow. “What?”

“Here’s a hint. It doesn’t mean fabulous. It comes from the wordfable,and it means you’re spinning stories.”

Jasper holds up his hands, lip trembling. “I swear she just needed to do her laundry. I was doing her a solid.”

“Doing her is right,” I say.

He shakes his head, whipping it back and forth. The denial is strong in this one. “I accidentally put it away with your stuff. So then Nacho just went into your drawer and got it out. You know what he’s like. He’s totally into underwear.”

“I do know what he’s like. I know exactly what he’s like,” I say, my anger masking all my hurt. I advance toward Jasper, crossing the living room and setting my sweetheart safely down in his cuddle cup. “And I know beyond a reasonable doubt that you’re a liar. Want to know how?”

“How?” He wobbles.

Deep breath. “Nacho only eats dirty underwear.”

Jasper’s face falls. He gulps visibly, and then the great backtracking begins. “It only happened one time. You were running a signing at the bookstore. We watched a hockey game together. She’s a hockey fan too. It won’t happen again.” He presses his palms together in prayer. “Please forgive me. I just love you so much.”

A sob threatens to climb up my throat. It threatens to make me believe him. That it was a one-time thing, that it was no big deal, that it was a transgression.

But that sob comes from my broken heart, not my head.

When my eyes stray to the framed tickets behind him, to his precious hockey paraphernalia, my head takes over, sayinghold my beerto my dumb heart. “I’ll consider it,” I say carefully, evenly. “But I need a few hours alone.” I push out my lower lip, letting it quiver. “Can you do that for me, baby?”

He nods immediately, clearly ready to grovel, giving me puppy-dog eyes. “I just don’t want you to move out. I mean, we’re doing such a great job, making rent together. Life plan and all, babe.”

Our life plan did not involve your dick in another woman and her panties in my dog’s belly.

By some miracle, I don’t say that, though I completely understand every impulse every woman throughout time has ever had to hurl vases, dishes, or mugs at a cheating ex. But I’m not going to do that. I am going to hit him where it hurts. Just like he hurt me right in the heart—through my dog. “I get it. I’m just going to do some yoga,” I lie.

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