“What did last night mean to you?” Lottie asked, no longer waiting for me to respond. Fear of my answer made her voice needle thin.
“I was using you,” I answered honestly. “She was in the room. And after…I was with her—”
Her palm collided with my cheek, her slap harsh and stinging, but the tears in her eyes branded much worse.
“I hate you,” she said with a trembling voice.
I sat on the edge of my bed, dragging my hands through my hair.
“You don’t like me,” I said, finding Lottie’s eyes. “You’re only trying to make it work because you have to.”
“I do. I do like you. I thought by turning you down I was saving myself from my fate. I told myself I wasn’t going to do this,” Lottie said. “I wasn’t going to be like my grandmother and mother and sister. I wasn’t going to end up in a marriage with a man with a wandering heart. And you’re Playboy Gray, the boy whose heart only knows how to wander.”
I never really understood the term knock me over with a feather until now. She liked me?
“I like you, Grayson,” she said quietly. “You were always my Prince Charming, and I’ve always wanted to be your princess. From the very first day we met, to that day at Rosey, to now. I was afraid, and I thought pushing you away would make it better. That it would hurt less when you didn’t like me back. It didn’t. It made it worse. I really like you, Grayson.”
We stared at one another, the same realization shadowing our faces. If only we’d been honest from the start, maybe when we fell in love, it would have been at the same time.
“It was always supposed to be you,” I said quietly, taking her hand. Tears glittered in her eyes. “I’m sorry, Lottie. She’s inside me. Shit. I can’t fucking let her go.”
“It’s my fault,” she mumbled, numb. “You gave me every opportunity to love you, and I was too afraid.”
She swallowed and straightened her back; then the Lottie I knew returned. “So we do what everyone else does, a marriage in name only.”
“I don’t want that kind of marriage,” I gritted.
“Are you going to cancel?” Wonder spread across her face, knowing what that meant.
“No.”
And just like that wonder shattered into misery. “So she’s going to keep staying with you.”
Obviously I couldn’t do that anymore. I rubbed my forehead, unsure of what to do. I can’t let her go. I can’t keep hurting Lottie.
Fuck.
“I don’t know,” I admitted.
Lottie rolled her lips. “Is it love? Do you love her?”
Her laugh. Her smile. Her brazen honesty. Her death-wish questions. The way she glared. The way she challenged me. Those eyes, how they see into my soul.
Is that love?
It can’t be, because I can’t be in love.
I shrugged. “Nah.”
“Okay. Just get it out of your system before the wedding. In the end, it doesn’t really matter who we love. You’ll still be my husband, and I’ll still be your wife.”
Forty
STORY
* * *
I spent days with my uncle at the clinic. It provided a pretty decent distraction from what I’d had to leave behind. Now today was Abigail’s birthday, I thought absently. I’d memorized her calendar ages ago, and days popped out and poked me like pin needles. End of July, Ms. Abigail’s birthday, don’t forget to steam her towels and