More awkward silence.
Zahara knew she was being a bitch. Knew her words were unprofessional. Highly inappropriate, even, given the offer Jax and Lexi had just bestowed on her. But she couldn’t control the fiery anger whipping up a wildfire inside her.
Lila laughed again, a nervous twitter. “Well, I’m not pregnant or dead. At least I have that going for me.”
Zahara felt the shocked, nervous gazes of Lexi, Jax, and Chase pressing into her. Felt the tension singing among their quintet. But—fuck—she’d trusted Chase with everything—her body, her reputation, her heart. And he’d just moved on? After a couple of weeks apart? Out of sight, out of mind?
With a married woman? One who’d treated him like shit in the past?
What the actual fuck?
Disappointed, disillusioned, disheartened, depleted, Zahara suddenly understood the saying the weight of the world on her shoulders.
She turned her attention to Jax and Lexi and forced what had to be a pathetic smile. “Thanks for the great news. Let’s talk more tomorrow. It’s been a long couple of weeks. I really want to sink into a pillow right now.”
As if she’d be able to sleep.
Jax agreed, and Zahara gave Lexi another hug before she exited the banquet room without acknowledging Chase or Lila again. Once she stepped into the quiet hallway, Zahara let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. Still, she felt so heavy. Exhausted. Body and soul.
She hurried toward the exit, but the hair on the back of her neck tingled. She swore the main exit doors receded with each step she took toward them, like a time warp from a horror movie. Her barriers crumbled, and by the time she reached the first set of glass doors to freedom, she was shaking.
“Zahara.”
Chase’s voice sliced down her spine and halted her feet. Her hand froze on the handle.
Keep going. Keep fucking going.
“Wait.” His voice was at her ear, and his hand closed over hers. “Please.”
She jerked her hand away and turned on him, rage crackling through her body.
Check yourself.
The whispered warning came from her smarter side. She could do some serious damage to a person if she physically lashed out in anger.
“Your ex.” She spat the words, hating the pettiness echoing there. “Your married ex?” She fisted her hands, dug her nails into her palms. “Was everything between us a lie?”
His shoulders lifted with a deep breath. “I know from your perspective, this looks bad, but it’s not real.”
“Those kisses looked damn real to me. I’ll bet they’ll look damn real in the papers and on television too.”
Guilt and remorse washed away the tentative hope wavering in his expression. “I didn’t want you to find out this way. I wanted to talk to you myself.”
“So you are with her.” The words rang inside her body, and echo in a gutted canyon. “It is real. What wasn’t real was us.”
“No.” His answer was immediate and vehement. He reached for her arm, and Zahara knocked his hand away. Hard.
“Are you with her or not?” Her voice fell to a raspy demand.
“No. Yes.” His face contorted with emotions and confusion. “Sort of.” He glanced around the foyer and scraped a hand through his hair. “It’s…complicated.”
“I guess husbands can do that to a relationship.” She sounded like the clichéd wronged woman. Venomous. “Did you get back together with her for a fucking part in Siege?”
“What? No. I would never—”
“Then, what? What. The. Fuck?”
He exhaled hard. His shoulders slumped. And he looked at the ground a second. “I was at the wrong place at the wrong time.”