Every night for the next week, Greier sleeps in his room with me. He holds me through the night, his even breathing tickling my ear and neck. He never forces me to give more of myself than I’m willing to give, in bed, which hasn’t surpassed kissing and some serious petting, or out.
On nights I have free, he comes home for a few hours to cook us dinner. We dine in the courtyard when it isn’t raining, beneath the magical burn of Chinese lanterns. After he’s finished with work, and I’ve cleaned up dinner, we get cozy on the couch to watch TV. It usually results in us making out like teenagers. A first for me. Clearly, Greier’s had plenty of practice—because his technique is perfect.
Tonight, he plans to get off early and then cook for us. But the fridge is barren, so I make a list of everything we’ll need and head out to the market. I’ve never shopped for groceries before living with Greier.
I like it.
I like being independent.
I like not having my mother riding me about every minute detail of my life.
I like making my own choices.
Most of all, I like the woman I’m becoming.
When I get back from the market, I have to walk through the bar, which is extra crowded with drunk tourists. Normally, I take the courtyard entrance for this exact reason, but I forgot my keys. Luckily, Greier leaves the entrance to the apartment unlocked during the day so he can come and go with ease.
With arms loaded to my fingertips, I manage to bust through the door and scale the steps. I drop the bags on the floor in the kitchen with a relieved moan, rubbing the life back into my dead muscles before sorting through the food.
Once everything is put away, I make for the bedroom at the front end of the apartment, stripping my t-shirt as I span the living room. I enter the room, and my feet forget to work when I notice the bed I’d made this morning disheveled, the blankets, sheets, and pillows wrinkled. If the rest of the apartment were wrecked, my first assumption would be Shaw found me. But the bed is the one thing out of place.
Suddenly, the bathroom door opens and out saunters the most self-hate-inducing blonde woman. A towel barely contains her vixen-esque curves. We stare each other down. Except, she isn’t outwardly fazed by my presence like I am by hers.
I’ve seen her before. Somewhere. At the bar? While out with Izzie?
I glimpse between the bed and the half-naked woman standing in my bedroom…in Greier’s bedroom.
Holy fucking Christmas.
“You’re his ex, aren’t you?”
“I wouldn’t say ex.” She glances at the bed and then back at me, casually drying her golden hair with a towel. “You must be the consolation prize.”
Debutwat. Even nearly naked, she screams beauty pageants and cotillions.
Normally, I’m a reserved person, hard to ruffle, yet her couldn’t-give-a-fuck attitude and sharp tongue makes me want to go Dynasty on her, tear that weave from her head. That’s what I’d like to do. Instead, I’m tranquilized into a pitiful stupor.
She brushes passed me to the closet, losing her towel on the way, adding insult to injury. When she looks inside, realizing her clothes are gone, she adds, “And the one who stole my clothes.”
“Actually, we ritualistically burned them,” I smart off, crossing my arms over my chest. Not just because I’m annoyed but to cover myself as well.
Her head snaps back at me, her mouth puckered, her eyes two burning coals. When she realizes I got her, the anger melts from her face.
“It’s fine.” She swipes her hand across the hanging clothes, causing a metallic scraping noise as they swing back into place. “I’ll have Greier buy me new ones.”
Bitch. Bitch. BITCH.
“Where is the lover boy?” I ask, rallying as much dignity as possible while sporting my bra. This is by far the most humiliating moment of my life. And there have been some doozies.
“He went to buy dinner for us,” she replies, walking over to the mess that was once the bed Greier and I shared, fluffing her fake blonde hair. “We really worked up an appetite.” Sitting on the edge of the mattress, she crosses her shapely legs, completely confident in her bare skin. Dignity isn’t a concern for her. She’s out for the kill.
“Well,” I choke out angrily, “when he comes back, tell him I said to go fuck himself, will you?”
Turning sharply and walking out of the room, I shove my shirt back on, snatch my purse from the kitchen table, and head for the stairs without a damn clue where I’m going. Anywhere. As long as it’s not here.
Sometime after nine, Tiny takes over for me down at the restaurant while I head up to the apartment for a shower and a late dinner. During Carnival, I live in the bar, usually passing out on the couch in my office because I’m too beat to walk upstairs. But Rae’s taken my mind hostage. I’ve thought of her all day. I want to see her, be near her. When I enter the apartment, instead of her beautiful face and warm voice, empty darkness and the suppressed chaos of partying outside my double-paned windows welcomes me home. I check my phone for missed calls or texts. Nothing. It isn’t like her to disappear without telling me where she’s going. She even told me she was going to run a few errands earlier. I remember watching her walk through the bar when she came back, arms full of those reusable bags. She didn’t see me. But I definitely saw her. I remember noting how out of place it was and how much I liked it—how I could get used to seeing it for a long time to come.
I check the fridge and cabinets. They’re freshly stocked.
I check the bedroom and then out on the terrace, thinking she may be watching the madness in the streets below.
She isn’t.
I check down in the courtyard, hoping she’s reading one of her novels like she does most evenings off. Sometimes, when I’m in my office, I catch myself spying on her from the French doors overgrown in ivy.
But it’s empty.
Maybe she went out with Izzie and forgot to mention it. Or I forgot that she told me. Things tend to slip around this time of year, when there are a million tasks and my focus is stretched thin.
I type out a quick text to Rae as I ascend the courtyard stairs and reenter the apartment. When I hit send, my eyes drift up from the bright screen of my cell.
Charlotte.
“Ya should call him,” Izzie suggests over the screaming groups of people packed in the bar like pickles in a jar. She dressed me in a skintight ultraviolet number and dragged me out after I explained what happened through my tears. I showed up on her doorstep with puffy eyes and a snotty nose. It took her a while to catch on through the sniffles.
“Or maybe I should.”
“I’ll kill you if you do,” I threaten, but we both know my threats are as good as shit. “Whose side are you on anyway?”
His. It will always be him. And even as mad as I am at him, I respect her for her loyalty. He needs that in his life.
“Both actually.” She nudges me in the arm with her shoulder. I smile at her and nudge her back.
“Thanks.”
I doubt she’ll think the same when the truth comes out. Even if I’m not the woman of Greier’s dreams, I lied to him. I used him. I never meant to. I never meant for him to mean something to me either. Maybe I deserve this afternoon. This is karmic retribution for running out on Shaw and into the arms of another man. Even if he did—
“He’s figured out ya gone by now.”
I huff theatrically, my body shaking from the force of my sarcastic amusement. “He’s too deep in his girlfriend to even notice.”
“Ya sure ya saw what ya saw?” she asks, her loyalty to him annoyingly endearing.
“Wet, naked blonde coming out of the shower and sex-rumpled sheets on the bed. Yeah, I’m sure.”
I catch the attention of a server weaving through the crowd toward the bar, gesturing for a couple more rounds for the table.
“Doesn’t sound like Grey,” she states, and funny enough, I agree with her. It doesn’t. Which makes this whole situation even worse. I never saw it coming. “And even if it did, he’d be smart enough not to let ya walk into any of that. Men can be stupid, but Grey’s smarter than most.”
Is Izzie right? She knows Grey better than anyone. If she says it isn’t in him, then it isn’t.
“Does he still love her?”
“It’s—” she says, drawing it out.
“Complicated?”
“No, it’s a fuckin’ tragedy. Charlotte has been pullin’ that boy’s chain since we were kids. They’d be so in love. Then she’d run into the arms of Greier’s cousin. She’s under the delusion she’s Scarlett O’Hara or some shit like that. And Greier and his cousin ain’t exactly friendly. Hell, they hate each other’s guts. And she was napalm to that fire. She always comes back to Greier, and he always forgives her.” I see her catch herself, her eyes flashing, before backtracking. “Except this time of course.”
“Of course,” I play along.
“Ya know, he reminds me of that bald kid—with the football. Every time he’d run for the ball, the hopes that that time would be different, that little girl would yank it away, and he’d fall flat on his back. That is their relationship to a fuckin’ T.”
Forgetting my current predicament, my heart actually sinks in my chest for him.
“If that’s their history, why do you think this time is different?”
Her eyes narrow, and she stares at me as if I’m an alien with an extra arm growing out of my forehead.
“Ya really don’t see it, do ya?” she asks, sounding genuinely dumbfounded by my lack of awareness over this ‘it’ I should apparently see but don’t.
“See what?”
“Suga, Grey is downright smitten with ya. He hasn’t been interested in anyone but that snake. And she sure as shit doesn’t make him happy the way ya do. I have neva, in the many years I’ve known him, seen him smile so much. Ya put that boy unda some kind of hoodoo.”
She picks up her first shot for this round and downs it like a pro. It must burn good because she makes an “O” face and whoops, “Woo-wee, that is some good shit!”
While she enjoys her drink, I think about everything she’s confessed to me, about Greier, his past, his ex. Something about her little journey into his history repeats over and over in my brain. The part about this Charlotte woman and his cousin. Typically, I try not to pry too much into Greier since this opens the opportunity for them to interrogate me. But with Izzie being so forthcoming, it’s my chance to probe further without a cross-examination.
“Is that why she left him?” I ask. “For his cousin?”
“Every fuckin’ time.” She chuckles wickedly. “But she really screwed herself.”
“Why?”
“Because, this last time, he was gettin’ married to some politician’s daughter. And she was none too happy.”
Did I actually hear that? Or have I had way too many shots?
“A politician’s daughter?” I confirm. “Really?”
It can’t be.
“That’s what I heard. Rumor was his daddy ordered him to. Sad.”
It isn’t possible.
“Yeah, very,” I agree. “What’s his cousin’s name, anyway?”
Please don’t say—
“Shaw,” she utters, and my heart drops dead in my chest. “Shaw LeBlanc.”
Shaw and Greier are cousins? What are the fucking odds?
Wait.
That’s it.
That’s where I’ve seen Charlotte before, at the wedding. I noticed her right away. She was in head to toe black as if she were in mourning. I guess, in a way, she was.
A zillion thoughts and questions dance in my head like sugarplum fairies on speed.
Has she been sleeping with him?
Why show up on Greier’s doorstep now?
Did she recognize me?
If she did, will she snitch to Greier? Or, even worse, Shaw?
Am I too deep?
“What little Ms. Dumbass sees in him, I’ll neva know. He’s a lyin’, cheatin’, swindlin’ sonofabitch. Not that I want her with Grey. But he’s a hundred times the man Shaw wishes he was. He’s as dark and twisted and unholy as black licorice.”
Her face contorts as if she’s tasted something nasty.
I want to tell her she’s preaching to the choir, but that would blow my cover. So, I continue to casually ask questions instead. “How are they related? Greier and his cousin.”
“Their mothers were sisters.”
“Is he close with his family?”
“God. No. When Greier’s mother died, they acted like they didn’t even know him or his poor daddy. They neva approved of her marryin’ him in the first place. They’re horrid people.”
That explains why Greier wasn’t at the wedding.
“Poor Greier,” I sigh.
“I really think ya should send him a message,” she suggests when my guard is down and I’m feeling bad for Greier, “tell him ya staying with me tonight. At least that way he won’t tear down the Quarter lookin’ for ya.”
“And what do I say? Thought you and your girl would like to make use of the bed tonight?” My body jerks with a soundless (sarcastic) laugh. “If he really does like me as you say he does, then he should worry after the mess I walked into.”
“Fine. Well, we ain’t sittin’ ‘round mopin’ about it the whole damn night.” She lifts her last shot in the air. “Let’s pull down the night’s pants and make it our bitch.”
“Do you have any beads for me, baby?”
My traitorous whore ex stands in the middle of the front room, wearing heels, thigh-highs, a garter belt…and nothing else.
Well, not nothing.
Her absinthe eyes smile at me from the obscurity of a Mardi Gras mask. Her hands rest on her rounded hips. Her shapely legs spread shoulder width. She looks like an X-rated superhero.
“Wondering when you’d make an appearance.” I groan, shoving my cell into the back pocket of my jeans. “Why the fuck are you in my apartment, Lotte?”
She says in her lax accent, “Our apartment, baby.”
Fuck. Words sound good from her mouth.
Reagan. If she comes home to this, she’ll never forgive me, never let me back inside her or my bed. And I’m not down with that.
“You forfeited this place when you gave up on us.” I brush past her and grab a blanket from the couch, chucking it at her. She catches it with an hmph. “Cover yourself.”
Without skipping a beat, she lets it fall to the floor and kicks it aside, sauntering over to me with a hungry look in her eyes. “You missed me. Admit it.” She runs a pointed red nail down my chest and stomach. “Come on, baby. Don’t you want me? Don’t you want my mouth wrapped around your thick…?”
“My cock doesn’t jump for you anymore, Charlotte. It came to its goddamn senses when you left me for him—the last fucking time.”
“You know how it is with him,” she says casually, as if fucking two men at the same time is something to be accepted. “I’ve loved him since we were knee-high. He has a power over me. If he wants me, I come running. You’ve always known.”
She’s right. I guess I was a glutton for punishment because I always forgave her, knowing she’d do it again. Not anymore. Things changed when I met Rae. I’m done being a masochist.
“But he didn’t want you this time, and you still came running, didn’t you?”
“He loves me. He loves me.” Her cool veneer cracks, revealing her true nature. Selfish. Cold. Insecure.
“He only loves you in the dark. I loved you in the light.” Finished with this conversation, I plant a hand on her upper back and firmly escort her toward the stairs. Let the drunks have her. “Goodbye, Lotte.”
“Those clothes hanging in the closet, do they belong to that girl?”
“None of your—” I halt her at the top step with a hand on her bicep. “What girl?”
“From earlier,” she vaguely clarifies as if I’m supposed know what the fuck she’s talking about, putting on her Southern belle act with me.
Rae.
“Did she see you?”
“Maybe.” She shifts her gaze and bites down on her bottom lip, as if mulling it over. “I really can’t remember.”
“Goddamn it, Lotte,” I shout, roughly throwing my hands into my hair in frustration.
She always does this shit to me, driving me mad with lust or plain fucking mad. Sometimes both. But I’ve had enough. I’m done with her. I’m not going to let her fuck with Rae or our relationship.
I yank my hands out of my hair and look her dead in the eye, with a forbidding fire in mine. “Cut the bullshit magnolia act. You don’t have a demure bone in your fucking body.”
“Fine,” she admits defeat, “yes.”
Like an eager proctologist with long fingers, I probe deeper, “Are you the reason she isn’t here right now?”
“I really didn’t see the point in prolonging her suffering. I put the poor thing out of her misery.” She steps toward me, slithering her slimy tentacle down my chest. “She isn’t enough woman for you, baby.” Inching her lips closer to mine, her bare breasts flattening against my chest plate, she sensually whispers, “I’ll let you put it anywhere. No one makes you feel the way I do.”
“Disgusted with myself?” I take a distancing step back from her. “I wouldn’t be too proud of that.”
She steps away, too, crossing her arms over her chest, revolt on her face. “She really has your sack in a vise.”
“My sack isn’t your concern.” I turn my back on her, a clear-cut sign this conversation is over.
“What if I want it to be?” she asks, her voice earnest.
For a split second, I believe her sincerity is sincere. And my shield comes down.