Molly

“Miss McKinley,” Bella says softly after dinner’s been served. “I think you need to see this.” She holds out her phone.

I shake my head. “Not now, Bella.” I nod toward the head table, where Brayden is about to give his speech as best man.

She bites her lip and looks anxiously between me and Brayden taking the microphone across the room. “Just look on Instagram as soon as you have a chance.”

I nod then press a finger to my lips, indicating she should be quiet now. She rushes back to the kitchen to help the other servers clean up.

Dinner service went well, considering we were short-handed, but I haven’t been able to chase away this gnawing feeling that’s been eating at my stomach and whispering ugliness in my ear since the incident with Austin.

Austin’s assumptions and presumptions about me brought all my old fears to the surface, and with every word Brayden said to try to make me feel better, I just kept thinking that what happened with Austin is more of the same. I got kicked out of my house because my landlord thought he was entitled to a piece of me, and when I didn’t hand it over, he got pissed. Brayden lost an investor when I got drunk and careless and forgot I wasn’t that girl anymore.

Tonight could have been worse, but it was a reminder that I can’t leave my past mistakes behind. They will follow me, and I have no idea why Brayden would want to put up with it.

Behind the head table, he straightens his suit jacket and smiles at the room. He’s gorgeous and kind, and the sight of him makes my throat go thick. “Good evening, everyone. I’m Brayden Jackson, Ethan’s brother, which means I’ve had the absolute pleasure of being his best man, and it means now you get the dubious pleasure of listening to me speak. Anyone in my family can tell you that’s not something I choose to do often.” He pauses a beat while everyone laughs. “Tonight, however, I’m proud to say a few words.” He turns toward the newlyweds. “I’m not someone who believes everything happens for a reason—at least not in the sense that there’s some cosmic plan unrolling outside of our control. We lost our father too soon. I watched my mother lose the love of her life too soon and watched my siblings each struggle with their grief. And I guess that just hurt too much to accept as some cosmic plan.” His gaze lands on Ethan. “When Ethan lost his first wife and was left to raise his daughter while ravaged by his grief, I knew I’d never believe such a thing.”

The last of the guests’ whispers quiet at the mention of Ethan’s late wife, and all eyes settle on the best man.

“And now that I’ve convinced a room full of people that I should never be allowed to speak at a wedding again”—laughter—“I’ll get to my point. Regardless of how good or bad the things in our life are, we get to choose. It’s the choice that’s the gift. Ethan and Nic chose love. Despite their individual heartaches. Despite their own fears of getting hurt. They could have declared their love just wasn’t meant to be. Instead, they fought for something better than the heartache they’d both endured before. And because they made that choice, they found something that inspired even my old, jaded heart to believe in the power of love.” He raises his glass. “To Nic and Ethan.”

“To Nic and Ethan,” the crowd calls in return, and they all drink. Even Brayden, who meets my eyes over his glass and holds my gaze. And because I’m a coward, because I’m not sure I can believe in the same things he does, I turn around and head for the kitchen, where my staff is working to clean up.

They have it under control, but Bella meets my eyes and pulls her phone from her pocket. A reminder.

I head to my office and pull my own phone from my purse, wondering if I’ll even be able to find what she’s talking about.

But I don’t have to search, because my phone has blown up with notifications all leading back to Austin’s last Instagram post.

Blowjob Molly, doing her thing. Thanks for everything, @MollyMcKinleyJB #happeningatJacksonBrews

With shaking hands, I press play on the video. It’s only thirty seconds long, but by the time it’s over, I feel my world in pieces around me. I close my office door and shut off the lights. Then I curl into the corner and I cry.

Brayden

I was hoping Molly would have a chance to step away from the staff after dinner was cleared, but I haven’t spotted her since my speech. Though I’ve left the majority of the details of running this place to her, I do know enough to understand that there’s a lot to be done. Tonight, the staff doesn’t just need to clean up from this plated dinner for one hundred and fifty; they’ll need to do the prep work for the tasting room’s lunch menu for tomorrow, and prepare for the catering events in the week ahead too.

I understand she’s legitimately busy, and yet as the guests spill onto the dance floor and I’m left to contemplate my beer alone, I still feel like she’s avoiding me.

Shay takes the seat beside me and crosses her legs. “Are you okay?”

“Sure. I’m fine. Wishing my girlfriend were out here, I guess, but good.”

Shay flinches and looks away.

“What is it?”

She pulls her phone from her lap and puts it on the table, nudging it until it’s in front of me. “I’m sorry,” she whispers.

I unlock her phone and see she has Instagram pulled up and a post from Austin on her screen.

The caption makes my blood boil, and I want to find the little punk and knock him out for using that horrible nickname. Hell, I already wanted to do worse for what he did to her this afternoon.

The first time I watch, I don’t really know what I’m seeing—Molly, standing just inside her office, talking to Jason Ralston, who’s in her doorway. Molly looks at the camera or whoever’s holding the phone, then pulls Jason inside her office and shuts her door. Then it’s just . . . the door.

I frown at my sister, and she swallows. “It has more . . . effect if you can hear them.” There’s an apology all over her face, and she shakes her head. “We don’t know when he took this video.”

I hand Shay’s phone to her and push my chair back, heading outside to be alone. If this dread gnawing at me is any indication, I want to be alone in the cold when I watch—listen—to this.

The first time I do, my stomach plummets to my feet . . . lower. Molly pulls Jason Ralston in her office, and then she’s moaning. I can hear the sounds she makes until they’re interrupted by Austin’s snicker on the other side of the camera.

I don’t want to believe it. He could have added those sounds into the video. But I know Molly. I know her moans and her pleas. I know the sounds she makes when she’s turned on and nearing climax, and I recognize her noises as clearly as I recognize her voice.

I knew she was seeing Jason. Maybe I didn’t know they were sleeping together, and maybe the idea of her letting him touch her here makes me insane, but I knew they were on a date just last week. This video could have been—

Tuesday. For just a beat in the middle of her moans, the camera pans to the daily schedule on the white erase board outside her office, and I know this video is from Tuesday. But which Tuesday? On Tuesday four days ago, I had her alone in her office—kissing her between her legs, making her writhe until she came against my face. Did she pull Jason in there before or after me?

I close my eyes, thinking about how she acted in front of Sara at the restaurant Monday morning—about how happy she was to pretend there was nothing between us just in case I wanted my old girlfriend back. I agreed to her boundaries. Her rules and restrictions on what we could be, but I never imagined . . .

I’m thrown back ten years to Sara and her professor, to finding out in the most embarrassing way that she was sleeping with him behind my back.

“I’m so sorry.”

My head snaps up to Molly, standing coatless in the cold again, her arms wrapped around herself. Her eyes are bloodshot and her cheeks are mottled pink. In the streetlight illuminating the parking lot, I can see a streak of dried tears running through her makeup.

She chews on her bottom lip and looks everywhere but at me. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know how he did this.” She presses her hand to her mouth and whispers, “Or . . . why anyone would hate me so much.”

She never wanted a relationship. She never wanted more.

But it doesn’t matter if we were officially a couple when Austin took this video. It doesn’t matter to me that she told me she can’t do relationships. None of that matters when this awful betrayal is roaring in my ears that I’m an idiot. That I’m blind. That Jason has something to offer her that had her pulling him into her office the same day I—

“I deserved to know.” I swallow hard and look away—toward the building, the place we built together. She let him touch her there. “If you were fucking him and me at the same time, I deserved to know.”

She gasps. “What?”

“We weren’t using protection, Molly. I fucking deserved to know.” I can’t look at her. It hurts too much. And this feeling like maybe I don’t have a right to be angry? That just makes my rage worse.

“You should get back inside.” She swipes at her cheeks. “They’re cutting the cake soon.”

“That’s all you have to say?”

She laughs, a hollow, empty sound. Her long inhale is so jagged that it sounds like it’s running over a hundred razor blades on the way to her lungs. “Do you want me to say it’s a lie? Would you even believe me? Go celebrate with your family.”

I don’t move. I’m not going to walk away from this conversation—I have no business being in that reception while I’m this angry anyway.

But she walks away from me, and I know this conversation is over.