“Chuckie—”
“No,” I scream. “Just no.” I point to the door. “You need to leave, right now.”
“Now, Charlee, let your grandma explain.”
“Shut up, LeeAnn,” I say, pointing my finger at the older woman who resembles Dorothy from the Golden Girls to a T. “You have no idea what her lie has done to me. What I’ve gone through, what I put my boss through.”
“But you found love,” my grandma says, grabbing on to anything.
“No, I didn’t. I didn’t find love. I found myself in a fake engagement so my grandma could see me walk down the aisle in her wedding dress before she died. I found that the guy who I thought cared about me was actually using me for his own benefit, to save face around his ex. I found that there isn’t anyone in this dark and dreary world that actually cares about me.”
“I do.”
“No, you don’t. You know how much I love you. You know you’re my best friend.” A sob wracks my body out of nowhere and I catch my breath. “You’re the one person I trusted most in the world and you took that and played with it. That isn’t love. That’s manipulation.” I take a step back and point at the door. “You need to leave, right now. I’ll have someone bring you your things but leave. I can’t even fucking look at you right now.”
“Charlee, please, just let me explain.”
“Leave,” I scream on a cry and then crumble to the floor. “Fucking leave. Now.”
I sense the hesitation in her steps, but God bless LeeAnn, because I hear her encourage my grandma to leave.
She faked it, faked everything . . . because I had eyes for Rath? How on earth did she think that was okay? Maybe she really is sick, sick in the head, because I can’t imagine any scenario where faking illness and getting your family worked up about it is helping in any way.
I’ve never felt more horrified. Foolish. Angry. Hurt. And mostly? Alone. Completely and utterly alone.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
RATH
Concerned, I tap my fingers on the bar and stare out the window at Charlee. She’s acting weird, and not her normal-self weird, but concerning weird.
During the ceremony, I couldn’t keep my eyes off her and her gorgeous dress. I kept thinking how we were going to be in the same position as Bram and Julia soon, walking down the aisle toward each other, and even though it started off as a fake engagement, it’s never felt more real.
Without a doubt, Charlee is the one I want. She’s the girl I want in my bed every night. She’s the one I want to give my heart to. She’s the girl I can see a forever with.
And not because we have the best sex I’ve ever had, that would be entirely shallow of me. That’s just the icing on top of the delicious Charlee cake. The reason I like her? She pushes me out of my comfort zone. She makes me think about being a better man and pushes me to be one. She’s so fucking smart. Her smile is contagious, and she lights up the room when I’m in a bad mood. Most importantly, I meant what I said to her, she makes me happy. So fucking happy.
Linus walks over to her and I watch her greet him, giving him a light hug. Jesus, how long does it take for a bartender to get a water?
“Here you go, mate,” the guy says. Just because I’m not a dick, I stick a few bucks in the tip jar and then head toward the door. I’m really hoping whatever is going on with Charlee isn’t anything too serious, because I have plans for her.
“Birthday boy,” Bram calls out from across the room, pointing at me.
That’s gotten old pretty quick. I’m at an age now where I really don’t care about my birthday. It’s just another day at this point—although, Charlee’s birthday treatment is something to look forward to every year. We didn’t even come close to twenty blow jobs like she said, only two, but I did get to have her three times, and that right there is a goddamn present.
Bram gave me a present when I met up with him at his apartment. A Kindle, so I don’t have to read my “special” books as he put it in public with that book cover Charlee gave me. And then he stocked the Kindle with some of my favorite authors. And do you know why he knows them? Because he’s reading the books too and we compare who we like the best.
It was a pretty good present. Roark gave me a slap on the back and then slid some tickets in my pocket to go see the Bobbies in the playoffs. Several of his clients play for the Bobbies so he has an abundance of tickets . . . that he gets for free. When I pointed that out to him, he said the private jet he was flying me in wasn’t free.
Out of those gifts, I still like Charlee’s best. The picture that encompasses her soul in one shot and it’s hard not to stare at. I kept going back to it all morning.
“Oh, that’s right, it’s your birthday,” a familiar voice says, coming up next to me. I look to the side to see Vanessa with a glass of champagne in hand and a smile on her face.
This is the moment I was dreading, actually talking to her. I didn’t see her at the ceremony, so I was hoping she didn’t show up, but she apparently did. Then again, I was so distracted by Charlee the whole time that I really wasn’t looking for an ex-girlfriend.
“Hey there,” I say kindly as she reaches around me and pulls me in close. My hand falls to her back, not really wanting to give her a hug, not really caring to be part of this conversation at all. I was afraid she’d come up to me, because that’s who she is, but now that we’re interacting, what’s incredibly interesting is that I feel absolutely nothing.
Nothing.
It’s as if she’s now a regular person I used to know. Not the first and only girl to tear out my heart. To even think of her that way almost makes me laugh at this point, because apparently, I didn’t know what heartache was back then.
Now if Charlee up and left me, then there would be a problem. Like when she took her ring off and gave it to me, that was a new kind of pain I’d never felt before, as if my heart was actually cracking in half.
“Happy birthday, Rath.”
“Thanks, Vanessa,” I say kindly. “How are you?”
“Good. Engaged, but I guess so are you, huh?”
Shit, how does she know that? I haven’t told many people, especially people at Bram’s wedding because frankly, we didn’t want to have to invite a bunch of random people.
“Oh yeah, uh, how did—?”
“I met her. Charlee, right? I overheard her talking about your engagement. She seems really sweet. I’m happy for you.”
“Thank you,” I say stiffly, which causes Vanessa to laugh and lean in, her hand falling to my arm.
“Come on, Rath. I think we should be past the awkward phase. We both made mistakes. We both moved on. Water under the bridge at this point, right?”
“I guess so, yeah.” I lean in closer and say, “Wasn’t expecting this conversation to be so smooth.”
She chuckles and says, “We had a good time, but when I look back at our relationship, I know we weren’t really meant to be with each other.”
“Yeah, I had the same thought.” Shifting, I say, “I should say I’m sorry though. I should have treated you better.”