chapter 21

“Excuse me, I’ll be back in one moment.” Brighton kept her tone and her smile fixed as she opened the door and stepped into the house. She suppressed the urge to slam the door behind her and race down the hall. Until she found Jake and figured out what the hell was going on, she would show no weakness. She would show no fear.

“Jake?” She checked the kitchen, the living room, the massive study on the first floor. No sign of her husband.

“Jake?” Her pace quickened as she climbed the steps to the second story. By the time she started down the hall to the master suite, she was sprinting.

The bedroom was empty.

Panting a bit from the exertion, she braced herself against the doorjamb and dialed her cell phone with a mounting sense of dread.

I knew this was too good to last.

“Hey.” Jake sounded so relaxed, so confident. Part of her—the part that wasn’t whipped into a frenzy—couldn’t help responding to the deep, strong timbre of his voice.

“Hey.” She tried and failed to match his casual tone. “Where are you right now?”

“Working.”

“At your office?” She had no idea where that was.

“I’m in the guesthouse.”

“Okay, well, can I come out to the guesthouse for a second?”

“Absolutely.” His voice dropped even lower. “Bring some Gatorade.”

“Yeah, no. This isn’t about that.”

He finally picked up on the undercurrent of tension in her tone. “What’s it about?”

She said a quick good-bye and hung up. No way was she going to give him a heads-up; she wanted to watch his face and his eyes when she broke the news.

Plus, she didn’t want to get dumped over the phone—again. Losing her boyfriend of two years over a staticky cell conversation had been bad, but losing her husband of two weeks would be worse.

•   •   •

Brighton darted out of the mansion via the back porch to avoid Genevieve on her way to the guesthouse. When she reached the tiny cottage, she debated knocking but opted to barge right in. Which proved impossible to do—the second she set foot inside, Rory greeted her with a leap of joy that knocked her to the floor.

“Oof!” Before Brighton could get to her feet, the massive brown beast draped himself across her lap and rested his giant, drooled-drenched jowls on her black pants.

Jake, who was sprawled out on an oversize couch with a laptop, sat up and snapped his fingers. Rory reluctantly got up, but not before licking Brighton’s cheek.

Under other circumstances, Brighton would have demanded a grand tour of the tiny cottage where Jake actually spent most of his working hours: a modest, sparsely furnished little bungalow barely big enough for a sofa, a dog bed, and a whole lot of tech gear to Skype with Saudi Arabia. Right now, she had more pressing concerns than decor.

She did, however, notice the honey-hued rectangular coffee table by the sofa. “Hey. Is that from IKEA?”

He nodded. “How’d you know?”

“Because I have the exact same one in my condo.” She’d bought in on sale and spent an entire Sunday swearing and sweating while trying to assemble it. “Why do you have furniture from IKEA?”

“I like IKEA. It’s fun putting everything together. They give you those little Allen wrenches . . .” He trailed off when he saw her expression.

“You’re sick and depraved.” She narrowed her eyes as she glimpsed a few images on his laptop screen. “Hang on. Are you looking at the stock market?”

He shut the laptop as if he had been caught perusing the filthiest pornography. “No.”

“Stop lying. Your secret’s out,” she informed him. “Deep in your soul, you’re a die-hard workaholic, just like me. Speaking of which . . .” She stepped closer. “There’s someone at the door for you. Someone named Genevieve.”

His expression flickered. Just for a fraction of a second. He tried to hide it, but she saw it.

She saw it, and she knew.

•   •   •

“Brighton, wait.” Jake put aside his laptop and stood up.

She remained perfectly still, trying to prepare herself for whatever he was going to say next.

“Okay. I’m waiting,” she said. “And so is she. She says she’s your Genevieve.”

He opened his mouth to reply, but his gaze wasn’t focused on her. He was looking toward the main house.

Suddenly, Brighton realized where she’d seen the beautiful blonde before, why she looked so familiar. Pull that hair back into an updo, put on some red lipstick and a black ball gown and some fancy jewelry . . .

“She’s the woman I met at the charity ball, isn’t she?”

“She’s still here?” he asked.

Rory glanced from Brighton to Jake and started whining.

“As far as I know.” She couldn’t hide the hurt in her voice. Because Jake had looked at her with desire and passion, but he’d never looked at her the way he was looking at the door right now.

All traces of charm and charisma had vanished. He looked determined and intense and . . . vulnerable?

Brighton didn’t know any of the history between Jake and “his” Genevieve, but she understood that she would never inspire this depth of emotion in him. She would never strip away all his defenses like this.

She turned on her heel and strode out to the sand.

When he called her name, she didn’t turn around. She heard the tread of his footsteps on the gravel, heading away from her. Heading toward the main house.

Toward the woman he’d sworn meant nothing to him.