Total pages in book: 118
Estimated words: 120838 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 604(@200wpm)___ 483(@250wpm)___ 403(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 120838 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 604(@200wpm)___ 483(@250wpm)___ 403(@300wpm)
She went to Dair’s sitting room, right to the couch, pulled off her heels and sat cross-legged in it. His dog sat beside her and Blake’s hand automatically went to Sorcha’s head so she could scratch behind her ears.
Blake looked comfortable, mildly cute, and completely classy wearing her posh black trousers and jumper and petting his dog.
He loved seeing her like that in his space.
And he hated that they had to have this conversation.
But he had to know.
He couldn’t make the same mistake twice.
He sat down beside her, crossed his legs in front of him, but rested an arm along the back of the couch and turned her way.
“Ye sure ye dinnae need a drink?” he asked.
And, damn.
He was procrastinating.
“Just spill, Dair,” she commanded. “So I can get on with controlling my urge to find your father and throttle him. I’ve been worried sick about you for days, and it seems I had cause to be.”
Worried sick about you for days.
Again, even if he didn’t want her to have that emotion, it felt great she did.
Jesus, this was going to be rough.
“This isn’t about Dad.”
That threw her. “What’s it about?”
“I told ye about Signe—”
She cut him off by tossing both her hands up irritably and letting them plop on her legs. “So this is about her? God! Now what’s she up to?”
“I need to explain something to ye first, lass.”
Either she finally caught the feel of him, or she realized this was something deeper, because she changed.
She became hyper-alert and hyper-still.
He should have taken that for the warning it was.
Sadly, he did not.
“In the beginning with her, it was perfect,” he began.
Blake said nothing.
Dair did.
“They didnae call it this then, though maybe they did, and I never heard it, but she was all about love bombing. I could do no wrong. She could do no wrong. She read me and ascertained what was important to me, and she became that. Precisely that. If I did something she didnae like or that annoyed her, I had no idea I did, because she gave me no indication I did. She had all the time in the world for me. She’d bend over backwards to give me what I needed. Be the person I wanted her to be. And she made me believe I was the man of her dreams. I’m not a romantic man, but it felt like a fairy tale.”
Blake didn’t speak.
“After we were married, that changed. Wholly. I didnae ken the woman I was married to. And life was far from a fairy tale.”
He’d told her all of this, mostly.
But she didn’t remind him of that.
She didn’t say anything.
Dair found this troubling, but he’d begun, and it was important, so he had no choice but to continue.
“Now, I dinnae want to throw Rix under the bus,” he started cautiously. “He thought I knew when he shared how ye treated Alex before your wedding to Chad.”
After he said that, she didn’t move. Not a muscle. Not a nuance of her facial expression changed.
She just kept those alert, violet eyes locked on him, and that was it.
Dair didn’t find this troubling.
He found it alarming.
He kept going anyway, because he had no choice.
“Did ye ken they faked their engagement at first so ye wouldn’t be unkind to her because she didnae have a man?” he asked.
Finally, she broke her silence.
“Alex has shared this story with me,” she said stiffly.
“All right. So ye didnae invite her to your shower, or hen party, and ye waited until the last minute to demand she buy an expensive dress?”
She made no response to that, and Dair reckoned that meant yes.
This wasn’t good, but it wasn’t the end of the world. Mostly because it was clear Alex was over it because they were obviously close now.
And as he had no choice but to forge ahead, he did.
He pulled his phone out of his pocket, went to the photo he had at the ready, and turned it to her.
“Did ye sell this to some gossip rag?” he asked.
She looked to his phone.
But outside that, again, nothing from Blake.
“Blake, listen, ye wanted so badly to go to that little girl’s funeral, and you’d never even met her, and we hit socials with that—”
Instantly, she uncurled her legs and reached to her shoes, Sorcha popping up to get out of her way.
“Blake?” he called.
He watched as she put on her heels.
“Blake,” he repeated.
She got up and walked from the room.
Sorcha was undecided for a moment, and then she followed Blake.
“Fuck,” he bit off and followed them both.
He found them in the kitchen with Blake’s head bent to her phone.
“I’d like an answer, love,” he informed her.
She shoved her phone in her back pocket and looked to him. “I have a car coming. I’ll wait for it outside.”
Wait one moment.
What?
She went to the boot room and collected her jacket.