She took another sip of her drink then realised it was empty.
‘Another champagne?’ Aiden asked immediately.
Sienna was about to demur on the basis that she needed to be able to think straight and two quickly consumed glasses on an empty stomach was not the most well-regarded formula for logic and reasoning.
But Chuck was there, too. ‘Let me,’ he said smoothly, nodding towards the bar. ‘If we’re going to be partnered together for the wedding, we should get to know each other. Do you mind?’ He glanced at Aiden and Astrid. Before either could reply, he was putting a hand lightly on Sienna’s back to guide her away – and she let him.
But before they’d gone two steps, she heard Astrid exclaim, ‘Gawd, wouldn’t that be something? Can you imagine how gorgeous their babies would be?’
Sienna didn’t hear Aiden’s response over her own soft laugh.
4
There was no dinner, just a heap of canapes being carried around on trays by waiters who seemed to have been trained in the subtle art of not giving out food, because no matter how hard Sienna tried to death stare them into coming her way, they remained relentlessly oblivious.
She wasstarving. And not for tiny circles of quiche, either, but a big, greasy burger. She thought longingly of the way Luke – the chef at the diner she worked at back in Ashbury Falls – had of crisping bacon and her mouth actually exploded with little bubbles of saliva.
Maybe she could distract a waiter and take a whole tray up to her room? Feast on thirty-seven of the delicate pastries before coming back down, ready to continue with Operation Hurt the Heartbreaker.
‘You look tired.’ She knew Aiden’s voice even without turning to face him. Mentally, she winced.
Was looking tired technically something she could incorporate into her plan? Wasn’t she meant to be some kind of Diana goddess all weekend? Stunning and indefatigable?
‘I’m not,’ she lied, thinking of the shifts she’d had in the lead up to this trip, and the paper she’d had due, not to mention it being her weekend with Melanie sleeping over.
‘I got you a coffee anyway.’
She bit back an actual groan as she turned to face him now.
‘You still drink the stuff?’
‘Drink it?’ She looked at the mug longingly. ‘Not only do I drink it, it would not be an exaggeration to say the most meaningful relationship in my life is pretty much the one I have with coffee. Gimme.’ She held out a hand, ignoring the way her stomach went into backflip mode as he passed over the mug. Or the way her fingers tingled with the force of exploding fireworks when their hands brushed at the moment of coffee cup contact.Screw you, body. Talk about betrayal.We’re supposed to be ignoring him. Definitely not feeling little zippedy zoos when our fingers brush.
She looked away again quickly, sloshing a little of the coffee onto the tiled floor.
‘Sooo,’ he said, and out of the corner of her eye, she caught the way his hand jammed into the pocket of his suit pants. ‘Apart from coffee,’ he said, then trailed off into nothing, as if he realised the inherent awkwardness of asking the supposed one-time love of his life about her current dating situation. He cleared his throat; tried again. ‘Are you seeing anyone?’
She wanted to shout at him. She wanted to shove him. She wanted to pour something – though admittedly not the steaming hot coffee – on his head. She wanted to rage and roar and tell him to go to hell, that ofcourseshe wasn’t seeing anyone, because how could she ever, ever trust someone again after the way Aiden had sucked her in then so royally screwed her over?
Once, a long time ago, Bella had kept them up all night reading quotes fromThe Art of Warover a video call, and Sienna vaguely remembered there was a line in there about biding your time, some reference to playing the long game. Or maybe she was getting mixed up; maybe it was one of Bella’s little bits of war wisdom or something.
Either way, Sienna knew that blurting out her anger at Aiden here and now would be immensely satisfying in the moment, but utterly emptying afterwards. She hadn’t walked through the emotional equivalent of the fires of hell for a decade to lose her shit at the first provocation from the arrogant piece of work.
‘Not right now,’ she said, sweetly, hoping that he took from that some kind of implication that she had been, up until recently. Then, she added, as if as an afterthought, ‘At least, no one serious.’
‘Cool.’
Cool?Cool? She ground her teeth and looked across the room, to where all of her supposed avenging friends were dancing their little hearts out with the loves of their lives. Astrid and Blake, Paige and Olly, Bella and Chase. All so happy. So oblivious to the currents of rage flooding through Sienna.
As if misunderstanding her, he followed her gaze to the dance floor, cleared his throat and said, ‘Did you… want to dance?’
Only if it meant she could stamp on his foot, she thought mutinously. ‘I mean, you’ve brought me coffee,’ she reminded him, lifting it higher and breathing in the intoxicating fragrance, imitating a smile. ‘I should probably drink that first.’
‘Coffee will wait,’ he said.
She glanced up at him. ‘Whereas you won’t?’ The question came out sharper than she’d intended, reminding them both of the fact that no, he hadn’t in fact waited.
He frowned. ‘That’s not what I meant.’
