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.
