“Excellent. Up.”
He jumps to his feet and shehands him the garment bag. “You’ll have to borrow one of George’s ties for today. I didn’t realize there were cum stains on the one at my house.”
“Sorry, Ma’am.” He starts to leave the kitchen, then turns back to me, as if to ask me a question.
Or permission.
“My bedroom,” I tell him. “I’ll be up in a minute. Wait for me there.”
He hurries off.
Case doesn’t move. “Well?” she asks.
I steptoward the door leading to the utility room and garage and point at it.
She follows.
I don’t honestly know what my brain thinks happened, but if there was something going on between Declan and Ellen—which I doubt, but what thehell? —I want to know about it.
Once we’re in the utility room with the door shut behind us, I drop my voice.
“What the actualfuck, Case?”
She looks confused. “What?”
“Don’t youwhatme. You said he’s only been with you.”
“Yeah? So?”
“You fuckingliedto me. What else have you lied about?”
Now she looks confused, which means she really is. She’s got a damned good poker face, usually. “Lied about what?”
I’m not thinking. Before I can even consider it, my hand shoots out and grabs her upper arm, fingers digging in. “When I fucked him, it was like fuckingEllen. Want to know why?”
I’m confused by her growing confusion. “Uh, yeah, actually, I do.”
“Because he said the exact same fucking things to mesheused to say to me. How thehelldid he knowthat, huh?”
“What things?”
It means admitting what I did, but fuck it. So I tell her.
Her eyes widen. “You fucked himraw?”
“Let’s circle back tomyfailings in a minute. How thefuckdid he knowwhat to say, huh?”
I don’t understand her…smile. Or why she starts laughing. “You dumb fuck.”
“What?”
She shrugs my hand off her arm and pulls her personal phone from her coat pocket. She calls up something, then shows it to me.
It’s a Kindle account, showing pictures of…romance books? I mean, that’s alotof abs on the covers. I’m assuming they’re romances.
I don’t understand why she’s showingthis to me. “What thefuckdoes that have to do with anything?”
Now her expression changes, somber. “George, that’sEllen’sKindle account. She and I have always read nearly all the same books. We loaned them back and forth, or logged in to each other’s accounts to read them.”
