“Rodrigo is Charity’s fiancé.”
It felt as though the world around her had slowed. Everyone’s movements were sluggish and exaggerated. Vivianne’s mouth was moving, but Juliette couldn’t understand the words. She couldn’t hear anything. A weight settled upon her chest, and her stomach rolled into that heaving sensation of an empty pit. The engagement ring appeared in her mind, and in quick succession, images of the past seven years with Rodrigo splintered through her memory. The lingering gazes and extra-wide smiles, the late nights, the weekend business trips, all of them led up to this moment. All of them led him to Charity. Juliette had been so naive, so foolish to think he would marry her. She’d believedhis promises; she’d been understanding when the timing wasn’t right. She’d thought maybe Rodrigo didn’t want to get married. Except he did.
Just not to her.
“I…I have to go.” Juliette shoved up from the table and glanced around at the faces staring back at her. Brock was on his feet a second later. “I don’t feel well. Probably the…the crab or something.”
“No.” Vivianne jumped out of her seat. “You shouldn’t be alone right now.”
“I’ll take care of her.” Brock gently took her by the elbow. His hand was warm, she could feel the heat of him radiating through her thin sweater. But her body was cold.
Vivianne’s face crumpled in despair. “Are you sure you’re alright?”
All Juliette could do was nod. She worried that if she opened her mouth to speak, to say anything at all, she might vomit.
“Don’t worry, Viv.” Brock draped Juliette’s coat over her shoulders, then slid an arm around her waist, drawing her into him. “She’ll be safe with me.”
Walking through the Ugly Crab and out into the winter night was a blur. Foggy and dense. Juliette didn’t speak. Her mind couldn’t rationalize proper words for conversation. Brock led her to his truck, and she didn’t protest when he helped her climb in or when he fastened her seatbelt. Icy numbness settled over her, and she gazed out the passenger window into the passing night, quietly overanalyzing every aspect of her relationship with Rodrigo. She tried to remember where they had gone wrong, when things stopped being so recklessly easy between them. But all she could come up with was the fact that she simply hadn’t been enough.
Brock drove her to his house and helped her get settled. He gave her an oversized black sweatshirt and another pairof flannel pants so she could change into something more comfortable. His clothing smelled like him, and she inhaled deeply, praying the scent of citrus with a hint of spice would alleviate the pain in her heart. After she changed out of her own clothes, it took all of her effort to leave the bedroom and join him in the living room. Her footfalls were heavy. Weighted. She dropped onto the sofa, and he brought over a blanket and a bottle of wine, poured each of them a glass, and sat next to her.
“Maybe I should start keeping a few extra sets of clothes here for you.” There was a lightness in his voice. A familiarity she missed. And it broke her into pieces.
The tears fell hot and fast down her cheeks. Wave after uncontrollable wave of anguish caused her shoulders to shake and her breath to catch. Her chest cracked and she swiped hastily at her face, hating that Brock’s sweater was catching her tears over some other guy.
He wrapped one arm around her and pulled her close. “It’s going to be okay, Jules. He didn’t deserve you. He never deserved you.”
Her head came to rest on his shoulder, casual and comforting all at once.
“I…” She sniffed and blinked up at him through watery eyes. “I saw it.”
He rubbed her back in small, slow circles. There was no judgement in his face, no aversion. Only raw sympathy and kindness. “Saw what?”
“I saw the engagement ring. I found it. I thought it was for me.”
Her own words echoed through her head, a terrible clanging in her ears.
She could see it clearly in her mind, the stunning two-carat round solitaire set in platinum, cushioned in the velvet of a blue Tiffany box. She’d discovered it a week before their NewYear’s Eve party and had nearly exploded with excitement. It wasn’t really her style. She preferred something unique and not so trendy, and perhaps that should’ve been her first clue. But Juliette had been so giddy, bubbling to the breaking point with anticipation, she slipped it onto her finger without a second thought.
In retrospect, it was probably bad luck. Even more peculiar was that it was too big. But a sizing issue was easily fixed. She’d ignored the tiny warning bells, the little voice in the back of her mind telling her something was wrong.
“I was so stupidly happy when I found it. Like blind with this false sense of joy. On New Year’s Eve, I brought a friend upstairs with me because I was so eager to show it to her.” Juliette tugged the hair tie loose from her head and let her waves fall down around her. Her temples were throbbing, the headache pulsed behind her eyes and at the base of her neck. “We heard a noise coming from the bathroom. And my friend, she tried to get me to leave. But no way was I going to let one of Rodrigo’s friends bang some chick in our bathroom. So, I opened the door.”
“It wasn’t one of his friends, was it?”
She was sure Brock already knew the answer. “No. It was Rodrigo. With his pants around his ankles and some girl, who was not Charity Rhodes, on our counter.”
Brock muttered a curse.
“Jules, I’m sorry.” He wrapped both arms around her, and she breathed in the comfort of him, the smell of fresh citrus and spice soothed her soul. “I’m really sorry.”
Silent tears continued to fall down her cheeks, and she wiped them away like an afterthought. Her chest ached with a pain she couldn’t rub away, and she knew her eyelids were swollen, that she probably had smudges and clumps of mascara beneath her eyes, but she was past the point of caring.
“Do you want to know the worst part?” she asked suddenly, easing herself off Brock’s shoulder so she could face him.
He said nothing, just continued to watch her with those piercing green eyes, so kept going before she lost her nerve. “When I told him I found the ring, he…he told me it wasn’t mine. It wasn’t for me. He was planning on marrying someone else.”
She slid from Brock’s hold and took two large gulps of red wine. It was dry, and even though flavors of dark cherries and oak burst on her tongue, she could barely taste them.
