The Easter event the day before had nothing on this.
Pearson Farms had been packed, and for good reason, seeing as it’d been set up like an all-day experience—with vendors, food trucks, and games for the families. But Amber’s festivals were always on another level. There was more to do. More to experience. And more people to worry about.
“How do I keep getting roped into this?” I murmured when Gray parked the truck on the driveway of his oldest cousin’s bed and breakfast, just a street away from where the downtown area was blocked off for the festival.
“Because you secretly love this,” he said without any of the tease he normally would’ve delivered a line like that.
“No, I—that isn’t what I meant,” I stammered and mentally cursed the heat that rushed to my cheeks at the confident way he’d spoken. “I meant getting dragged tothisthe day after Briggs tricked me into going to that Easter festival with him.”
Gray’s eyebrows shot up in surprise before furrowing in a wounded sort of way. “What was that?”
I stilled as I thought over what I’d just said, not at all sure what could’ve made him have that reaction. “What?”
“You went to an Easter festival . . . withBriggs?”
“Yes?” I answered, slowly drawing out the word as I studied the growing frustration in his pale green eyes. “At Pearson Farms. Why?”
An exasperated sound left him. “You don’t”—Gray seemed to think for a moment before continuing—“see anything potentially problematic with that?”
“No,” I said firmly. “He called a meeting. Lainey promised to take Kaia there, but she hasn’t been feeling well, so that’s where we met.”
Gray’s head just bobbed before shaking irritably.
“What?” I snapped.
“Nothing,” he muttered as he opened his door to leave, the nonchalance in his tone at complete odds with the strain in the cab of the truck. But just when I was about to demand he explain, he slammed the door instead and twisted toward me. “He’s married, Mallory.You’remarried.”
“Technically,” I reminded him.
“We’re still married,” he shot back. “But even if we weren’t, can you really not see how it might look to anyone who knows Lainey if they sawher husbandandKaiawith another woman? At a festival on her family’s farm, no less.”
I tossed my hands out in front of me, nearly knocking my empty cup out of the cup holder as I did. “We were having a meeting.”
“You think that’s what it looked like?”
I stared straight ahead as I tried to consider how itmight’velooked. But, once again, I wondered if the way I’d been raised had made me wholly unprepared for this.
Because, even though Gray’s reaction and words had my gut twisting in worry, all I could think was that it was Briggs. It’d been a meeting. That was it.
“You knew,” I finally said, then looked at him accusingly. “You knew I’d been at a meeting with him. Wren told you?—”
“No,” he said over me. “Wren told meyouwere there, which had already been a surprise to me. I hadn’t been able to figure out why you would be there.” He pressed a hand to his chest. “But a lot happened right after finding that out, and I honestly kinda forgot you’d even gone there until just now. And, remember,Chloetold me you’d had a meeting with Briggs.”
A pained laugh burst from me, laced with resentment. “Oh my gosh,stop.” I shifted away from him, only then realizing how closely we’d leaned toward each other during the short argument. “Once again, you haveno roomto talk, Gray. You’regetting on me for having a meeting with our boss and friend, but what about you?” I seethed.
“In just a couple sentences, you said,‘Wren told me’and‘Chloe told me’like it’s perfectly normal and okay for you to be getting your information from the women you’ve slept with or tried to sleep with?” I waved a hand at him. “If you’re going to use the wholemarriedthing against me, don’t forget it applies to you too.”
“I never?—”
“If it’s about either of them, save it,” I said as I opened my door and started stepping out of the truck. “I was there for too much with both of them.”
I shut the door behind me and stalked down the driveway, toward the groups of people heading to the festival. My emotions clashed and built until I felt ready to unleash every ounce of my pain and anger and uncertainty on the next person who so much as looked at me.
It wasn’t until I was lost in the masses, replaying our conversation for the third time, that I realized I’d grasped at any available thread to lash out at Gray with. Not because I’d thought he was overreacting—though, he probably had been. But because the same panic that had filled my chest yesterday had been quick to rise at the realization that he could see things I couldn’t and should’ve been able to, and I’d just...reacted. But instead of giving into that panic I could still feel pressing against the walls of my chest, I’d fallen back to what I’d known...
Anger.
The fourth time through the conversation, I slowed to a stop as regret and shame burned low in my veins. But even if it’d just been Gray and me alone somewhere, I’m not sure I would’ve known how to explain my reaction or what I’d said. Not when it felt like one step into that conversation would lead me tumbling into all those weaknesses I was struggling to hold back.
