“Gia’s my friend, so I’m making it my business.”
I could finally breathe a little easier. “Your friend, huh? You sure that’s all you are?”
He rolled his eyes. “The fact that you have to ask me that proves that you don’t know your wife at all. Gia told me she’s known you forever, that you were friends long before you got married. And you don’t know her well enough to know she’d never cheat on you?”
I let that sink in before I pulled up a chair next to my wife, reaching for her hand.
Gia’s hands were bare and I wondered if it was because she wasn’t allowed to wear jewelry, or had she taken her wedding rings off because she couldn’t stand to look at them anymore? I glanced at my left hand, trying to imagine it without the simple gold band she’d placed there during our wedding ceremony. I couldn’t. I wanted it to stay firmly in place for the rest of my life.
I closed my eyes, bringing her cool hand to my lips. There was so much I wanted to say to her, but not with an audience hanging on my every word. “If you have somewhere to be, don’t feel the need to stay.”In other words, get the hell out of here, so I can have some time alone with her.
He chuckled. “You don’t pull any punches, do you?”
I frowned at him. “Can you blame me?” I pulled my phone out of my pocket and showed him the picture Kaitlyn sent me. “Someone sends me this. Then I find out you’re here with my wife, holding her hand all goddamn night, how the hell do you expect me to feel?”
He scowled at the picture. “There’s only one person who could have taken that. What the hell did you ever see in Kaitlyn?”
“It wasn’t forever, I can tell you that.”
His half-smile told me he understood. “Sure, she’s easy on the eyes, and she’s probably a little firecracker in the sack—”
“Do you mind?” I snapped, re-claiming Gia’s hand. “You think I want to think or talk about that with you-or anyone, in front of my wife?”
“I was just curious.” He sat back in the metal framed chair, crossing his arms over his broad chest. “Told myself if I ever got to meet you, I had to ask.”
Since he felt so free to ask questions, I had a few of my own. “How long have you known Gia?”
“We just met when I came to work on her show.”
It made me feel marginally better to know they didn’t have history. Though I knew no man on the planet had the kind of history with her that I had. “Huh, and you became so close in a couple of weeks?”
“I don’t have to tell you how amazing Gia is. She’s easy to love, man.”
“Love?” My chest tightened as I stared at him, trying to refrain from jumping across the bed and throttling him. “Are you telling me you’re in love with my wife?”
He laughed, shaking his head. “No, not in love, love, like a friend.”
At least I wouldn’t have to kill someone today. “You can’t love someone after a couple of weeks, not even as a friend.”
“Really? ‘Cause my fiancée loves Gia and she hasn’t even met her yet.”
“Your fiancée?”
He whipped his phone out and flashed his screensaver. A picture of him with a pretty blonde. “My pregnant fiancée, so if you think you have to worry about me, you don’t.”
“Good to know.”
“What you have to worry about,” he said, waiting until I looked at him. “Is being a dumbass and losing the best thing that ever happened to you.”
“Get. Out.”
“Not until I’ve said my piece. Gia is a great girl and she doesn’t deserve to be with a coward who runs away when things get tough.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “Are you for real? How would you like it if some stranger came along and told you all the ways you’re screwing things up with your fiancée? Mind your own goddamn business. You don’t know Gia and sure as hell don’t know me.”
“I know what it takes to make a real relationship work, which you clearly don’t.”
I couldn’t argue with him on that score. My history proved I sucked at relationships. “Yeah, I bet you’re a regular Dr. Phil, doling out relationship advice when nobody asks for it.”
