Chapter Forty-One – Cullen #2
Verity chats with Steven and Garrett about her job at Delute, showing them the same images she’d shown me the first time we met, of her work on the HP Energy campaign, but also the pictures from the Kelton event and a couple other projects she’s worked on.
Steven’s boyfriend joins, having returned from the bar with glasses of champagne for himself and Steven, and is almost immediately taken by Verity.
They’re all lost in conversation, and I’m more than happy to sit back and let her run the show. I take her empty cocktail glass and pass it off to one of the servers milling about the floor. I use the opportunity to do a quick scan of the event, checking to see if Clifton has shown up yet.
While I am having a good time, I can’t forget the main reason why I came here.
“Verity?”
The foreign voice calling out to my girlfriend snags my attention back. I land on a young guy in a dark gray suit, who had been chatting with the two agents from Vanguard. His focus on Verity brings their gaze to our group, and they instantly clock me.
Great.
The Chad-looking bro pushes over to us, and I reflexively take half a step forward, positioning myself slightly in front of Verity.
It’s then that I notice how still she has gone, the widening of her eyes bordering on the verge of pure horror.
It raises my hackles, telling me that something is wrong with this situation.
The guy gives me a dismissive glance, his focus solely on my girlfriend.
“Verity, what are you doing here?” His tone is light, friendly even, but his gaze lingers on her breasts in a way I don’t fucking like. It’s like the asshole can see through the fabric, and it makes me want to punch him.
Instead, I slip my hand into Verity’s giving her a reassuring squeeze. It seems to reboot her system.
“Mike.” His name sounds like torture on her tongue, and the smile she attempts to give him is full of cracks.
Mike.
Why does that sound familiar?
I give him another rundown, trying to figure out if I’ve met him before. Vanguard has many agents, but this guy seems too young to have been around when I was last in the city, and I know he isn’t someone I’ve met since coming back.
His very presence annoys me, but I don’t know why.
“Long time no see. How’ve you been?”
There is something off about his words. On the surface, they seem harmless, but my senses tell me otherwise.
His question sets Verity off like a firecracker. Any pretense of niceties falls away as her upper lip twitches with irritation, her eyes narrowing with ire.
“Long time no—” She cuts herself off with a light scoff. “I’ve just been peachy. Thanks for asking. How about you? Busy, I assume.”
He ignores the clear anger in her voice, giving her a relaxed shrug. “Of course. You know the real estate market is always a grind; my schedule is always packed.”
“I bet.”
“Still, I didn’t expect to see you here.”
“My boyfriend invited me.” She punctuates the word boyfriend with purpose, a tight, sugary smile on her face as she uses our clasped hands to pull me against her body. Her free hand crosses over to clutch my bicep, making it so she is practically hanging onto my arm.
“Boyfriend.” Mike squares up with me, finally deciding that I’m worth his attention. “I didn’t realize you were into older men.”
“I’m into men who can communicate their emotions and show up to dates.”
“That sounds like a pretty low bar.”
“And yet, you couldn’t reach it.”
Verity’s venom is surprising. The entire time I’ve known her, I’ve never seen her get truly mad. Yes, we’d had our fight when she first found out I am Celine’s ex, but even then, she wasn’t angry, just hurt and upset.
There have been plenty of scenarios she has been in where she’s had the right to get mad and yell but didn’t.
Like the time we’d been crossing the street and a taxi turned the corner, almost taking us out.
Or when she’d gone downstairs to collect her laundry and found that someone had taken her stuff out of the washing machine and just dumped it in the corner.
She’d come back upstairs, lips pursed tightly and crawled into my arms with a grumbled curse.
Even on the night I first met her and she’d been stood up, she didn’t have this level of heat pouring from her.
It’s then that it finally clicks.
Shitty Mike.
This is the guy who stood her up.
With the puzzle pieces all connected, I am able to toss my coin into this game.
I reach my hand out to Mike and formally introduce myself. “Cullen.”
He stares at my proffered palm like it’s coated in crap. That doesn’t bother me. I didn’t expect him to shake it. My goal was to make him look like even more of an asshole.
I tuck my hand into my front pocket.
“I have to thank you. If you hadn’t stood Verity up, we never would have met.”
The knowledge that his upper hand, his manipulation of her, had backfired, twists like a thumb in an open wound in his thigh. His upper lip curls, all prior jovial pretense melting away.
“Isn’t that sweet,” he grits out.
“It is. Can’t believe I scored myself such a sexy girlfriend.”
“Whatever, man. You think I care? Chick’s clingy as fuck. She texts like twelve times a day. That shit’s such a turnoff.”
Verity stiffens at the insult, tears instantly beading her bottom lashes.
Fuck this guy.
I step away from Verity, tugging out of her hold and closing the distance between me and Mike.
“You better watch what you say, kid.”
“Or what, old dude? You think you can take me?” He steps even closer, getting up in my face.
He’s probably two or three inches shorter than me, which means he has to turn his gaze slightly up. Something he didn’t realize till now. It’s not a huge difference, but to someone like him, it’s irksome.
Getting into a fight here would be dumb. I have enough sense to know that. But Mike doesn’t have the same social intellect.
I rest a hand on his shoulder, squeezing it tightly as I lean down and whisper my threat.
“I don’t have to fight you with my fists to take you down.”
He raises his hands to my chest and shoves me. He’s not that strong, but I still shift a few steps back.
My hand balls into a fist.
A warm hand grabs onto it.
“Cullen.”
I look back at Verity, centering myself again, before turning back to Mike.
“You’re not worth it.” My voice is cold as ice, but it lights a blaze in his eyes.
I don’t fucking care about him. He is a waste of time.
I unclench my fist and take Verity’s hand, not bothering with goodbyes, and I lead us back through the event. People are still coming and going, the double doors to the hall filled with foot traffic.
The night air is chilly as we step out of the music hall, and I stop for a moment to take off my jacket and place it around Verity’s shoulders.
“Are we leaving?”
There’s still a stray tear clinging to the lashes on the outer corner of her eye. I reach up and brush it away, my heart squeezing. Fuck, I want to go back in there and tear his tongue out.
“Did you want to stay?”
She looks over my shoulder, avoiding my heated gaze. “You didn’t get to talk to Clifton.”
“I don’t care about Clifton. I care about you.”
“But—”
“But nothing. I’ll figure something else out with him. What matters most to me right now is you.” I run my thumb over her cheek. “You think I’m going to make you stay there when some asshole made you cry?”
She reflexively reaches up to dab her eyes.
“I’m so embarrassed.”
“Don’t be.”
She gnaws her bottom lip. “Do I text too much?”
God. Fuck that guy for making her feel insecure.
“No.”
“Really? Because I know I sometimes send a few in a row, and I’m not trying to be annoying. I just—”
“Verity, you could send me a thousand texts, and I would read every single one of them. They could be utter nonsense, and I would hang on to every word. When I see a message from you, it makes my day. You are not an annoyance; you never could be.”
“How did I get so lucky with you?”
“I’m the lucky one who gets to be your boyfriend. Don’t forget that for even a minute, Verity. You took the chance on me.”
I don’t give her a chance to refute me, silencing her with a kiss. I pour all my earlier words into it, flooding her with all the love I can possibly give.
Her hands slowly snake over my shoulders, the distance between us closing completely. We don’t care about anything else at this moment. There is just us and our connection.
There’s Verity and there’s me.