Chapter 3
Chapter Three
Present day
“Hello, Sosie,” Granger said.
Fucking cool as a cucumber. Like he hadn’t pounded me through the mattresses the last time he’d seen me.
Like he hadn’t cheated on the very night of his wedding. Had Pippa ever had any idea?
“Back here for a visit?”
I felt hot pink-pricks of sweat on my throat and chest.
He hadn’t even known I was coming back. He obviously didn’t think about me at all.
What if he thought I was coming back because I was still in love with him or something equally embarrassing?
I’d had to stand through their entire wedding, his cum still rolling in drops down my legs, my entire cunt aching from how hard he’d taken me, and smile. Pretend like everything was all right.
Like this was the greatest love story of the century, a man with no name and a fiddle marrying the town’s heiress.
Instead of my worst nightmare.
I had barely been able to look Pippa in the face.
I’d slept with her new husband. I’d let him fuck me up and down and in more positions than I’d known existed.
And in the end he’d rejected me. That would teach me to trust a handsome man.
Pippa said, “She’s the featured flute player this summer.”
“Ah,” Granger said, twining his arm around Pippa’s neck, draping his hand casually over her shoulder. “I didn’t know you played the flute, Sosie.”
His eyes with those sinful dark lashes were taunting me.
Because yes he did.
Yes, he absolutely did.
When the diner was slow, we’d open the back door and escape out to the beach and sit on the sand, me playing the flute, and him taking that fiddle out of the old leather case that smelled like a library.
And we’d play for hours sometimes, his leg brushing by mine, our fingers meeting as he’d drop a pretty shell in my lap. I thought it was the beginning of forever.
Either he was lying or he truly had forgotten, and either option was so damn humiliating.
But fuck him, I had a better boyfriend now.
Granger had been a stupid mistake. Jax was my future, and I couldn’t wait to tell him all about my first evening as a Siren.
Even though every other man here was dressed in a three-piece suit, Granger was dressed in dirty work pants and a loose gray T-shirt. There were little holes in it where I could see his tanned skin.
Pippa took his hand eagerly, looking up at him with eyes shining.
Even though she was my best friend, Pippa had always been just a bit arrogant. In fact, sometimes I had felt like a bit player in her starring role.
But she had changed. It was obvious, just from subtle shifts of her body, that Granger ran the show now.
I said nothing to him, and he kissed Pippa, his touch slow, lingering, the kiss going on just a touch too long for normal behavior, and she leaned into him with a sigh of adoration, the thick gold band heavy on his finger.
This was fine. I didn’t care.
But was this how the whole summer was going to go? Him practically tonguing her in front of me?
There was still that uncomfortable gleam in her eyes when she turned around. Like she was scoring a point on me every time he came into my vision.
Why did she still do this? Why was she so convinced that some crush two years ago affected me at all today?
And there was no way she could know—it had been more than a crush.
I’d thought he was my soulmate.
It was so ridiculous. How could a sweet-talking dirty cheater ever be my soulmate? Who else had he been cheating with?
Pippa, so sharp, so firm and confident, didn’t even ask Granger to get dressed.
You didn’t tell Granger what to do. He’d get dressed in his own damn time.
I looked away.
“I need to go circulate around the tables.”
“I’m sure it will be lovely,” Pippa said. “You’re doing such a good job, Sosie. I’m so happy to be able to help you. God knows a music graduate student can’t make much.”
My cheeks felt heated with embarrassment, but I forced my voice to stay calm.
“No. . . . I don’t make much.”
“We thought you could really use this job.”
We
“Thank you,” I said steadily.
His arm had migrated down now, those big fingers casually spread around her slim waist, the thumb absently rubbing up and down. Like he didn’t notice he was touching her, because their bodies were so aligned together.
I walked away, putting my flute up to parched, anxious lips. Forcing myself not to turn around. Not to betray by any sign that Granger could affect me.
Chamberlain Hollingsworth came out to greet me, and mention his son, which flustered me even more.
It felt like I was making mistake after mistake.
Goddamn Granger! I couldn’t do this every performance or I’d never find other people who wanted to hire me.
But every time I tried to focus on my job, I could feel his eyes. They sat differently on me than everybody else’s. No one else’s eyes felt like they were peeling off my skin, assessing me, measuring me. Was he wondering if I was still in love with him?
I wasn’t!
What the hell was wrong with me? I shouldn’t be feeling his gaze like this. Right down my body, pooling in the deep and shameful places in my belly, dripping down my thighs.
Somehow I managed to get through the performance, smile at the guests without throwing up or fainting.
It hadn’t gone that badly, right? For my first day, that had been good?
“Congratulations!” Pippa chirped, coming over hand-in-hand with Granger. “I found Hayden and he wants to say congratulations, too!”
Hayden was a year or two older than us, a tall, serious-faced man with short brown hair and a neatly-trimmed beard.
He was very handsome and at one time I’d had a little crush on him. But that was before Granger came to town. . .
As usual, even dressed-up Granger looked like sin and his gaze felt like degradation, the first few buttons undone on his shirt, showing just a hint of the muscles on his chest and a light dusting of hair.
“You were wonderful out there,” Hayden enthused, handing me a glass of champagne.
“I’ve really been hoping Granddaddy would ask you,” he went on. “And finally, he agreed this year. We all thought it would be so beneficial.”
Great, so everyone was talking about how poor I am. Nothing embarrassing about that.
“He’s a very stubborn man,” Granger said.
“What made him agree this year?” I asked.
“Who knows?” Granger said. “Maybe a little birdie told him you needed a job.”
Pippa flicked a glance up at him, but her smile was just as artificially big when she turned back to me.
So that was it. Was that the source of this strange undercurrent of tension I could feel? Was Granger the reason I had this job?
I didn’t even know what to say.
“To many more good performances,” Hayden toasted, and we all clinked our glasses together.
I could taste a bit of pear, an earthy hints of rosemary and thyme in there too.
I felt Granger’s eyes on me, cool and assessing, but I ignored him.
I refused to give him the satisfaction of even looking his way. Or of speculating about what he had said.
Did he expect me to be grateful that he’d pulled the strings with Chamberlain?
And for what purpose? Why? After I’d blocked his number that should have been the end of it.
I didn’t want anything he’d done out of guilt.
Disgusting, vile man.
I took a big gulp of my champagne, hoping something would distract me from this horror show.
Hayden began asking me about my graduate studies, and I tried to focus on that.
But, as always, Granger seemed to overshadow everything. It wasn’t just his height. It felt like everything here revolved around him, and it was disorienting.
“Shit, is that a cormorant out there?” he said, pointing out into the sea. “It’s mighty early in the season for that.”
Pippa and Hayden craned their necks around to see what he was talking about, but I smelled bullshit, and that was my damned mistake.
My suspicious glance only made that slow, wicked smile spread across his face and he deliberately took a big gulp of his champagne, throwing it back so I could see his throat working.
Then he bent over and spat it all back in my almost-empty glass.
I gasped.
Disgusting. He was a filthy, foul, disgusting man.
“A toast,” Granger said. “To the newest member of the Sirens.”
I wanted to throw it in his face, my heart pounding so hard my chest ached.
They all clinked glasses and drank, but I was frozen in place. Would it be too conspicuous if I dumped it all on the ground? Would they think I had gone mad?
“Something wrong with the champagne?” Pippa asked frostily, and oh yes, she had always resented when I didn’t properly appreciate any of her charity.
Fuck, I couldn’t show that anything was wrong.
“No, everything is fine.”
“Then why aren’t you drinking it? It’s a particularly rare bottle Hayden chose for your debut.”
I raised the glass to my lips, hoping she would look away, but she didn’t, her eyes slightly narrowed.
Oh, so maybe she did remember certain. . . incidents from before they were married. Times when Granger seemed to prefer me. Maybe they hadn’t been completely forgotten yet.
I closed my eyes and drained the glass, swallowing down his filthy attempt at domination, the champagne burning my throat and settling like a stone in my belly.
“Delicious, isn’t it?” Granger said, and put his arm around Pippa’s waist, drew her closer so their bodies looked fused together.
What was it like to have sex with Granger every night? To feel those wicked hands on you every day?
I swallowed hard, trying to force the jealousy down my throat too.
I couldn’t stand being here a second longer.
“Oh, I think it’s my boyfriend,” I lied, looking down at my phone. “I’ve gotta take this.”
“Liar,” Granger murmured as I brushed by, so quietly I wasn’t sure if I had heard him right.
But I didn’t look back.
My skin crawled with a heady mixture of nausea and arousal, and as I didn’t even wait for them to acknowledge me leaving, just fled as fast as I dared to the big, marble-tiled bathroom on the first floor.
Fuck.
“Get yourself together,” I demanded at my reflection as I splashed cold water on my face.
My auburn hair was hanging long and wild around my face, the pupils blown in my green eyes.