Chapter 19
SIMON
“He seems happy,” Corey said as we threaded our way through the breakfast crowd, walking so close to me that our elbows brushed. Not that there was a whole lot of choice, given how many people were suddenly around.
It was still an intimate wedding by the standards of Theo’s family, despite the expanded crowd. Delilah had said she’d had to fight her mom on it, so this must have been the compromise.
“Who?”
Corey stopped, looking at me with a raised brow. “Theo,” he said, as though he was talking to the biggest idiot he’d ever met.
It wasn’t impossible he was, though not for the reasons he thought. I was an idiot. I was an idiot for letting… whatever was going on between Theo and me go as far as it had.
I still didn’t understand it, but I knew it wouldn’t last. Eventually—weeks or months or even years from now—Theo would realize what I’d known since we met. That I could never be enough for him.
I was currently standing beside a man who hadn’t been enough for him, and I had the self-awareness to know I must have looked ridiculous next to him. He was model-beautiful—on account of being a model—successful, well off—even if not quite at the Hargrave family level. Glamorous.
People had called me a lot of things over the course of my life—most of them nice things, even—but never that. I had all the glamour of a wad of wet paper towel.
“He is,” I said all the same, straightening my shoulders.
If nothing else, I wanted Corey to believe Theo had moved on.
That he was happy. That his heart wasn’t broken, that he wasn’t broken.
That whatever had happened between them—and I still didn’t know what that was, other than that they’d broken up and Theo hadn’t dated since—he was over it.
I might not have been the world’s number one trophy boyfriend, but I could make it clear I adored him.
Corey raised an eyebrow. “Defensive,” he said, lips twitching at the corner. “C’mon, you’re about to make sure I marry someone else. I’m not a threat.”
“I never thought you were,” I lied. I’d been steeling myself for the engagement announcement before he and Theo broke up. I’d been so sure Corey was it.
Corey’s smirk widened. “If you say so. I was trying to get across that I’m glad to see the two of you happy,” he said, starting to walk in the direction of the house again. “Theo’s… he deserves it. Happiness.”
“Yeah.” That, we could absolutely agree on. Theo’s happiness was the greatest good in the world to me.
“There you two are.”
A cold shudder ran down the back of my neck at the sound of Theo’s mom’s voice. The morning had started out so well. I should’ve known that wouldn’t last.
“Mrs. Hargrave,” Corey said with so much warmth in his voice that it almost sounded sincere.
Theo’s mom beamed at him, so broad she almost looked sincere in return.
I hadn’t realized they didn’t like each other. Theo’s mom didn’t seem to actually like anyone, but Corey was attractive, successful, personable, etcetera—and he was planning to marry Delilah, not Madelaine, who was the golden child.
But then Delilah had implied she hadn’t gone to college not because of not being able to get her hands on her trust fund, but because of her mother. If Corey was sincere about how he felt about her—and despite everything, I was inclined to think he was—a little animosity made sense.
Another thing we could agree on. If she wasn’t a woman and more than twice my age, I would probably have gotten into a fist fight with Theo’s mother by now.
I didn’t particularly think I would have won it, so it was just as well I hadn’t.
“Or should I say Mom?” Corey asked, grin widening.
I still didn’t like him, but I didn’t hate the way Theo’s mom’s eye twitched when he said that.
“Since we’re about to be family, and all,” he added.
“Mm,” Theo’s mom hummed, narrowing her eyes at him for a moment before turning to me. “Why aren’t you dressed?”
My stomach plummeted as, for a horrible moment, I wondered if I’d somehow been wandering around naked all morning.
I glanced down and breathed the subtlest possible sigh of relief as I caught sight of the dark jeans Ellie had talked me into getting. They were still stiff and uncomfortable—hard to forget I was wearing them, except in the face of this particular woman’s scrutiny.
The more time I spent with her, the less I understood how Theo was so relatively well-adjusted. Okay, he was a little neurotic, and a little weird, but given what he’d grown up with he was doing great.
Corey slung an arm around my shoulders, pulling me to his side—a surprisingly protective gesture, coming from him.
“We’re just on our way to final rehearsals,” he said. “I know you’re worried on Delilah’s behalf, but I promise you today is going off without a hitch. Simon’s good at organization. Aren’t you, Simon?”
Huh. Had Delilah told him I’d helped out with the seating charts and catering arrangements?
“Uh. That’s, umm. What they pay me to do,” I said, pushing my slipping glasses back up my nose.
Theo’s mom gave me a once-over. Her mouth twisted a nearly imperceptible degree. Nearly.
“I was just talking to Simon here about how happy Theo seems,” Corey continued, as though the temperature of the conversation was still about the same as the sunny morning.
“Who knows, maybe this’ll be good practice for when he and Theo get married.
We could be back here this time next year doing it all over again! ”
Theo would have died rather than get married in this place—possibly rather than have any of his family, with the exception of Madelaine, present. Corey must have known that. He was just torturing Theo’s mom.
She looked at me again, vague distaste turning to nose-wrinkling disgust.
Which was why Corey had said it in the first place. To annoy her, to disgust her.
Because he knew—they all knew—that I wasn’t one of them. I wasn’t the kind of person who was going to marry Theo.
Audrey, who could laugh off hundreds of millions of dollars in a trust fund, was the kind of person who was going to marry Theo. Hell, even Corey wasn’t really good enough for him, judging by the way Mrs. Hargrave was reacting to him marrying Delilah.
The knot in my stomach crawled up my throat, making it impossible to say anything. That was fine—what was there to say? We all knew the truth.
“Let’s worry about this wedding first,” Mrs. Hargrave said. “And let the future remain unmarred by speculation.”
Unmarred by speculation. I’d have to remember that one.
Corey made a less-than-thrilled sound, taking his arm away from my shoulders but nudging my elbow as he did. “C’mon. Standing around’s making me nervous,” he said. “Give my love to Delilah, Mom! Can’t wait to see her.”