"Nice dress," he said when I approached him, cool and collected as per usual. "Red's always suited you."
I resisted the urge to pin him against the nearest wall and opted on a simple thank you instead. "Where's Lauren?" I questioned, looking past him in search of her.
"She'll be here soon," Jack said, not bothering to elaborate. He took a moment to take in his surroundings before meeting eyes with me again. "Which reminds me … do you mind if I ask what exactly you were thinking inviting us to this?"
"What?" I questioned, playing dumb. "You're practically my brother. Do I really need a reason to invite you to a party?"
"Oh, I'm your brother now?" Jack looked amused by that. "That's funny. I don't remember being your brother when we-"
"Don't," I interrupted, shoving a bouquet of flowers at him. We weren't doing this. Not again. "I need you to add a few of those to the arrangements on each table. And make it look nice. I'm a stickler for detail."
I started to walk away, but Jack stopped me before I could. "You really do look nice in that dress," he whispered, rubbing a suggestive hand up my side. "Who knew event planners were so sexy?"
I held my breath in anticipation of his next move, but it never came. He loosened his hold on me a few seconds later, leaving me breathlessly staring after him as he went to work on the task I'd given him.
I snapped back to reality when I heard a loud bang from the kitchen, but luckily it was just a case of some clumsy caterer dropping a plate of smoked salmon en route to the patio. No fires were on the verge of igniting, no one had suffered any bodily harm, and the entire garden was packed pretty close to full capacity with jovial partygoers not even a half hour later.
This event, for all its hiccups, had been a success.
Satisfied with my work, I went to get myself some food and was in the process of loading up a plate when I heard Lauren call out to me from the crowd. "Sorry I'm late," she said once she finally reached my table. "Unexpected business obligation. This is a great party though. If I wasn't on the verge of exploding, I'd definitely be out there dancing."
I followed Lauren's gaze downwards and froze. The dress she had on was tight and form fitting, calling attention to a small bump that had sprouted up where I was sure a completely flat stomach had been just a week prior. Pregnancy moved fast. Up until that moment, the only indication I'd seen that she was actually with child was her refusal to touch any alcohol at dinner, but now that the proof was staring me in the face all I really wanted to do was run.
Jack seemed to sense this. I glanced up at him when he approached, and his expression darkened as soon as he saw what Lauren was wearing.
"I have to go take care of something," I said, excusing myself to go hunt down Jada. I definitely wasn't in the mood for her lecturing, but fuck it. Hanging onto her coattails for the remainder of the evening certainly beat making nice with the man I loved and the mother of his child.
~ CHAPTER FOURTEEN ~
I found Jada near a bunch of shrubbery nursing a glass of Merlot like her life depended on it. "Who do you think the sexiest guy here is?" she questioned, eyeing the swarm of bodies in front of us. "And don't say Jack."
"Wasn't going to," I muttered.
Jada gave me a disbelieving look. "Well? Who then?"
I sighed and decided to appease her. "Uh … I don't know … what about him?" I said, jutting my chin out towards the first half decent guy I could find. "Cute right?"
Jada followed my gaze and let out a low whistle. "Yeah, he's got it," she agreed, taking another sip from her glass. "I probably wouldn't make him pull out."
I laughed and shook my head. She turned into a whole other person whenever she got a couple drinks in her system.
Not that I had any room to judge. At the end of the day, I was just glad that Jack and me were no longer on the forefront of her mind.
"What about him?" Jada questioned, very unsubtly pointing to an expensive looking man near the dessert table. "He's tall and he's got big hands. You know what that means … "
I leaned into her to get a closer look and laughed when I saw him staring directly at us. "Yeah, he's alright," I agreed. "But you know he saw you pointing at him, right?"
Jada swiveled around to get another look at him. "Shit!" she gasped, grabbing hold of my arm. "He's coming over."
An anxious expression passed over her delicate features, but she plastered on her most convincing smile and allowed herself to be swept out onto the dance floor by him. Just like that, my only lifeline was gone, and I was left once more with nothing but my guilt to keep me company.
"Care to dance?"
I turned around to find Jack standing beside me with a devious smile pulling at his lips. It was truly unfair how good looking he was. All it did was make him harder to resist.
"I doubt your fiancée would approve of that," I said, making a point of avoiding looking him in the eye.
"She couldn't care less," Jack said, taking another step towards me. "Or was that not obvious when I came back to the table the other night with your lipstick on my mouth?"
I scoffed. "You're despicable," I muttered, trying my best to calm my nerves. If he took even another step towards me, I was sure I'd lose all control of limbs.
Jack smirked, reaching out to caress my arm. "No, I'm honest," he corrected, his words silky smooth and to the point. "What Lauren and I have is an arrangement. She has her vices and I have mine."
"Really?" I scolded. "That's all I am to you. A vice?"
I tried to push my way through the crowd to get away from him, but he grabbed my wrist in mid-stride and forced me to look at him. "Of course not," he said, his gold flecked eyes never once leaving mine. "You're so much more than that."
"Then why didn't you fight for me?" I challenged, grateful for the music when I heard my voice raise a few octaves. I didn't want to draw a crowd, but there was no reeling the words back in once they were spoken. What came next was an avalanche of thoughts I'd been holding in for far too long. "We lost a child. And I – I know I wasn't easy to be around after it happened. I'm not saying that I was. But I never stopped needing you. Not even for a second."
Jack's eyes misted up as I spoke, but he clenched his jaw and kept his cool.
"And that's just it," I said, waving a hand at him. "You're always so cool and collected. You never grieved. You never told me what was going on in your head. You just...you let me go."
"That's not true," Jack jumped in. "There hasn't been a single day that I haven't thought about you and our little girl. Not one. I just...I didn't want to make things any harder for you."
"So you left?" I let out a dry laugh and wiped a stray tear from my cheek. "Because that makes so much sense..."
"It did at the time," Jack said, his voice thick with regret. "I was losing you and you know it. All you did was drink and sleep. You wouldn't even look at me. So when we had that fight and you told me that you wanted me gone, I believed you. It hurt like hell, but deep down I knew it was what you needed in order to start healing."
"Do you still believe that?"
Jack shrugged. "Look at you," he said, waving a hand at me. "You're one of the most adored event planners in this city. You made something of yourself. Do you really think that would have happened had I stuck around?"
I stared up at him for a few seconds at a loss for words. "I don't know," I admitted. "All I know is that while I was off 'making something of myself', you were busy settling into the life we should have had."
"It wasn't like that," Jack insisted. "I only just met Lauren. We barely even know each other."
"Well that doesn't change the fact that she's carrying your child, now does it?"
"Chantel." Jack let out a deep sigh and rubbed his face. "It's like I told you. The chemistry just isn't there between us. I can't force it anymore than she can."
Jack's words were firm, but that didn't make me any less skeptical. What he was saying went against the grain of everything I'd been conditioned to believe. How could someone not have feelings for the person they'd come together to create a life with? It didn't seem possible to me. I loved my baby girl with every fiber of my being even though I'd never gotten the chance to hold her in my arms. I loved her when I was giving birth to her knowing she'd already passed on, and I would love her until the moment I took my last breath.