Hard(48)

“Don’t you dare!” I groaned. “Look, I’ll do whatever I can, but you guys know my trust hasn’t kicked in yet. I don’t have the money.”

“How do you afford the house?”

“My dead father’s estate pays for the upkeep.” I gritted my teeth. “You really think I’d deny you guys? Well, Heaven, you can screw yourself, but you three…” I swallowed. Azariah, Layna, and Nikkole had the decency to look away. “When you said to come out tonight…you weren’t trying to help me with Professor Sweeten at all. You just wanted…money?”

Heaven sipped her water. “Told ya’ll.”

“Know what?” I dug through my purse and found two crumpled twenties. I tossed them on the table. “There. That’s everything I have on me. Divvy it up. I’ll sell off a fucking rug or something tomorrow. You can have whatever you need.”

Azariah tossed her purse to Layna and tried to follow. “Shay, wait.”

“I gotta go,” I said. “Thanks for the invite out, but I should get back to my brother.” I eyed Heaven. “Make sure he survived our fucking last night.”

Yeah, that wasn’t a good thing to shout in a crowded restaurant. People stared, but I was too mad to be ashamed of my behavior.

None of this made any sense. I didn’t do anything wrong. Did they really think I was flaunting my money by not flaunting how fortunate I was?

Did they even know how ridiculous it felt to get my father’s fortune? It was random—like a lottery I didn’t enter. I hardly knew Dad, and what I remembered wasn’t great. He was a man who lost his temper with Momma most nights at dinner and a father who missed his child’s every recital, school function, and birthday.

And maybe they were right. Maybe I shouldn’t have cared where the money came from.

Except the ache in my heart was a loneliness that cash and investments couldn’t heal. Momma was gone. Dad had never been around. I had no real family, and my friends couldn’t understand just how deep the scars ran.

Only one person ever saw through my pretense. He’d felt the same way, tried to comfort me, and was either my last bit of family or the beginning to a scary and exciting relationship.

So why did I keep running from him? I wouldn’t blame him if he gave up on me. He asked for a chance to make something happen, moments beyond shamed nights when I needed comforted. He came to talk to me, and I hadn’t listened. I took what I needed and left.

I wouldn’t do that to him again.

Zach was either my step-brother, which made him family, or he was…

I didn’t know what else he could be, but I hoped for something amazing.

I drove home and braced myself for the relationship talk of all talks. Epic levels of mushy-stuff, heart-to-hearts, and every cliché the French ever discovered. My stomach twisted. This was the one conversation I couldn’t afford to mess up.

I parked in the garage, checked my makeup, and hurried into the house. Zach wasn’t in the gym or theater. I dropped my purse on the kitchen counter. A bottle of aspirin overturned on the island. I tucked it in the cabinet.

And froze.

Two wine glasses rested in the sink.

One smudged with the barest pink of lipstick.

My heart knotted itself into a pretty little bow of innocence and naivety.

Was I that much of an idiot?

Her voice carried from the parlor. I didn’t know what I expected to find or why I didn’t just turn around and walk out of the estate.

I rounded the corner into the parlor. Zach laughed on the couch—fully-clothed, a goddamned miracle. He spread his legs wide, and the pretty little blonde who owned the red Porsche sat on the coffee table. She smiled and patted his knee.

I shouldn’t have been surprised, but my heart pounded itself into a million flaking pieces.

It hadn’t even been twenty-four hours since I hopped into his arms, and he was already sexing up some other little tart the instant I left the house?

Her smile faded as she spied me in the doorway. She gestured to Zach.

He turned, those striking green eyes capturing me in a wide-eyed blitz of panic.

“Shay!” He swore. “I…didn’t know you were back.”





Son of a bitch.

What was she doing home so early?

“Shay.” I stood. “I thought you’d be out for a bit longer.”

“Imagine that.”

Shit.

She was pissed, and her anger was another vice trying to crush my head from the inside.

I called to her when she retreated from the room. “Shay, it’s not how it looks.”

She tried to be mad, but her words trembled instead. Her lip quivered. Fuck. I’d kick my own ass for hurting her.