Playing with Danger (Desire Bay 2)

I had to fly back to New York. I wish it had been with you. But maybe you’re right . . . our lives are too different. Thank you for being my wife while it lasted. You should have everything you want in life. I’ll be in touch with details about dissolving our union.

Love, Grant

The note slipped from Hannah’s fingers, and an instant pain erupted in her chest. Like someone had lit fire to her ribs, and they were charring and burning like old driftwood. She couldn’t breathe. Her knees wobbled, her calves turning to mush instead of muscle.

“‘Love, Grant’?” she repeated out loud. “Love?”

She didn’t feel loved. She felt betrayed. Shortchanged. She’d really thought they still had two days. Sure, she had Cal’s event to bartend at tomorrow, but they still had two days. But he was gone.

He’d left her.

The Laythem men are takers. They take your youth, your heart, your money, and try to leave you with nothing . . .

All Hannah cared about was her heart. Because for the first time, she truly felt what it was like to be cast off. She’d come to want Grant. Need him. Trust him.

Should have known better.

She looked around, and her skin itched with the need to leave. She couldn’t be in her own home because he was so real to her there. She needed to get away. So she went to the only place she could to outrun the loneliness. She went back to Goonies.

“Weren’t you just here?” Rudy teased, keeping court with only three customers. Thankfully it was a slow day.

“Yeah, I just needed to get out of my house,” she said honestly and walked up to the bar.

“You still good to go to buy this place?” Rudy said.

Hannah nodded, and he slid her a beer. “I get my big check from this event in the mail today. Then we’re good to go,” Hannah said.

“Excellent. I get out of this place, and you get in it. Dreams do come true.”

Hannah clinked her longneck with his and took a sip. She needed to focus on something other than Grant and the gaping hole growing deeper in her ribs.

“H

ey, Hannah,” Cal said, coming to sit beside her at the bar.

“Hey, what are you doing here?” she asked.

“Ah, just taking a break from working. Long hours this week. But I’m excited for tomorrow night.”

Hannah frowned. “You’re going to be at the event?”

“Yeah, it’s kind of my deal. Well, Grant put it on. Investors are coming to the subdivision to see my buildings, and they’re talking about kicking in as backers to get my business expanding.”

Hannah had been hit with too much information at once.

“Wait, Grant put this on? This event?” Hannah searched her mind—the woman she’d been working with was named Sarah. What the hell did Grant want with investing here?

“Yeah, he’s thinking of investing and brought a few guys form New York out. Though he said he had an emergency, so he won’t make it. But he already cut me a check and went all in. I have my first project funded by him already. The other investors are still coming, too, so that’s even more opportunity.”

“Whoa.” Hannah faced Cal fully, trying to piece all of this together. So Grant got hold of Cal to let him know he wasn’t coming to an event he’d planned? And he’d invested money into Cal’s business.

Which meant . . .

“Grant is hosting the event, so he hired all the people to put it on,” she muttered. And he had more money than she’d thought. Not that it mattered, but it was starting to make sense why his mother was fighting for it.

She has a way of spinning lies to make people feel like shit . . .

“Yeah, that would make sense,” Cal said.