“That is not true.”
“It’s the truest thing I know, and it terrifies me, Fin.”
She shook her head. “You can’t say things like that.” Disgust in her voice. “You can’t.”
“It’s not easy for someone like me.”
“A stubborn jackass. A power jerk.”
“A Sherwood. It’s difficult to explain.”
She pulled her feet out of the sand, one by one, and then dropped his hand. “You’re not going to try either.”
“You stood on that barstool at the Blarney, and you made me notice you. You sat beside me, and you intrigued me. You kissed me, and you had my full attention. But I had to work out what to do with you.” God. Fuck. In constructing lie upon lie, he’d forgotten how to be a human being and treat people with respect.
“Before or after you dumped me at the hotel.”
“You were worth more to me than a one-night stand.” She had to see that. “I choose you.”
“I seem to recall, I chose you, jerk face.”
“To fuck with your ex, yes. I choose you for more.”
“All the way back then,” she scoffed, disbelief and scorn mashed together in her voice.
“From the moment you sang ‘Happy Birthday’ in that blonde wig, in that dress that fit you like a slick of daylight.”
She looked at him for the first time since they’d arrived at the shore. “You never saw me in the Marilyn dress, Zeke did.”
“I never told you I saw you in that dress. I never told you I was your Mr. Anonymous.”
She stumbled backwards in her haste to move. He snatched her arm to stop her falling, and she wrenched it out of his grip and pulled her feet free of the sand.
“You bastard. You set me up. It was a test. For what? To see if I could shill for you, to be your party favor.”
“Yes.” The truth was ugly, but it was all he had.
There was a long silence, broken only by the sound of waves rhythmically hitting the shore to the distant backbeat of the DJ’s tunes.
“Now I understand.”
“You wanted this as much as I did, and you had the skill to make it happen. That’s what I was testing. It would’ve been appallingly unfair to you otherwise.”
“At least you had the decency not to fuck me.” She broke off and left his side to walk along the shore on the hard-packed damp sand.
Now she understood that, too. He let her get ahead and then followed. All his abilities to manipulate the truth dissolved in the face of her anger and loathing. When she stopped, he did, too, but he allowed the distance between them to remain.
She spun to face him, hands thrown out in front. “I’ll never be anything but a tool for you. Your disposable fake wife.”
He pushed a hand into his hair. If he could yank out a handful, he would. He needed to do something with the things he was feeling, and he couldn’t shout, or he’d spook her further.
“I’ve been trying to tell myself that’s all you are since we began. I don’t think of you that way. I tried, but it’s better for you not to get too close to me, to have deniability.”
“You love to talk in riddles. I can’t listen to you anymore.” She took off again, her feet squeaking in the sand.
“We were meant to use each other.” His voice carried easily, and it stopped her. “It was meant to be simple to cut you loose.” He’d caught up with her by the time he said, “It’s not fucking easy. I would keep you forever if I could, if only to hear you laugh, see the pleasure you take out of working your favor with a purse or an earring or a tilt of your head. Watch your confidence grow, expand until you shone with it.” He said all that to her back, but now she turned to face him. “You already shine with it. You underestimated yourself. I never did.”
She took a step backwards, shaking her head, wrapping her arms around herself. “What does all this mean?”