With Every Heartbeat (Forbidden Men 4)

I felt doubly betrayed.

Just then, the server, wearing a huge smile, approached our table. “I hope you guys have a big appetite tonight.”

The blood drained from my face. Life could not possibly get any more humiliating than it was in this second. Actually it could, because I was half a second away from puking my misery all over the floor.

But Zoey plowed into the server, sending the bucket full of crabs flying everywhere. I watched in a daze as she apologized to the waiter as if she totally hadn’t meant to tackle him.

“I should’ve watched where I was going,” she said as she crawled through butter sauce and crabs and shrimp until she curled her fingers around something she picked up and cradled to her chest. When she looked up, her eyes met mine.

I saw pity, and I couldn’t handle it. I whirled away and stalked from the restaurant.

“Quinn, wait.” Cora raced after me. She grabbed my arm and whirled me around.

“What was that? Was that a ring she picked up? Are you going to propose to me?”

Her eyes lit with a smile, but I snorted. “No.” Hell, no! “Because I never want to see you again. It’s over, Cora.”

This time, she didn’t go after me when I stormed away, and I wouldn’t have let her stop me if she’d tried.

Cora was a sobbing mess. It was hard to understand anything she was saying. I still wasn’t sure what had just happened between her and Quinn, but he’d been so upset, more upset than I’d ever seen him before.

Through all Cora’s tears, I finally understood that he’d seen something on her phone he was never supposed to see. So I grabbed he

r phone, and then I saw something I never wanted to see.

“Oh my God, Cora. You…you’re cheating on Quinn? Quinn?” I stared at her, wondering when she’d lost her freaking mind. “How…how…how could you?”

“I love him, Zoey. I swear I do. Quinn is the best boyfriend I’ve ever had. I don’t want to lose him. What do I do?”

“How about not having sex with other men?” That’d be a good start.

She huffed out a sound of irritation. “Those were just flings. Quinn’s the real deal. No one’s ever been as good to me as he is. I really do want to marry him. But I like sex. What’s so wrong with that?”

“Oh my God, Cora. You can’t have your cake and eat it too. Marriage means monogamy. And you...you just lost the best thing that’s ever happened to you.”

I turned away and left her in Jenny’s Crab Shack too, with Quinn’s engagement ring a little buttery but tucked safely in my pocket.

I cried a little bit, wandered around town a lot, refused to return to my apartment where Cora was. About an hour after everything fell apart, Caroline called, frantic.

“Oren just showed up here with a black eye and really upset, mumbling something to Noel about how Quinn will never forgive him for what he did. What the heck happened?”

“I don’t…I don’t know. I’m not sure. Cora cheated on Quinn, and they broke up.”

“What? Cora cheated—Wait. Oren wouldn’t possibly be stupid enough to...not with Cora? Would he?”

“I don’t think so.” I shook my head. “No, the texts I read weren’t from him. She definitely cheated with someone else.” Or maybe a couple someone elses from the sounds of it.

“That lying fucking whore. I mean...I’m sorry. I know she’s your—”

“She is not my friend,” I snapped. “Not right now. She lied to me too. I had no idea.” I’d helped Quinn buy her a ring. I’d...Quinn probably thought I knew about this. He probably thought I’d purposely led him on a merry goose chase. “I’m sorry, I have to go.”

I hung up on Caroline and raced toward Quinn’s apartment.

When I stormed through the front door of my apartment, Ten was slouched on the sofa, eating from a bag of potato chips and drinking a beer as he watched television.

I slammed the door behind me and began to pace the front room.

“I’m sensing turmoil,” he said mildly.