“Hawaii. I need to kill someone.”
“Sit.” She grabbed his jacket and pulled down. He sat.
“He was married and didn’t tell you?” Oscar sounded horrified. Dillon looked too angry to speak.
“For two years,” she said. “Two years we dated. Maybe one year total if you count all those trips he took to LA. He worked in the Oahu and California offices. I thought it was just work stuff taking him back and forth. He’s a VP of Operations so it made sense.”
“Is that allowed? VPs and marketing managers dating?” Oscar asked. It was a fair question.
“Not technically, but we didn’t work together. I have my own boss and didn’t answer to Ben for anything. We justified it that way. I didn’t think for one second he had a wife back in LA. Until I went to surprise him on the way here. It was bad.”
“I can’t even imagine.” Oscar shook his head. “I’m sorry. Truly.”
“Thank you. I appreciate that.” She smiled at her brother’s future husband and knew Dillon had found one of the good ones. “But that’s why I can’t take the job. I can’t quit now. If I quit, Ben wins. He gets to keep his job and keep his secret and keep doing what he’s been doing. At least if I’m there, I can make sure it doesn’t happen to someone else. All I have to do is mention ‘Ben’s wife’ at a staff meeting one day and everyone will know.”
“Sweet, sweet revenge,” Dillon said. Joey rolled her eyes.
“This isn’t revenge. He did something horrible to me, and I refuse to walk away and let him win.”
“I understand the feeling, Joey,” Oscar said, “but you know you can’t police the man for the rest of his life. Eventually he’ll get another job or you will and he’ll lie to as many women as he wants, and there’s nothing you can do about it.”
“I know. I know.” She raised her hands. “But you know Ben is at home right now hoping and praying I’m mad enough to quit work. That’s his dream. He knows I can make his life hell when I go back to work. Quitting would be playing into his hands. It’s exactly what he would want. I can’t give him what he wants, not after what he did to me. And his wife, too. God, that poor woman. I hope she strangles him.”
“If she won’t, I will,” Dillon said.
“No, you won’t. You’re getting married and you can’t get married in jail,” Joey reminded him. “You’re going to focus on Oscar, on the wedding, on finding me the perfect birthday present to make up for you two stealing my birthday. My favorite color is red. My shoe size is seven. My ring size is six and a half and diamonds are a girl’s best friend, but emeralds and sapphires are also on very good terms with most women. And that is that. No more talk of Ben or Chris or me. Tell me about the wedding. That’s an order.”
* * *
AFTER DINNER, SHE kissed both Dillon and Oscar goodbye and
headed back to her Lost Lake cabin with one-quarter of a gluten-free brownie tucked in her purse. She’d save that for later. Later was most likely “as soon as she got back in the cabin.” Her self-control was dubious at best and nonexistent where gorgeous men and chocolate desserts were concerned. She’d even tried to combine them once and quickly discovered she wasn’t the sort of person who liked to mix her pleasures. Licking chocolate fudge off an erect penis made the fudge taste weird and the penis unfuckable until after a long shower. Lesson learned. She wouldn’t try that with Chris. She loved the way he tasted. Not even chocolate could make that man any more delicious than he already was.
Joey found herself grinning as she unlocked the cabin and went inside. Four days past a breakup and already grinning like a fool in lust. Maybe she could talk Chris into coming down to her cabin for a nightcap. Of course the drive was pretty long—about an hour between the lake and Timber Ridge. And it was late. Late-ish, anyway. Ten-ten. By the time he came down to the cabin it would be eleven-thirty probably. Then they’d talk awhile, and fuck awhile, and talk some more. That would take at least an hour and a half. By the time they were done it would be, oh, one in the morning? That was definitely too late for him to drive all the way back to the lodge. He might as well stay the night.
Now that Joey had planned Chris’s entire night for him, she decided she should probably tell him the plan. Once she finished her brownie. While snacking at the kitchen bar, she dug in her purse for her phone. One missed call from Kira. One missed text from Kira. Is the plan working? Are you over Ben yet? If not, stay under Chris. These things take time. One missed text from Chris. Feel free to make me miss lunch tomorrow, too.
Joey sent Chris a quick text in reply. If you haven’t had dinner yet, you can come down to the cabin and skip that meal with me, too.
Who needs food? he quickly wrote back. Be there soon.
She grinned at the text. At least he wasn’t angry at her for telling him no to the job offer. First time in her life she’d been offered a job while standing naked in a shower. If Chris’s naked body couldn’t convince her to take the job, nothing on earth would. Although she had been tempted. Of course she had. Coming back here for the wedding had been like coming home. She’d forgotten how much she missed this part of the world—the mountain, the rain that kept everything so lush and green even in fall and winter, the cottonwood trees turning as yellow as the sun this time of year, the scent of pine and fir, and her family, of course. Dillon in Portland. Mom and Dad only two and a half hours away in Tacoma. And the work would be fun, too. Marketing for a brand-new company just getting off the ground was a dream challenge. Not that it would be hard to convince people to come to Mount Hood and stay at Lost Lake. As soon as they saw the pictures of the area, they’d fall in love, madly in love. They would come here and never want to leave.
She knew how they felt.
And yet...she couldn’t stay. Well, she could. But she wouldn’t stay. She loved her job at Oahu Air, and she loved Honolulu, and she loved the work she did, and she did not want Ben to think for one single, solitary second that he was home free. If she quit her job, he won. After what he did to her and his wife, he didn’t deserve to win. Kira was right, too. No way should she make a major life change so soon after a big breakup. If she took the job now, she’d be taking it for all the wrong reasons.
So that was that. She’d made up her mind. Might as well enjoy her time here while it lasted. She needed to store up as many good memories as she could to help her cope through the next few months of working with Ben. What would that mess be like? Would he ignore her? Would he try to win her back? Would he lie to her about what she saw? Would he beg her not to tell anyone? Would he find another woman at work to sleep with during his two weeks a month he spent in Hawaii? She could torture him a little, threaten to tell HR about them. Yes, she’d get fired but so would he. Almost worth it. Almost...
If only she could stop thinking about Ben. She didn’t even miss him. She might have had it been a normal breakup where they decided their schedules were too incompatible or their goals in life too different. If the problem was that he wanted kids and she didn’t it would be one thing, but this wasn’t a normal breakup. The lying, the cheating... It ate at her. Staying busy kept her from dwelling on it too much, but as soon as she was alone again and had a split second to think, the anger came back to her again, hitting her like a slap in the face or a glass of ice water down the back of her shirt. A horrible feeling, sobering, simmering. She didn’t want to feel this way. Not during this brief period she was back home with her family for such a happy occasion. Maybe if she called Ben and yelled at him she could get it out of her system. But she didn’t want him to know he’d gotten to her this badly. Kira said to ignore him, let him go, pretend he meant nothing to her, and that would be the best of all revenges.
Kira was probably right about that, too. As much as Joey didn’t want to let Ben off without at least verbally excoriating him, she knew that ultimately it didn’t matter. The satisfaction of telling him off would be short-lived, and when it was all over and done with, she’d still have to get on with her life. Maybe if she skipped the dealing-with-Ben thing and headed straight into focusing on her own happiness, she’d find it a little faster.
Joey smiled as she heard the sound of a diesel engine pickup truck rambling down the gravel road toward the cabin. She never associated diesel engines with great sex before, but now that she’d started sleeping with Chris, they would be forever linked in her mind.
As she headed to the front door to unlock it, she heard her phone vibrate on the walnut coffee table. It was a very loud wood. She picked up her phone and nearly answered on sheer instinct.
The call was from Ben.