The Wedding Date Disaster (Harbor City 4)

Of course his brother would think that. He was the fun Holt twin, the funny one, the nice one. It had been that way since they were kids. Why? Because Will cleaned up the ugly so Web didn’t have to see it. This time the only way to make that happen was to pull back the curtain.

“Dammit, Web,” Will said, his frustration peaking and making his voice louder than he meant in the plane’s crowded interior, gaining him some curious looks from the other passengers. Letting out a deep breath, Will lowered his volume. “She’s just in it for the money. Whatever she told you about loving you and whatever she promised, it was a lie. She’s a damn gold digger.”

“Hadley Donavan?” his brother said, disbelief and amusement still thick in his tone even if he wasn’t outright laughing. “One of my best friends, Hadley?”

Will gritted his teeth, willing himself not to yell again. “Yes.”

“One, she’s not a gold digger and two, I didn’t give her any money,” Web said.

“Thank God.” The tight pain in his chest remained, but some

of the agony twisting his gut relented a bit. “If it’s just a promise, she doesn’t have a legal leg to stand on.”

“You know who you sound like right now?”

“The brother who just saved you from a gold digger?” The words left a foul taste in his mouth.

“Our grandmother.”

Of all the things Web could have said to him, nothing would have hit home as hard as that comparison. “Bullshit.”

Web scoffed. “You’re obsessed with two things right now: our family money and being right. That sure sounds like Grandma to me. Of course, you’re obsessed with Hadley, too.”

“I was watching out for you.” The roiling in his gut rushed back, worse than before, making his palms sweaty and his chest ache. It was as if his body were revolting, calling him out for being so far off the mark—but he wasn’t. “She’s good. She almost fooled me.”

“No, the asshole who fooled you was you,” Web said. “Hadley and I are friends, just friends. I’ve tried loaning Hadley money so she could leave that job where they treated her like shit and finally start her company. She turned me down every time. My guess is that if she has the money now, it’s because it came from her family. Did you even bother to ask her where it came from, or did you just make an assumption?”

The mental image of Hadley in the cabin flashed in his mind. The way her eyes had gone wide as she flinched back as if his words had struck her. He’d taken it as a sign of guilt, the shock of being caught. What if…

Ignoring the doubt creeping in like Lightning through an open window, Will refused to consider any alternative. “She would have told me.”

“Why? Did you give her the chance, or did you walk in assuming you were right?”

Before he could answer, the flight attendant’s voice came over the plane’s speakers. “We have closed the cabin door. All cell phones must be turned off or put in airplane mode.”

“I gotta go,” he said, glad for once to be flying commercial so he couldn’t continue to use his phone.

“We’ll finish this when you land.”

Yeah, that wasn’t going to happen. He knew the truth. He’d known it since the first time he’d seen Hadley; he’d just let himself get distracted. Will hung up and watched out the window as the plane taxied away from the gate.

He was right. Hadley was a gold digger—just like Mia. She was just subtler, so much so that if he hadn’t known what signs to watch out for, he would have missed them.

Or maybe you were just looking too hard.

Will shoved the errant thought out of his head. No. He was right. He was always right. Hadley was only after the money, no matter how well she’d hid it with denials and smiles and sweet sighs.

You know what assuming does, Mr. Right? It makes an ass out of you and me.

No. Not in this case. Not with Hadley. He’d— Oh, fuck it.

He dialed her number when the flight attendant stopped by his seat. “Sir, please put your phone away.”

“It’ll be quick.” He just needed to hear her voice one last time to quiet the doubts that were starting to scream in his ear.

The phone didn’t even ring a full time before going straight to voicemail. As Hadley’s voice told him to leave a message, he put the pieces together. She’d blocked him.

“Sir,” the flight attendant glared at him. “Do not make me ask the pilot to turn the plane around so law enforcement can have a chat with you.”