Page 92 of Keep Me
Chapter 20
“I’m looking forward to meeting your father,” Britt said as I pulled up to the quiet restaurant. She placed a tentative hand on my thigh, but I didn’t acknowledge it. Instead, I peered out the window, looking around for my father’s truck. He’d flown out to see me, so I knew it wasn’t in the parking lot, but better to search for a nonexistent truck than face my wife who was intent on divorcing me.
“Is everything okay?”
No. Everything was not okay. It hadn’t been since the minute I left her hotel room in Vegas, and I couldn’t pretend it was anymore.
I swept my gaze to hers, taking in her tight black dress and pouty red lips. She’d dressed up tonight, and in any other context, it would feel like a first date. Oh, how wishful my little heart was. Her concerned brows and darkened eyes only served to remind me that was never going to happen.
Britt and I were apparently the epitome of the right person, the wrong time. We were supposed to be together. I could feel itin my bones, but after everything we’d been through, I knew it wasn’t a possibility anymore.
There was no way around it. The love of my life didn’t want me. It wasn’t some huge misunderstanding. Britt just didn’t want me. Erik only proved that point when he came over and apologized at the Players’ Ball. Apparently, she’d faked an entire relationship with him, and I could only assume that was because I wasn’t taking the hint.
“You’ve been a little quiet,” she whispered, trying to coax an answer out of me.
Typical Britt. Concerned about my well-being even though I was just her friend. Always so polite.
She wet her bottom lip and stopped herself from saying something. I ignored the yearning in my chest to kiss away her anxiety because she wasn’t mine. She was hell-bent on believing that I cared for Olana more than her, and I got it. I’d never fully cut it off. Even now I felt an obligation to help my ex, but that didn’t negate the way I felt about Britt. Not that she wanted to hear about it anymore.
I had to face it.
I’d lost her.
Not just as my wife but as my best friend.
“Matty?”
“I’m good,” I sighed out, gently pushing her hand off me because my dick was unfortunately getting involved in all this heightened emotion. I swore she could just look at me and my cock would spring to attention.
“You sure? Because you’ve been acting a little off.”
“Just got a lot of things on my mind.” Not only was I having to deal with the reality that she didn’t want me, but I was having to deal with it under the backdrop of her meeting my father. The man who hated me and told me whenever he could what an abject failure I was.
What would she think when she met him? Would that solidify everything she thought about me? That I wasn’t worth it. That I was a loser who couldn’t keep his family together and spent too much time focusing on my ex?
This was a fucking nightmare. I remembered all the things she said in Vegas. The excitement that glinted in her eyes at the thought of being married to me. Was that all a lie?
“Dinner should be nice,” she said, and it soured my mood. Britt was too polite for her own good. She knew she was walking into the viper’s den, and she was still willing to do it because she wanted to divorce me that badly.
“Don’t say that. It’s a lie.”
“It’s not. You and your dad may not be close, but having dinner with the man who had a part in bringing my best friend into the world sounds pretty awesome.”
Best friend… Did she have to keep pointing it out? Best friend. Not her husband. Not her partner. Not even her fucking boyfriend. I’d been friend zoned so hard that the metaphorical punch in the stomach made me want to vomit.
Britt was mine for only a second, and it was a fact I would have to face sooner or later.
Without a word, she slipped her hand in mine, interlocking our fingers. “Everything’s going to be okay.” Those were the words I’d been saying in my head for the last few hours. My mouth was dry as I looked her in the eyes, and the realization hit me like a sledgehammer. Everything would not be fucking okay. The only reason my dream girl was touching me and in my presence was because she didn’t want me.
Not only that. She was about to have dinner with my father and see the shitshow that my mom left behind. It wasn’t all daisies before she passed, but my mother made things tolerable. She made my dad happy and left behind a bitter drunk when she died.
This entire situation was fucked.
“I’m here for you.”
Her smile.
Damn. It made my heart stop every single time. All I saw when she did that was a future I’d been hoping for. One I could never have because timing was never on our side.
