“We’re gonna have so much fun tonight!” Sydney, one of the bridesmaids, screeches from behind me as we make our way into the lavish casino. “Do any of us even know how to, like,playcards, though?”
“Who cares,” Rachel, another bridesmaid, replies before cackling. “It’s an excuse to watch hot guys in tuxes lose a bunch of money!”
They rush past me in a fit of laughter, nearly toppling over as they attempt to move around the man who was briefly in front of me on the bus.
“Shit, sorry!” Sydney blurts, grabbing at his arm as she stumbles.
The man turns, his hand going to her elbow and holding firm. “You’re all right,” he says, and I swear I catch a hint of an English accent. It’s unsurprising, considering the groom grew up in London and most of his groomsmen are his childhood friends or Premier League footballers. “Careful, though, yeah? Don’t think Ron and Janelle want anyone to end up in hospital tonight.”
The accent is obvious now, even over the din of trilling slot machines, and the phrasing of his sentence confirms it. But it’s his expression that really drives it home. He’s smiling in that stereotypical tight-lipped white British way that looks closer to a grimace than an expression of joy. It’s polite and deferential but somehow patronizing at the same time. He’d make a great member of parliament with a smile like that.
But speaking of lips…the man’s got nice ones, the kind where there’s actually something to kiss, and I can tell he knows what lip balm is. Not that I’m—not that I’m thinking aboutkissinghim. Patronizing men who look too good in tuxes aren’t my type. At least, they shouldn’t be, because that’s exactly who fucked up my entire life.
But I can’t deny that this one’s handsome.
Under the warm casino lights, his hair is a deep shade of chestnut. A wavy lock of it, perfectly disheveled, sweeps across his forehead, though I have no doubt he styled it that way with some sort of expensive pomade. His eyes, a piercing blue, are framed by thick lashes, the kind I’d be jealous of if I didn’t have the best lash tech in the world on speed dial. And while his skin can probably verge on Snow White levels of paleness, he has just enough of a golden undertone that I’m sure he spent the summer letting the sun beat down on him.
If all of that wasn’t enough, his features are so perfectly chiseled it’s like some classical sculptor birthed him from a slabof marble. Straight nose, high cheekbones, ungodly sharp jaw. He looks…regal. The man might as well be out of a fairy tale.
I keep staring as the women titter and giggle and bat their lashes some more. I can’t blame them. If I had the opportunity to get that close to him, I might be doing the same. The old Stella—back when I was single, wild, and carefree—wouldn’t have missed a beat. But the current version…
“God, they’re embarrassing.”
I glance to my right to find Daphne beside me, sneering at the same scene I’m looking at. Except her focus is on the two women pawing at Prince Charming, not the man himself.
“Rachel and Sydney can never keep it in their pants,” she complains, shaking her head like she’s witnessing a true shame. “That man better be ready to get mauled.”
I won’t fault a woman for her desire to maul a man—been there, done that—so I don’t deign to answer Daphne’s chiding. Ido, however, let my gaze linger on him. No harm in admiring a little eye candy.
One thing about no longer being in a relationship is that I can look at whoever the hell I want whenever I want. I’m a single woman for the first time in five years. I’mfree. It’s just a shame thatfreemeans I want to break down about every ten minutes.
As determined as I am to move on, I’m still mourning the loss of my relationship and the life we built together, and I know I will be for a while. But I also know that this could have been so much worse if I’d been just a little more in love with him.
That’s not to say I didn’t love Étienne. God, far from it. But over the past year, our relationship had been…strained. I blamed it on wedding planning and being busy with work, the typical things that could tax a couple, but something else wasgoing on. I ignored it at the time, blamed his emotional distance on everything in the book other than him losing interest in me. But in the end, that’s what it came down to.
I just don’t want to be with you anymore, Stella.
I really should have seen it coming. We hadn’t had sex in four months. Every kiss was barely a peck. Once he even pulled his hand away when I tried to hold it, making the excuse that he was just shocked by how cold my fingers were. It would have been a perfect moment to grab my hand and warm it between his palms, maybe even press a kiss to my freezing knuckles. But no. He’d just shoved his hands into his pockets and let me trail behind him as we walked on. I should have known we were doomed. I just wish I’d opened my eyes to it sooner.
They’re open now, though, and they’re staring straight at a man who I wouldn’t have looked twice at a couple of weeks ago.
“I’m so glad you’re not like them,” Daphne says, pulling me out of my thoughts. There’s a saccharine note to her words that I do not like. “You’ve been so graceful and dignified throughout all of…you know. You could have been out in the streets, doing the absolute most to make up for those years you lost to Étienne, but you’re not. Those two could really learn something from you instead of acting like nasty little sluts.”
I nearly trip at the insult, my heel catching on some invisible bump in the carpet, but I manage to keep my footing. “Excuse me?”
Daphne waves a hand, brushing off her awful comment. “I know it’s crude, but women like that are truly a breed of their own. I have no respect for them.”
“Are you saying you wouldn’t respect me if I’d done that?” I challenge, unable to resist cupping that little spark of anger and fanning the flame. If I have to give Daphne credit foranything, this is the first time I’ve felt more than bone-crushing despair or numbness since my wedding day.
“Of course not,” she scolds, looping her arm through mine and pulling me close. “But I might have viewed you a little differently. Besides, you never would have. That’s so out of character for you.”
“Oh, really?” We may be family, but it’s clear she doesn’t know me. Or maybe she’s just forgotten what I was like before an intense career and a crumbling relationship slowly sapped away my energy and personality.
She seems to think I’ve beengracefulanddignifiedafter having my entire life blown up. Last I checked those weren’t synonyms forgrievinganddepressed. If she’s under the impression that any of that is who I really am, then she’s sorely mistaken.
“Yeah,” Daphne confirms, giving my arm a little squeeze that makes me want to punch her in return. “It’s just not you, Stella.”
Something snaps in my chest, opening the floodgates of every emotion I’ve kept locked away and refused to feel lately. Who the hell is she to tell me who I am? How could she possibly know me better than I know myself? And why does she think she has the right to judge how I or anyone else lives their life? It’s not like it affects hers.
