I don’t think there’s any bad blood between Emma and me. At least not on my end, there isn’t. But my friends, including Heston, couldn’t stand her when we dated. So it’s weird that he brings her up.
“Fine, I guess,” he shrugs. “It was awkward as hell, though. She’s still dating Spencer. And she demanded I tell you that I saw her with him.”
Ah, so she’s showboating him around town now. Spencer Chase is a little bitch. Not to mention he’s also Savannah’s brother. We do not get along in the slightest.
When Emma liked me, he liked Emma. I had the girl that he wanted, and he hated me for that, which he made abundantly clear whenever I was with her. It was annoying as hell.
In the time that Emma and I were together, Spencer did nothing but sit in his posh air-conditioned office in the city just thinking of all the ways he could piss me off. Well that, and making more money than he knows what to do with. We couldn’t be any more different.
Now I’m hard up for his sister who hates me, and I’ve become the shining star of my own little backwoods soap opera. Yee-fucking-haw.
I raised my white flag in his little pissing match pretty quickly, though. Breaking things off with Emma got him off my back until recently, when I asked Savannah on a date having no idea they were siblings.
“Is it bad that I’m kind of hoping for them to work out so that Emma moves to the city with him and they both stay the hell out of Westridge?” I chuckle.
It sounds bad, wishing someone would leave town. I get the feeling that she’s using Spencer to try and make me jealous. If she’s going out of her way to show him off to Heston, who she knows would rather dig a well by hand than participate in small-town drama, then it confirms that she’s willing to try anything to get my attention.
Heston just shakes his head with the tiniest of smirks.
“Nah,” he says under his breath before another drink of his beer. “She’s certifiable. Wouldn’t want her around either if I was you.”
“Did you say anything to her?”
“Nope. Walked away.”
I laugh as I picture Emma trying to show off her rich boyfriend only to be met with Heston’s unimpressed glare. Against my better judgment, I ask the question on the tip of my tongue.
“Was Savannah there with them?”
With a knowing quirk of his eyebrow, he shakes his head.
My phone vibrates on the arm of the chair as the screen lights up with an incoming call. Heston takes that as his cue to leave. What Heston doesn’t make clear with words, he does with his actions. He knows Spencer and I have been at each other’s throats in the past—and that Emma can get a little over the top. His bringing them up was a heads-up that Spencer is in town and Emma is clearly trying to use him to stir up some envy on my end.
Once Heston is back inside, I lift the phone and read the unfamiliar caller ID number. It’s local, but not in my contacts. Not wanting to miss a call that could pertain to my business, I slide my thumb across the bottom of the screen and answer in my most professional voice.
“This is Warren.”
My brows instantly pull together when an automated robot speaks back to me.
“This is a collect call from an inmate,” there’s a short pause while it switches to a recorded voice, “Savannah Chase.”
I jump up from my seat.
Inmate? Savannah? I twist my face and fight the urge to laugh at first. She’s got to be pulling some kind of prank on me. I wouldn’t be surprised, considering we just had the world’s worst first date. One that I never even got to explain myself for.
If she’s really in jail I highly doubt she’d call me, anyway.
The look of disgust on her face flashes through my mind, and for the millionth time, I mull over the disastrous dinner we had.Trying to bring back my focus, I rub the pinch in my forehead away.
“Do you accept the charges?” the automated voice chimes in again.
I hesitate for a moment until the same message plays a second time and warns me that if there is no response, the call will be terminated.
“Yes,” I answer while scratching my head and trying to predict what sort of trouble Savannah might have gotten herself into if this call is legit. There’s a short pause followed by a click on the line.
“Warren?”
Her voice is only slightly less irritated than the last time it graced my ears. I swallow hard and close my eyes long enough to fight off the urge to pace around the patio like a nervous madman.
