AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“No,” she answered, “but it’s awfully easy to do these days.”
With a sigh, he took a step back from her. “I’m going to find Julia.”
“Oh, don’t bother,” Lydia answered, refusing to let go of his hand, “I’m sure she’s found a replacement already. Your son is always waiting in the wings. And then there’s Luke. He is quite enamored with her.”
“And you were only too happy to bring him here, weren’t you?”
Lydia batted her eyelashes. “I have always been a sucker for love. And wow, does he love her! To hear him talk about her, you’d think she was some sort of angel descended from heaven.”
“You wouldn’t know what love was if Cupid beat you over the head with his bow.”
They spun on the floor, shifting to a new view. “Oh, I don’t know. I think I do know what it is. In fact, I think I’m looking at it right now.”
He held back rolling his eyes as he followed her gaze. His heart skipped a beat when he spotted Julia and Luke together. She stared up at him, her gaze soft.
A knot formed in his stomach. She looked so comfortable and easy as she spoke to him. A pang of jealousy laced with a sense of loss tightened his chest.
His muscles tensed reflexively as he considered storming across the room and throwing the man onto a table.
“Uh oh, I’ve struck a nerve. I really need to stop calling your attention to your wife’s straying eye.” She patted his shoulder as she stepped around him. Her hand slid down his arm, a smirk on her lips. “Enjoy the night while you can, Grant. Things are about to get much more interesting.
Her cryptic message coupled with Luke’s presence hovering over his wife left a chill in the air. The words, a harbinger of the turmoil Lydia brought wherever she went, made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. What was his ex-wife about to unleash?
CHAPTER 22
JULIA
Julia’s pulse quickened as she left Grant behind with Lydia. She knew the dance wouldn’t be Lydia’s big request of her, but she couldn’t shake the ominous feeling that something was about to happen.
At least they’d been able to remove Lydia’s leverage. The pictures of Sierra had kept them dancing to her tune for far too long. But now…
Before her mind finished the statement, warm fingers grabbed her wrist. She snapped her gaze up to the owner, heat washing over her.
“Luke,” she said.
“Hi, Julia,” he said with a smile. “You look…incredible.”
She glanced down at her dress before she flicked her gaze up to him. “Thank you. I’m guessing you are Lydia’s plus one?”
“I am, yes. I’m…sorry if that’s a problem for you, but…I guess I don’t have the history with her that your husband does.”
She shook her head, not wanting to discuss it but needing to warn him again. “No, you don’t. Nor the history I have with her. If you did, you wouldn’t be so nonchalant about this.”
“Your history with her? I assume most of that comes from the fact that you’re married to her ex-husband and she doesn’t know that’s fake.”
“Shh,” Julia said as she pressed closer to him. “Don’t say that out loud.”
He pressed his lips together, breathing out a sigh through flared nostrils. “I’m sorry, Julia. But soon, this won’t matter, right?”
Her heart ached at the words as he forced her to face the decision ahead of her.
“I’m sorry,” Luke said. “I…want to talk about this, but…whenever you’re ready.”
She offered him a slight smile as he squeezed her hands.
“Everything okay here, Julia?” Kyle asked as he sidled up to them.
“Yes, thank you, Kyle,” she said with a nod.
