Page 50 of Wild Promise

As I finished to their smiles of approval, the feeling in my gut was unmistakable. I’d impressed them. The only question now was how much.

“Well, Melina.” Lydia beamed. “That may be the best event plan I’ve ever seen.” My heart accelerated as she turned to Wyatt with what seemed to be a silent question before continuing. “As you know, I’ll be leaving at the end of this season. Wyatt and I have already discussed my replacement. I think it’s safe to say, based on everything you’ve already shown us, we’d like you to have the job.”

“That’s informal,” Wyatt interrupted, making the offer clear. Not that my heart understood or even cared. “We can’t put it in writing until this event is a completed success, but we have great confidence in your ability to make that happen.”

“Thank you,” I gushed, barely able to hide my enthusiasm.

“It’s well deserved,” Lydia said. “Now go make that party sparkle!”

I practically floated back to my own office, feeling like nothing could knock me down. For once in my life, it felt like my hard work and dedication were paying off. Everything seemed to be coming together. Even the parts I hadn’t expected. Like Zane.

Especially him.

“I’m surprised he stuck around long enough to drive you to work in the morning,” Becky sneered the moment I walked through our office door.

Smiling, I replied, “I have no idea what you mean.” Then I turned my back on her to stow my files in the one locked drawer I’d newly reserved for myself. I didn’t need to be taught the same lesson twice.

“Are you really so sad and naïve, or is it just an act you thought would lure him?”

Now the bitch had my attention. I whirled on her, my mask of professional indifference falling away. “You don’t get to judge. You know nothing about me.”

“Maybe not.” Her smile spread wide, and there was nothing fake about it this time. This was the real Becky—cruel, calculated, and enjoying every second. “But I know Zane extremely well. And I know he only asked you out because he made a bet with his friends.”

The implication of her words hit me hard, knocking the wind out me and deflating my earlier confidence.

She knew Zane. Extremely well.

Did that mean what I thought it meant? And more importantly…was it true?

“A bet, Melina,” she cackled, finally showing her true mean-girl colors in full. “Don’t you get it? You’re nothing to him but another notch on his bedpost.”

Nothing she said was sinking in. It didn’t feel right. It didn’t feel real. None of it meshed with the Zane I knew. The man who’d held me on his porch, sang to me on the ice, driven across town at dawn just because Nate told him I needed help.

But doubt tried to creep in, regardless. “If that’s true, then he’s already lost the bet.”

Her brows drew together in confusion, but for the first time in forever, she didn’t have a snappy comeback.

“We haven’t slept together. But maybe when he picks me up tonight, I can ask him if my act is working. What was it you called it? Sad and naïve?”

The stark red of her hair and lips made her look suddenly paler.

“But you know, it’s funny,” I continued, tapping my finger on my lips in mock ignorance. “I didn’t feel too sad or innocent when I came on his hand this morning. I guess I’ll just have to check how I feel when his head’s between my legs later tonight, like he promised.”

“You think you’re so smart,” she hissed, her eyes narrow and teeth bared. “Just because he wants to fuck you, doesn’t make you special.”

She left me in a flurry of flowing hair and clacking shoes, my bravado sliding back down my throat the second she was gone. Even though I couldn’t trust a word that came out of her mouth, I still felt like shit.

Everything I’d told her—all the beautiful, intimate details of what had happened between me and Zane—now seemed tarnished and cheap. I’d taken the most private, tender parts of whatever we were building and weaponized them against her. Used his reputation as ammunition, thrown his words back out into the world like they meant nothing.

But they meant everything.

And standing alone in that office, the adrenaline draining out of me, it felt like Zane was the one I’d cut down.

Chapter Eighteen

Zane

“It’s not going to be cheap,” Reid, my car guy, confirmed. “You’d probably be better off just buying her a new car.”