Page 41 of The Logic of Loyalty

She blinks at me.

“I didn’t get anything from you. Never. I would have answered your calls. I would have—have been there for you. Nothing could have kept me away.”

She … says nothing.

I gulp and rub the back of my neck, searching for the right thing to say, to explain what happened. Paige’s face, blank now, is suddenly replaced with a vision of her, only hours ago. Her small frame curved into itself, the wrapper crumbling in her fist, the biggest part of this clusterfuck—this perceived betrayal. The adultery my wife believes I committed the very same night she waited to share the news about the life we made.

“At the party, Bobby said something to me about Krista, and it hit all sorts of warning bells, and Bethany … She heard him.” A small sound of pain comes from Paige. Of course it’s the idea of someone else suffering that makes her finally react. “I wanted to dismiss it as drunken idiocy, but there were too many things that happened over the week since you brought it to my attention. Then I saw them together—Bobby and Krista.”

The memory comes back to me all at once. That stupid night full of all the wrong decisions. Looking at the face of my lovely, disbelieving wife, I sigh, and I tell her everything.

Chapter Fifteen

TREVOR

Fourth of July

“That is so bad! Your girlfriend is right there.” Running feet and a familiar voice cut into my peaceful silence as I sit in the living room.

“Not as bad as you. Come here.” There’s rustling and a sigh, and I finally recognize who’s speaking. Shit. You have to be kidding me right now.

I sit up and look in the kitchen, and sure enough, Krista and Bobby are in each other’s space.

“No, no. I told you already. I need a ride to the concert. You can give me a ride, and⁠—”

“Do I have any benefits for this ride?”

“What, like a payment?”

“You know⁠—”

“Hey, y’all.” I hop up and walk to where they stand behind the island, and Bobby backs away, running his hand through his hair, like that will do anything.

“Trevor, nice house. Krista was asking for a ride⁠—”

“I think you should probably leave, don’t you?”

Bobby opens his mouth, then closes it, eyeing her. “Yeah. I’m going to go find Bethany.” He leaves as quickly as they arrived.

“Hmm.”

Krista’s face falls, but then her focus zeroes in on me. “So what about you? Will you take me since you scared away my other prospect?”

Hell no. I shake my head, my refusal on my lips when she frowns, her shoulders dropping.

“It would mean a lot to me, and I thought a lot about what you said about my safety the other night.”

Krista waits for my answer, and the voice of my mother echoes in my mind. “Krista is going to your party, and if you and that wife of yours make her feel anything other than welcome, there will be consequences.”

I know exactly what kind of consequences she’s talking about, so what constitutes feeling welcome?

I scan our yard, looking for the person I always scan for, but Paige is nowhere to be found. Instead, I can see Becky, Carter, and even Bethany and Josh. They’re all chatting together by the food while Carter steals grapes and feeds them to Becky and himself.

“Trevor? Will you?”

Bobby crosses the grassy lawn to stand next to Bethany and throws his arm around her waist. Somehow, he looks less cozy out there with his girlfriend than he looked in here with his girlfriend’s best friend. Dammit, what am I supposed to do?

“Why don’t you go home?”