by T. K. Leigh
Royal Games
Dating Games #4
T.K. Leigh
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Tangled Games
Playlist
Free Book!
Connect with Me
The Other Side of Someday
Books by T.K. Leigh
Acknowledgments
About the Author
ROYAL GAMES
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages for review purposes. If you are reading this book and you have not purchased it or won it in an author/publisher contest, this book has been pirated. Please delete and support the author by purchasing the ebook from one of its many distributors.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental or, if an actual place, are used fictitiously. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The use of these trademarks is not sponsored, associated, or endorsed by the trademark owner.
Published by Carpe Per Diem, Inc / Tracy Kellam, 25852 McBean Parkway # 806, Santa Clarita, CA 91355
Edited by Kim Young, Kim’s Editing Services
Cover Design: Cat Head Biscuit, Inc., Santa Clarita, CA
Cover assets:
olly © 2020
Romolo Tavani © 2020
trekandphoto © 2020
Used under license from Adobe Stock.
Copyright © 2020 T.K. Leigh / Tracy Kellam
All rights reserved.
To Faith, Hope, and Perseverance…
Chapter One
Nora
You can’t live in the present if you’re still held captive by the past.
Sounds fairly straightforward, right?
Unfortunately, I’ve found that living in the present is easier said than done.
All our lives, we’re trained not to live in the present. To either long for the past or to look toward the future. It’s rare we’re allowed to enjoy the moment. To stop and smell the roses, so to speak.
We count down the days until we move into our college dorm and bid farewell to our parents’ rules.
Then we count down the last few months of college until we’re free and can start our career.
Once we have that career, we count down the hours at work until we can go home or on that date.
And we count those dates, wondering when he’s finally going to pop that all-important question so we can start the next chapter of our lives.
When you think about it, that’s all life is. A series of chapters. When one ends, another begins. The story continues. Your life goes on.
Except for me.
Ever since that night six years ago, I’ve been stuck in the past, struggling to turn the page.
I’m not sure I want to turn the page.
I’m not sure I’m ready to say goodbye to the only time in my life I’ve ever felt happy.
“Congratulations!” A boisterous cheer assaults me, nearly knocking me over.
I’d expected to walk into Chloe’s apartment in Chelsea to a subdued atmosphere, my three friends hanging out in the kitchen, each sipping a glass of wine.
That is not the scene that greets me at all.
P!nk’s voice blares from the surround sound, belting that she’s had enough and to blow her one last kiss. Black balloons fill the industrial-looking space, a banner boasting “Ding-dong, the dick is gone” displayed prominently along the wall over the couch. Centerpieces of a hand sticking up its middle finger decorate the coffee table and a few side tables. However, the pièce de résistance is a three-tiered cake, like one would expect at a wedding. That’s where the similarities end.
Instead of figurines of a madly in love bride and groom, the bride has pushed the groom off the cake, red frosting made to look like blood following the path of the groom’s untimely demise all the way to the scene of the crime at the foot of the bottom tier.
My gaze shifts to the three women standing proudly beside the kitchen island, “Divorce Support Group” scrawled on the front of their matching black t-shirts.
“Welcome to your divorce party!” Evie dances up to me, her expression bright, red lips curled up in an animated smile. She grabs my hand, dragging me farther into the apartment.
“Divorce party?” I arch a brow, glancing at a few of my coworkers, who salute me with their drinks. I lean toward my friends, lowering my voice. “I told you not to make a big deal out of today. It’s just another day.”
“No, it’s not,” Chloe insists, her gray eyes trained on me as she slings an arm around my waist, moving her hips in time with the music. “Today is the first day of the rest of your life, and it must be celebrated!”
“So put on your shirt and let’s get this party started.” When Izzy throws a black t-shirt at me, I scramble to catch it. “Because if you don’t, Evie will pout all night long. Seriously. Since she heard about the divorce, she hasn’t shut up about this party and these damn t-shirts.”
“That’s not entirely true,” Evie interjects, scowling playfully. “I commiserated at first. Then I started planning your freedom party. I am a planner after all.” She winks.
Shaking my head, I shrug off my blazer, leaving me in just a tank and skinny jeans. I hold up the t-shirt in front of me and burst out laughing.
“Divorced A.F.?”
“I wanted to spell it out,” Chloe tells me, “but Evie thought someone might find it offensive.”
“We will eventually be leaving your apartment tonight. There could be children around.”
“At a bar?” Chloe shoots back dryly.
“Still, I didn’t want to offend.”
“Says the girl who used to write articles for the magazine about techniques to give a blow job that will have him begging for more.”
I smile at my friends’ bickering, grateful for this small slice of normalcy.
Since I no longer have Jeremy to return home to, I’ve struggled to find a new normal. Sure, we were only together a few years, such a brief time compared to some couples, but his absence has drawn into focus all the trivial things he did. Like make me coffee in the morning. Or empty the dishwasher befor
e leaving for work. Or even change the lightbulbs. To most, these acts are insignificant, but now that I do them, I’m reminded that Jeremy’s gone.
I pull the t-shirt over my head, smoothing back the few tendrils of strawberry blonde hair that escape my low ponytail, then spin a slow circle, arms stretched wide. “Happy?”
Evie beams. “Definitely.”
As cheesy and cliché as these shirts seem, I appreciate the symbolic gesture. The knowledge that my girl gang, my tribe, my sisters from other misters will stand by my side as I navigate the uncertainty facing me as a thirty-year-old divorcée is exactly what I need.
“Okay. Let’s celebrate.” Chloe grabs a wine glass off the kitchen island and hands it to me.
I bring it to my lips, stopping when I notice the words “Just Divorced” etched on the glass. “You guys went all out, didn’t you? Although I have to admit, I like the decorations.” I nod at the cake, surprised how realistic the “blood” dripping down the side actually looks. I turn to Chloe. “Was this your handiwork?”
“Can you imagine me baking?” She bursts out laughing, the sound echoing off the walls, everyone joining in at the ridiculousness of the suggestion. “I do not bake.”
“I’m more than aware of that. But why do I get the feeling the design was your idea?”
She shrugs, flipping a few blonde locks behind her shoulder. “Because you know I have an active imagination.”
“That, and when I told you about the divorce, you offered to pull a few favors with some of your contacts who know how to make people ‘disappear’,” I counter, using air quotes.
“What? Jeremy’s a prick for what he did.”
I narrow my gaze. “I told you. He was just confused. And scared of his family disowning him.”
While I was initially hurt to learn my husband had been seeing another man behind my back, my heart couldn’t help but break for him when he explained everything. How he’d always felt like he was different. How he’d pretended to be someone he wasn’t for years. How he was tired of wearing that mask. I somehow found strength in his ability to finally be himself.
It gives me hope that maybe I’ll soon stop pretending, too.
“That’s no reason for him to be unfaithful to you, Nora.” She grips my biceps, forcing me to face her. “I love you, and I am absolutely sympathetic to how difficult it must have been for Jeremy, considering how close-minded his family is. Hell, at your wedding, they kept mistaking Izzy for a member of the waitstaff because, according to them, all Hispanics look the same.”
I float my gaze to Izzy’s dark eyes, gritting an apologetic smile. When I look at her, I only see an amazing woman, one who’s made a career out of helping some of the most vulnerable people as a pediatric oncology nurse. I can’t wrap my head around anyone only seeing the darker tone of her skin or the fact she’s not blue-eyed and blonde-haired.
“Don’t forget that Jeremy made a promise to honor you,” Chloe continues, forcing my attention back to her. “Honor, Nora. He broke that promise. And now it’s time to rid yourself of the negativity surrounding those broken promises.” Looping her arm through mine, she drags me to the center of the room.
“What is this?” I eye what appears to be a miniature casket sitting amongst a model graveyard straight out of the attic in Beetlejuice.
“Isn’t it fantastic?” Evie asks excitedly. “It’s a ring coffin. Companies actually make them. Who knew?”
“Who knew indeed.”
“But Evie couldn’t leave well enough alone,” Izzy explains. “Thought if we were going to make you bury the ring, we needed a graveyard, too, so…” She gestures to it, “there ya go.”
“My brother used to make model railroads growing up.” She shrugs, her red curls bouncing with the movement. “I made a model graveyard.”
I step closer, noticing the engagement ring Jeremy had bought me while we were both in a St. Patrick’s Day alcohol-induced fog sitting beside the wedding band I’d worn for less than a year. The diamonds still glitter and sparkle, not having had enough time to grow dull from years of wear.
The music cuts out, and I glance around the room to see everyone step closer, expressions of forced solemnity crawling across their faces.
“We’ve gathered here at my apartment, surrounding this really creepy, tiny graveyard, to pay our respects to the dearly departed… Nora’s marriage to Jeremy the Fuckface,” Chloe begins in as serious a voice as she can muster.
I open my mouth to argue yet again that I don’t blame Jeremy, but her hand shoots up, cutting me off.
“But this isn’t a sad occasion, friends. It’s a momentous one. One in which we celebrate not the separation of two people who never should have been together in the first place, but Nora’s freedom to live the life she was meant to live. To be the person she was meant to be. Even if she doesn’t quite know who that person is just yet.” She offers me an endearing smile, then picks up a yellow rose petal from a nearby bowl.
Closing the lid on the casket, she places the petal on it. “Today, Nora Jean,” she continues, love in her gaze, “may you be happier than a bird with a french fry.”
Everyone erupts in laughter, including myself, even as I wipe the few tears tricking down my cheek. Not from losing Jeremy, but at the length my friends went in order to make sure tonight isn’t marked with regret and sadness but hope and laughter.
“May you be happier than a fat cat in a small box,” one of my co-workers, Claire, says, tossing another yellow rose petal on the casket.
“May you be happier than Daryl Dixon with a crossbow,” Gretchen, another woman from work, offers. We chuckle, all too familiar with her obsession with The Walking Dead.
“May you be happier than a dog chasing a squirrel,” Marcy, one of the women who works with Evie and Chloe, states as she tosses her own petal.
I smile in thanks, watching as each one of the dozen or so women steps up to offer their own wish for my happiness, all of them amusing. Finally, we reach the last few people in the circle. Evie steps forward, grabbing a rose petal.
“May you fly high and never let anyone clip your wings again.” The tone shifts from fun and humorous to sincere and earnest as she places her rose petal on the overflowing pile.
“May you find the strength you need in the people who love you,” Izzy encourages, then glances at the two women at her side — Evie and Chloe. “In your friends. In us.”
I nod, swiping at the tears escaping.
“May you dream big,” Chloe begins. “Sparkle more. And shine bright.” Then her grin turns conniving. “And have some mind-blowing sex, even if just for a night.” She waggles her brows as the room erupts in cheers and whistles.
Once they settle down, Chloe picks up the bowl and extends it toward me. I grab the sole remaining petal and place it on top of all the others.
“May I find the happiness I deserve.” I close my eyes, as if making a birthday wish, allowing my hope for the future to fill me with peace.
When I open my eyes, Chloe’s standing in front of me, holding out a shot glass, as Evie makes her way around the room with a tray, offering everyone a shot, as well.
Once everyone has one, Izzy holds up hers. “To Nora,” she toasts. “Never forget that walking away from something unhealthy is incredibly brave, even if you stumble a few times as you make your way out that door. Trust me.” She laughs under her breath. “I’ve stumbled more than a few times. But I’ve also learned that it’s never too late to find your happily ever after.”
“It’s truly not,” Evie joins in. “Sometimes you have to kiss a lot of frogs to find the prince you deserve.”
“Now, say it with me…” Chloe lifts her shot glass. “Fuck Jeremy.”
“Fuck Jeremy,” I laugh, my voice barely audible.
“Louder,” Chloe instructs. “With meaning.”
I roll my eyes, then quickly say, “Fuck Jeremy.”
“Is that the best you can do? For once in your life, stop bottling it up and let it all
out. It’s okay to be mad.”
Licking my lips, I square my shoulders, about to inhale a deep, calming breath.
“And none of that ‘positive energy in, negative energy out’ bullshit, either. Breathing exercises only mask the problem.”
With determination, I level my eyes on Chloe. “Fuck Jeremy,” I say firmly, my tone icy.
She grins in satisfaction. “Louder.”
“Fuck Jeremy,” I repeat with more tenacity and strength.
“Again.”
“Fuck Jeremy!”
“Again!”
“Fuck Jeremy!” With each repetition, my voice grows louder, more fevered, more excited, more animated. This is the most emotion I’ve shown in ages. This is the most I’ve allowed myself to feel in ages, too. Even when I walked in on Jeremy with another man, I kept myself in check, refusing to show even a hint of weakness.
“Again!” Gretchen calls out.
“Fuck Jeremy!”
“One more time,” Chloe encourages, eyes brimming with pride.
“Fuck Jeremy!” I screech at the top of my lungs, all the frustration and annoyance that’s built up over the years of hiding my true feelings spilling out of me like lava, burning yet satisfying at the same time.
When applause breaks out around me, I return to the present, smiling at all these people who care enough to support me during this trying time. That should be all that matters, shouldn’t it? Don’t they say you find out who cares about you when you’re at your lowest?