So she was on his mind? Maybe that’s why he’d started acting weird? It was scary to like like someone. Hell, she was scared of how much seeing that he thought about her in text was making her feel.
Hannah: Well, now I have a situation.
Jack: A flood in Ms. Havisham’s basement?
Why did he have to be so flipping funny? It turned her on and made it harder to view him as just a piece of meat that would get her a promotion.
Hannah: Swept away all the cobwebs.
Jack: Stop turning me on with literary references and spread your legs.
She wasn’t about to tell him that they were already spread and she was close to coming.
Hannah: Why would I do that?
Jack: So you can rub your clit, pretend your fingers are my dick, and we can get off together . . .
Jack: Are you touching yourself?
Hannah: Yes. You?
Jack: Pretending I’m deep inside you
She was pretending the same thing and so, so close. And the fact that he was moving so fast when he specialized in slow meant that he must be close, too.
Hannah: Already?
Jack: Remember I’ve already sucked your clit until you started sounding angry about it? Keep up, Duchess
Hannah: What position are we in?
Jack: I want to take you from behind, but I want to see your face the first time. Hmm.
Both. She definitely wanted both. But face-to-face was a lot. And this wasn’t supposed to be a lot. Despite how much she wanted to kiss him while they boned. Shit. She needed both.
Hannah: We’ll just have to do it more than once . . . if you’re up for it. Making up for lost time and all.
Jack: If you can be a smartass, you’re not doing this right. If I were there right now, I’d spank you.
As a rule, she was not into that kind of thing. But from Jack, she could totally get down with a little slap and tickle. But he didn’t necessarily need to know how much that turned her on.
Hannah:
Jack: That’s two.
Cheeky.
Hannah: I’m so scared! (And turned on, keep going)
Jack: Where were we? Ah, I’m inside you’ve already come once so you’re very wet and very tight and I’m listing saint names in my head to keep from making an ass of myself.
She rolled her eyes for real at his reference to saint names. It was his religious vow of celibacy keeping them from doing this for real right now. But then again, this was maybe better. He couldn’t know for sure how much he was affecting her.
Hannah: Think about how they were martyred so I can catch up.
Jack: On it.
Jack: Dammit, Hannah. Even thinking about your pussy has me feeling like a rookie again. All that pretty, wet pink.
Mansplaining and weird behavior aside, this man knew exactly what to say and how to say it to get her close.
Hannah: That’s the stuff. Right there . . .
Jack: Put two fingers in before you come. Almost as good as me there with you.
She didn’t read that last text for several minutes after she came. She had to close her eyes against how much he pushed her buttons, even when she was doing the pressing.
* * *
—
NOT FUCKING HANNAH WAS going to be the death of him. Sexting with her made him come so hard that he had to catch his breath. And her response when he sent her a picture of his abs smeared with evidence of what she’d done with him told him that other guys were probably just doing this whole sexting thing very, very wrong.
He was so strung out on finally getting to come with Hannah that most of his humiliation from telling her that he was saving sex for marriage the night before was gone. Patrick would never stop laughing at him when he told him that.
Not that he was going to tell the father that he’d used the church’s teachings on premarital sex to avoid having sex with Hannah when they hadn’t ever mattered before. Jack was pretty sure that was a sin, and he was guessing that there weren’t enough Hail Marys and Our Fathers to make up for it.
But it was the only thing he could think of in the moment that would save him. Not that it would save him from falling for Hannah. Nothing could stop that. Not after he’d slept in her bed. Not after she’d told him things he got the feeling she never talked about. Not after that morning.
Guilt at lying to her ate up his afterglow. He was so screwed.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
HANNAH ALWAYS HAD POINT on the company Halloween party, which she’d never been nervous about. She always had the perfect venue, theme, decorations, and music planned by late June. And this year was no different in those respects. But there was more riding on it this year. If this went well and she could convince Annalise that Jack had fallen in love with her, she would be a VP.
Uncharacteristic butterflies roamed free in her belly. After spending the night with Jack and the ironically sexy sexting that came the morning after, she was fairly certain that Annalise would interpret whatever was between them as love. But a little bit of uncertainty remained.
So much was riding on tonight, and she needed it to be perfect. If tonight went well, she was almost guaranteed a promotion.
And she could finally stop being the perfect girlfriend for Jack Nolan.
All of their most important clients and soon-to-be clients were sure to be wowed by the private tour of the Art Institute’s Egyptian collection followed by cocktails and canapés in the Modern Wing. Everyone was dressed in costumes from antiquity, which made for a stellar icebreaker and lots of men in very short skirts. All wins for Hannah.
But that didn’t stop a pit from forming in her stomach as she hung out at the back of the tour, waiting for Jack to show up in his costume. Even though she should be paying attention and rubbing elbows, she was checking her phone every five seconds.
He was late.
Still no message about running late, totally uncharacteristic. Not that she knew what characteristic was. They’d just started dating two weeks ago. He’d done a bunch of annoying guy stuff—mansplaining, introducing her to both of his parents, and fighting his brother. And he’d sent her a dick pic.
He’d probably just been on his best behavior until she’d offered sex. Now he’d taper off. He’d show up late tonight without giving her a heads-up. Next week, he’d tell her he’d call her, and then “something would come up.” In a few weeks, hopefully after the engagement party, she’d realize that he hadn’t called or texted for a week. And she wouldn’t be able to follow her previous advice to Sasha—if a guy isn’t calling, it’s best to leave it alone. She was woman enough to admit that Jack had wiggled his way underneath her defenses. Not that she’d tried very hard to keep him out.
She liked him. Oh fuck. She really liked him. Just in time for him to ghost her.
Luckily, she was saved from freaking out by Sasha finding her and pulling her over to deal with a problem with the caterers—they had gluten-free options and vegan options, but no gluten-free and vegan options, and one of the guests was having a conniption because she’d consumed mayonnaise with egg in it.
It was times like this when she felt like her job was stupid and Noah had been right to suggest she do something more substantive and serious with her time.
All it took to fix it was telling the caterer to set aside some of the gluten-free toasts to pair with the vegan topping, but sometimes she couldn’t believe that she had to tell people these things.
Worse yet, she was so hot from spending time in the kitchen that she swore she could feel her heavy kohl eyeliner slipping down her face and her wig listing to one side—not exactly the image of the cool, competent professional she was trying to portray for her boss and all of their firm’s most important clients.
By the time she made it back to the party, the tour was over, and everyone was drinking in the vestibule of t
he Modern Wing. She checked her phone and still nothing from Jack. This was ridiculous. They’d been on a bunch of dates, and they’d had everything but sex. She could text him to see where he was when he wasn’t where he was supposed to be. Doing that wouldn’t make her a harpy. It didn’t make her “crazy,” and it wouldn’t make him break up with her.
Where are you?
The message was delivered and then read, but still nothing. Not even the three dots. Shit. That jerk-off was going to stand her up. Without a goddamn word. Or an apology for freaking out after they’d gotten intimate. Not even a transparent excuse. He was going to bounce—and all she had to show for it were some orgasms.
Picking just the wrong moment, Giselle swanned toward her, wearing a costume that would have fit in on the set of an HBO period drama set in ancient times. Without doing anything, the woman managed to make Hannah feel even shabbier.
“Where’s the boyfriend?” Giselle asked in a voice that made Hannah gnash her back teeth together.
She feigned looking around for him even though she knew he wasn’t there. Even though by Monday everyone would know that he’d stood her up, she wasn’t about to give Giselle any satisfaction in that regard right now. “Not sure. I was dealing with an emergency in the kitchen.”
Giselle pressed her lips together. “Hmm.”
“Where’s your hubby?” God, the word “hubby” was awful, but it somehow seemed to fit the other woman’s husband. “Cowering in the corner somewhere?” That probably wasn’t necessary, but Hannah was feeling pretty raw and didn’t really have the patience for Giselle’s particular brand of psychological warfare right now.
Her coworker just changed her champagne glass to her left hand so that her giant engagement ring flashed in the light. Her aim was so good that Hannah was temporarily blinded. “He’s getting me another drink. Husbands are handy for that. Not that you would know.”
Hannah looked at her closely, squinting her eyes, as she took a sip.
“What are you staring at?”
“Checking to see if you have a forked tongue.”
Giselle let out the closest thing to a laugh that her evil core would allow. “Shouldn’t you be sucking up to Annalise or the Chapins right now?”
Hannah resented the accusation that she was some sort of suck-up. Not that it wasn’t true. After all, she’d acquired a real live fake boyfriend at her boss’s behest to prove that she wasn’t averse to romantic love. That was real dedication.
And in this moment, when she was worried that all of her dedication wouldn’t pay off and that all she’d be left with was a heart a little more cracked than it had been, she was too tired for more combat with Giselle.
“Don’t you ever get tired of being such an underhanded bitch?”
Giselle paled under her carefully applied makeup, no doubt copied from an academic text on ancient face painting. Even though she absolutely loathed the woman, she had to respect her attention to detail. “Don’t you ever get tired of being . . . you?”
Well, now Hannah knew she’d gotten to her. And still, it didn’t matter. Giselle was going to get the promotion, and it wasn’t even going to be a contest. Hannah wished she had told Annalise to stuff her promotion the moment she’d agreed that picking up some poor guy and dating him would prove her dedication. At least she would still have her pride. She would be able to reply to Giselle with something sharp and funny and mean. Something witty, instead of, “Yeah, honestly, I do.”
It was exhausting to have to be on her guard all the time. She’d thought she didn’t have to be that way with Jack. Too bad she was probably wrong.
Knowing she’d just admitted defeat, she decided to go look for Sasha. After all the times she’d helped her bestie pull herself together after a good sob over a guy, the least that same bestie could do was help her fix her makeup after a solid ten-minute cry in the bathroom.
She felt stupid, and her whole body felt as though someone had pounded it with a meat tenderizer. She’d avoided dating because she’d wanted to avoid this numb feeling that followed someone rejecting her just for being herself. And not only had she opened herself up to him, broken so many of her rules for him, but she’d started to believe that he could actually like her back.
Such bullshit. Dating—love—was bullshit.
Tears burned the back of her throat, and she wasn’t sure she could make it through the evening without falling apart. She was never like this, and it just made her feel like crying more. She hated crying, and the fact that she was about three seconds from bawling at a work function was deeply embarrassing. Jack had embarrassed her, and it burned in her gut.
If he hadn’t been serious about her, why had he introduced her to his family? That still made absolutely no sense to her.
It didn’t matter now. He was done with her, and she was going to make herself done with him. She wasn’t about to get a promotion, but she wasn’t going to show any more cracks in public.
She spotted Sasha’s wig—she was doing kind of an ancient Greek Barbarella thing with a beehive—and moved across the crowd. Even though she was cracked and crumbling and close to tears, she managed a couple of handshakes and smiles with the heads of marketing for her most loyal clients.
Just when she’d finished chatting up the head of marketing for the Hawks, the one who had gotten her tickets at center ice for her and Jack, she spotted him.
She hadn’t seen him before because he’d been hidden behind Sasha’s wig. He was holding a drink and laughing. Both of those things brought a haze of red over her vision. He’d been ignoring her texts and drinking and laughing with her best friend while she’d been mourning both her promotion and their—whatever this was.
And he was just standing there—laughing?
* * *
—
HANNAH’S MURDEROUS GAZE WAS like a spiked heel digging into his nuts. Tonight, he was trying “lack of basic consideration and respect” on for size, and it didn’t fit him any better than flirting with other women or making things too serious, too soon.
Because he knew her well enough by now to know that behind her obvious anger there was some hurt on the side. He hated himself for doing this to her, but he was determined to follow through. He’d screwed things up by lying to her, and losing her for real was his penance.
She made her way over to him and Sasha and put her hand through his elbow. He knew he looked like a jackass. Although he’d followed instructions and worn his Mark Antony costume, he hadn’t shaved in about three days and had made sure to smear some wing sauce on his toga. Chris had suggested that he go to the gym and not shower before the party, but that seemed excessively slovenly.
Instead, he decided to show up forty-five minutes late, not respond to any queries about his ETA, and then not look for her when he finally did show up. Jack had always been an ace communicator in relationships because he’d been taught basic manners. And he hated when a woman didn’t communicate with him.
Except no communication might be preferable to the rage that Hannah was communicating to him perfectly right now. She hadn’t even said anything, but the way her nails dug into his arm was plenty evocative of the way she’d probably like to skin his balls with her fingernails. And the feral smile she gave him when he looked down at her told him that this was the night. She was done with him.
“What are you two talking about?” Her voice was bright but almost brittle. Translation: Where the hell have you been? And why didn’t you let me know that you were going to be late?
Seeing how angry she was now, he wished he had gone this route first. She would have broken up with him before they’d even slept together, and he could have told her the whole truth. She would have laughed at his stupidity and then continued dating him because he would have put on a charm offensive to rival any romantic-comedy movie. Grand gestures galore.
“I got caught up with the boys.” It was p
artially true. After the gym, they’d gotten beers and his friends had given him more advice on how to drive Hannah to dump him in the most efficient way possible. Chris and Joey were an endless font of that kind of information, had Jack thinking that they might be lost causes in the relationships-with-human-females department. And it had him feeling really bad about being a dude.
“And broke your phone?” Her tone was sweet, but he was pretty sure she was laying a trap for him.
He could feel her emotional investment in him in the form of her anger, and he had a feeling that there would be no going back. He felt as though he were being torn in different directions.
He pulled his phone out of the one pocket conveniently sewn into his rented toga and pretended to be seeing her text message for the first time. There was only one of them, which surprised him. He expected multiple messages, increasing in anger. At the very least, he expected her to threaten his future ability to have children. That’s what the girl he’d met at that stupid speakeasy would have done.
This Hannah was not that girl at all.
The moment he’d laid eyes on that girl, he’d been able to see a whole future with her. That wasn’t uncommon: he’d had the same kind of trippy romantic projection with all of his former girlfriends. And none of those relationships had worked out, despite his best efforts.
That Hannah was different because she’d looked right through him. She’d seen past his try-hard Boy Scout exterior and straight to the heart of him. He knew this because if she hadn’t seen it, she wouldn’t have let him buy her a taco, much less see her naked.
All of his other girlfriends had been sweet. And Hannah was, too. She just hid her sweetness under a layer of tart that made her sweetness all the more satisfying. But something had changed between the night they’d met and when he’d almost had sex with her. Seeing her tonight, with all her sweet and tart broken up together, he realized the gravity of his mistake—she’d been serious about letting him in, while he’d been using her.
Not the Girl You Marry Page 17