Page 68 of Her Every Fantasy

I swallowed the sour taste in my mouth and looked at my sister.

Wary eyes returned my stare. ‘If you expect me to apologise for turning up unannounced, forget it.’

But beneath the bravado there was something else. A yearning for a connection that resonated inside me. ‘Gracie—’

‘We don’t need to talk if you don’t want to. Just...let me be here. Please?’ The request was soft, vulnerable in a way that made me feel like a heel.

My head jerked in a nod and the sensation of drifting without a life jacket swelled larger.

I needed to talk to Savvie.

Needed to see her. Touch her. The growing suspicion that this...thinginside wouldn’t fix itself without her spiked hard.

‘I need a drink,’ Graciela announced.

About to tell her to entertain herself while I tracked down Savvie, I froze, watching in disbelief as Dan mounted the stage and disappeared behind the curtain.

The fury I expected to feel was shockingly absent. Instead raw fear clawed at my insides, that paralysing helplessness I’d felt watching her marry that bastard returning full force.

I took a step, then froze again as Savvie emerged, minus Dan, from behind the curtain.

She was a vision in gold. The cocktail dress she’d changed into had a plunging neckline, displaying her amazing cleavage and left her dark bronze shoulders bare, ending just above her knee to showcase her spectacular legs. The headdress was gone and her mane was free and a little wild, just the way I liked it.

God, everything about her was just the way I liked her...but what right did I have to her? The need to find out propelled me across the room to her. Perhaps something in my face alerted her to my mood. She stopped mid-conversation, excused herself and turned to me.

‘Bryce—’

‘What the hell is he doing here?’

That she knew who I meant further disgruntled. ‘Ignore him. He’s not important.’

‘Are you sure?’

Her gaze sharpened, grew brighter with anger. And disappointment. As if I had something to be ashamed of. ‘I didn’t invite him here, Bryce. He’s dating one of my models. He’s her plus-one.’

Relief drained out of me but swiftly on its heels followed shame at how quickly I’d needed to hear that. Would it always be like this?

‘That’s our problem, isn’t it?’

My stomach dropped when I realised the words hadn’t come from my lips or even my psyche but from Savvie.

‘What?’

‘You’re never going to trust me, are you, Bryce? Because of your parents? Because of that letter you still won’t talk about?’

I opened my mouth to immediately deny that. But the appropriate words never emerged. ‘We need to talk.’

Her eyes darkened to almost black, unmissable pain filling the depths. The churning vortex of dismay and uncertainty widened inside me as she shook her head. ‘I... I can’t. I’m busy. Anyway, I think it’s pointless.’

‘Excuse me?’

‘This isn’t about Dan and we both know it. It’s about you not trusting what’s right in front of you because you think it’s going to be snatched away at any moment. I can’t change that for you, Bryce. You have to find your own way to change it.’

I wanted to rage at the harsh judgement but deep inside I tasted the truth of it. Wasn’t Dan’s presence here some sort of twisted sign that I was deluding myself into thinking this would work? When the only real things I’d made work for me were the towers I’d built?

The only meaningful relationship I’d thought I’d had had been with Savvie, and it turned out I’d been abysmal at it. She hadn’t believed the foundations of our friendship were strong enough to sustain revelations of her issues. Truth was, I still didn’t...

‘Bryce?’ I caught the faintest tremble in her voice and hated it because I knew it was my fault.

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