Page 66 of Faking Romance

Carly rolls her eyes. “It’s grown-up talk, sweetie. Why don’t you go back to coloring?”

“Will you color with me, Unca Bray?” she asks, giving him a pathetic puppy dog look.

“Of course, little nugget. Lead the way,” he says as he gives me a look that says, “Sorry, dude.”

I turn back and motion to Al to pour me a double of scotch. He does and I down it in one gulp before turning to Cam and Carly.

“What exactly did she say to Haven?” I question as I look between them.

“Uh, well, Haven asked if Roxy was there,” Cam starts, “and Jocelyn said she had gone to the post office and would be back soon. And then Haven said that she was going to see if they could all go out to dinner this week because she just finished a book and would love to have Roxy there to debrief on it.” Cam closes her eyes for a moment as if trying hard to remember.

“That’s when I walked closer,” Carly says. “Jocelyn then said that it’s a good thing they are really dating now because it’ll be a lot easier to go out on the date.”

I slap my forehead. “She seriously said that?”

Cam nods. “Yeah, something like that. I think Jocelyn knew she fucked up though because she got really pale. Haven was like, what do you mean? And Jocelyn was like, oh, haha, they weren’t really together at first. And then she said, I think Gray said he had a girlfriend and Roxy said she’d play along, but one thing led to another and…well, it’s all real now.”

“Oh my God, I need another,” I say as I blindly hand Al my glass.

“It’s fine. Haven laughed and said that’s adorable and to let Roxy know that she stopped by. And Jocelyn said I will. She’s been in a foul mood today and that will probably make her feel better,” Cam adds.

My jaw involuntarily clenches at that statement. “So she hasn’t told Jocelyn about our fight?”

“I guess not. We both saw her as we left. She was coming up the sidewalk with a box and looked…well, not happy, so we stopped, and eventually, she told us what happened, but Jocelyn was still inside the store,” Carly explains.

I let out a long breath. “OK. I need to go talk to her,” I say as I slam my latest drink and start back toward the stairs.

“Gray, don’t do anything rash, man!” Hutch yells after me. But it’s too late. I’m riled as fuck. It’s one thing that she won’t listen to me about what happened with Lydia. It’s another that she’s not telling Jocelyn to stay quiet about the whole fake-relationship thing.

I make it down all seven flights of stairs in record time and run out the door and right into her store. Her head pops up from the desk and looks at me before sighing.

“What do you want?” she asks harshly.

“I want to know why the fuck you didn’t tell Jocelyn to keep her trap shut about our relationship situation,” I growl as I point a finger at her.

Her face goes red and she stands, walking straight up to me. “For your information, I just found out what she said. I hadn’t bothered telling her because I didn’t know Haven would come by, and also, I was going to tell her we aren’t even together anymore but then I had to go deal with something at the post office. And you know what, fuck you! I’m not the one who was caught cheating!”

Now, I feel heat creeping into my face. “I wasn’t cheating!” I yell. “If you would freaking listen for one damn minute, you’d know that as soon as I walked into the garden that my mother told me to look at, Lydia jumped me. If you had waited two seconds, you would have seen me push her away and yell at her, but you were too sure of what you saw. You have zero trust in me. In fact, you have massive trust issues in addition to the whole self-esteem thing. You should go sort that out, Roxy. Now, I have to go talk with freaking Pierce and sort this out and hope I don’t get fired from the one effing gig that I’ve worked my ass to get. So, thanks a lot.”

“You know what? First impressions are really correct,” she seethes.

I glare at her. “That’s not what you were saying two nights ago,” I say and immediately regret it. Her face falls and I can see the hurt and I fucking want to punch myself for saying it.

“Get. Out,” she manages from behind her clenched jaw.

“Roxy, I…” I trail off because if looks could kill, I’d be dead. “OK, I’m leaving,” I say calmly as I hold up my hands.

“Good. And don’t come back, ever! And good luck being a single cat dad!” she screams.

Something about that hits my heart and makes me lose my temper. “I won’t come back and you’ll never see Licorice again. She doesn’t need a mom that jumps to conclusions and then doesn’t hold up her end of a bargain.”

“Right, like she needs a dad who is accusatory and cheats on her mom,” she retorts.

“I’m out of here,” I say as I wave her off and stomp out of the store. As soon as I’m back in my apartment, regret starts to seep through me again. But my anger won’t let me go apologize. So instead, I feed Licorice and start to compose a song. I need to calm down before I talk to Pierce. I need to figure out what to say and I haven’t a clue.

CHAPTERTWENTY-FIVE

Roxy

---