Page 12 of Best Served Cold

Then I hear Jonah’s voice, so familiar but so wrong, and a shudder runs down my spine.

Briar and I exchange a glance. “You could just throw the phone in the garbage,” she suggests. “He’d be able to find it with the Find My Phone app, probably, but he’d have to go through the trash. He’d hate that. He doesn’t even like scraping dirty dishes off.”

She’s right, of course, although it’s still hard to wrap my head around the reality that Jonah has spent so much time with other women, enough that they’ve eaten home-cooked meals together. Does he travel for work at all? Or did he make phone calls to me while crouched on other women’s balconies or in their bathrooms?

“I’m going in,” I say, stiffening my spine.

“He had your phone when he showed up?” she asks.

“Yeah,” I say through my dry mouth.

Her lips press together. “I’ll get it for you. I know where they’re kept during meetings.”

She walks away, and I can’t help but notice that even the way she walks is elegant. It doesn’t make me dislike her, though. None of this is her fault, or BigCatchBabe’s fault, or even the fault of the mysterious GingerBeerBabe. There’s one person behind this mess, and he’s in that office.

That thought is enough to get me moving. I swing the office door open and walk in with Jonah’s phone outstretched as if it has offended me. Both Jonah and the tall, rotund man behind the desk turn to stare at me. Despite the early hour, each of them is drinking from a flight of beer, the small glasses arranged in labeled wooden carriers.

A sense of indignation washes over me. Jonah must have known there was a chance I’d discover his lies, yet he still took this meeting. He sent Rob, whom he doesn’t even like, to retrievethe phone. That’s how much he cared. He’s not just a cheater, but a lazy cheater.

I glare at him, my fingers squeezing the phone.

Surprise flickers across his face, followed by worry and then a fake wide grin. He’s so handsome, with his big hazel eyes, closely cropped dark hair, and that perfectly shaved jaw, but his looks feel offensive now.

“This is my fiancée,” he tells the big guy, who’s scowling at me. “What a nice surprise, honey, but we’re not quite done in here yet.”

“Oh, I think you’re done,” I say, my voice thrumming with anger. “I think you’reverydone.”

“Sophie?” Jonah says, reaching for my hand. “If you have something you need to talk about, we can grab breakfast in ten minutes. Why don’t you wait for me outside? It won’t be long.”

Outside, like a dog.

Outside, like an umbrella abandoned after a rainy day.

People have treated me like that almost my whole life. I’ve spent my adulthood trying to absorb it like a sponge or make excuses for them, but no more. My fingers squeeze tighter around the phone.

I try to remember the breathing exercises I was taught in therapy. But I can’t remember whether I’m supposed to breathe fast or slow to calm down, and?—

“No phones allowed in here, sweetheart,” says the man behind the desk as if he doesn’t notice the chaotic energy thrumming through the room. “Bring that out there with you, will you?”

Something inside of me snaps, and I drop the phone on the floor and stomp on it. Once, twice. And again, feeling the glass crack satisfyingly under my orthopedic sneaker. Jonah’s mouth drops open. He stares at me as if he’s just this moment realized that he doesn’t really know me.

I know what that feeling’s like. Normally this is when my empathy would kick in, telling me to save someone else from something that has hurt me, but it doesn’t happen.

I smile at him, probably looking like an insane person, and swing my gaze to the big boss. “Is that better,sir?”

He opens his mouth but doesn’t say anything. Then he lifts one of the small glasses of beer and drains it.

“You’ll apologize, Sophie,” Jonah says, getting to his feet. He’s five foot ten but consistently writes six-one on forms when asked for his height. He’s capable of looking down at me, but not as much as he’d probably like.

“You’re so much shorter than your brother, you know,” I sneer. “I think he mightactuallybe six-one. Maybe even six-two.” I grab one of the little glasses from his display. I was going to throw the contents at him, but I notice at the last second it’s their Elderberry Breeze, and I down it instead.

Surprisingly refreshing.

Jonah watches me with stupefaction now. Like he can’t believe I’m the same woman who accepted his ring.

“Sophie,” he finally manages to say. “Did you hear from your great-aunt?” He gives the big boss awomen will be womenlook that infuriates me. “Sophie’s elderly aunt just went into remission from a very serious illness. She’s doing better now, but it’s been a stressful time.” Swinging his gaze to me, he adds, “But that’s no excuse to make a spectacle of yourself, sweetheart.”

“Youhave made an ass of yourself,” I say. “What’s your excuse?” I pick up another one of the small glasses of beer and face the boss man. He recoils a little as if he’s afraid of what I might do, and for a second I quail. I know what happens when I break the rules. My mind pulls up a familiar memory. Sitting in the police station under the snapping fluorescent lights, my clothes smelling like smoke. But I swallow the old fear down. “Do you know this man has a girlfriend at every brewery intown? Every brewery.” I gesture with the cup on the last two words, and a tiny slosh of beer splashes on his desk.

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