Page 50 of For Always
“Yes. My job here will be done and I can return to Connecticut, or wherever my next assignment takes me,” she said.
He didn’t look happy about what she’d just said, but he didn’t respond either. Gabriella didn’t know why she’d even said it. How did she want him to respond?
“Well, hello, there stranger.”
The sound of the familiar female voice immediately grated on Gabriella’s nerves. Seeing Hannah Palmer come over to stand beside where Tyler was seated didn’t help her already tenuous mood. The fact that Tyler didn’t look that happy to see her either was the only bright side to this new scenario.
“Hi Hannah,” he replied. “Gabriella and I were just discussing how excited we are to taste P&P’s food tonight.”
Hannah never even looked Gabriella’s way.
Gabriella didn’t care. She had nothing to say to Hannah Palmer either. She should have slapped Brooke that night the woman thought she was supposed to put Gabriella in her place and she should have let Hannah know her childish ploys weren’t going to work on her. But Gabriella had taken the high road. After what Brooke had done, Gabriella wasn’t certain she was going to continue taking that path.
“I’m so glad you’re getting off the ranch,” Hannah continued speaking to only Tyler. “I was just telling Daddy how nice it would be to have you over to the big house for dinner. We could walk down by the lake like we used to. Oh and Mrs. Franklin from the Hobbsonian Gazette, she’d like to do a ‘Where Are They Now?’ story featuring us. You know since we were once prom king and queen, and because we were voted cutest couple that same year at the Valentine’s Day dance.”
Hannah rested her hand on Tyler’s shoulder now. Her long claw-shaped nails were painted light pink, and two gold charm bracelets dangled at her wrist.
Tyler’s features remained impassive, but he did reach up to take Hannah’s wrist and slowly move her hand from his shoulder, while saying, “Then maybe you should tell Mrs. Franklin how the day after we were crowned prom king and queen, I found you in the back of our barn giving my brother a blow job.”
Gabriella gasped but she was certain that the loud sound that several other patrons of the restaurant heard hadn’t come from her. Hannah’s already blushed cheeks darkened. He perfect pouting red lips formed a circle of shock and she finally snatched her arm from Tyler’s grip.
“How dare you speak to me that way, Tyler West! You’re in my daddy’s restaurant. You will show me some respect!” Hannah hissed.
Tyler nodded. “As soon as you start showing Gabriella some respect, Hannah.”
“What? Who is she? Absolutely nobody to me,” Hannah continued.
“She’s somebody to me,” Tyler said, his gaze locking with Gabriella’s across the table. “I expect you to respect that fact from now on.”
For a moment Gabriella thought Hannah was going to do the right thing. She’d watched her look around the restaurant to see that people were staring at her and Gabriella was sure that this was not the type of attention Hannah Palmer craved. But the next moments proved her wrong.
“You want some respect for dating this half breed?” Hannah asked Tyler.
When Tyler’s head snapped up to look at her, Hannah just shook her head. She took a step back from the table and continued as if she had absolutely nothing to lose.
“She’s only half royalty, from some backwards town in Brazil, if you even count that. And she took almost seven years to complete college. She’s an idiot! But then, you can’t really expect much from their kind. That’s how they roll in their hood,” she spat.
The last was said with a fake-ass hip-hop twang to Hannah’s voice and Gabriella saw the moment when Tyler decided what he was going to do next. So Gabriella stood first. She dropped the napkin she’d put in her lap onto the table and stood so that she was now only a foot away from Hannah.
“Oh, my! Look out y’all, she’s about to pop off!” Hannah said. “Isn’t that how you and your homies talk? Look here, missy, why don’t you take yourself on back where you came from. We don’t do the interracial thing down here.”
“You obviously don’t do too much growing up around here either,” Gabriella told her. “I am here in Hobbs Creek to do a job. Once that job is over I’ll be gone. But not a minute before, and certainly not because some simple-minded immature bottle-blonde who couldn’t decide which brother she wanted, doesn’t like that I’m here.”
“You can’t talk to me like that,” Hannah said and took a step to close the small distance between her and Gabriella.
Gabriella wished like hell she would not have done that.
“I can do whatever I damn well please,” Gabriella told her.
She hadn’t realized it before but Tyler had also stood up. He was pulling Hannah back from Gabriella now.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” He yelled into Hannah’s face.
“Me? You’re the one running around town flaunting your little piece of black ass! Your mama and daddy taught you better than that, Tyler.” She yanked her arm from him again.
“I don’t even want you touching me now that you’ve been touching her!”
“I don’t even want to be in this restaurant knowing that you’re here,” Tyler said. “Be sure to tell your father you’re the reason he lost his account with us.”
