Always the Last to Know by Kristan Higgins Page 0,99
was always cheerful and upbeat around him because I was those things, goddamnit.
Luciano brought our courses. I ate, laughed, murmured in the appropriate places. The food was amazing. At least there was that. Also, the champagne, my God. So good. I might even order a second bottle.
As I watched Alexander, I saw it. The performance. The need for validation. He was working hard to make sure we were The Couple To Be at this swanky, sophisticated restaurant. When I fake laughed, he’d glance around to make sure people saw that he had the power to bring humor. He smiled a lot, and where my dorky brother-in-law also smiled a lot, Oliver was . . . sincere. He loved my sister and his daughters. He adored my parents. He even loved me, not that I’d given him much reason to.
We ordered dessert (though I was going to go into a coma soon if I ate much more).
“Babe,” Alexander said now, “I know this has been a rough couple of months for you.”
“You, sir, are absolutely right.” I was tipsy and enjoying it. It was fueling my rage.
“So I wanted to give this to you, and hope it will make things a little happier.”
He reached into his breast pocket and pulled out a little velvet box.
Shit. If there was an engagement ring in there, I knew it would be big, and I’d want it, and I wouldn’t be able to have it, and everyone in here would feel bad for the poor guy who proposed and got shot down. Cringing internally, I waited for him to get down on one knee.
Thank God, no. He just passed it across the many plates and smiled.
“Aw. So sweet of you!” I opened it and, shit, it was a beautiful necklace. A chunky bezel-set diamond surrounded by pink gold with a matching chain. “I love it.” I did, damn it. I’d keep it, too. I could sell it and pay for something in my house. “Thank you. How much did it cost?”
“Oh, babe. Whatever it cost, you’re worth ten times that much.”
“So . . . what are we talking? A thousand dollars?”
He grinned. “More. Significantly more. Here, let me put it on you.”
Ass. I allowed it. He sat back down, smug and pleased (glancing around to see if everyone had noticed).
“It’s beautiful,” said the woman from the next table.
“Thank you,” Alexander and I said in unison.
“Hey, Alexander, I have a quick question for you, babe.”
“Sure, babe.”
“When you came to my mom’s dinner party, did you remember Gillian?”
“Uh . . . the one with the baby?”
“No. That’s Mickey. The very pretty woman?”
“Other than you, babe?”
“The one you made a pass at last May. At the yacht christening party she mentioned.”
He blinked. “I think she . . . no. I’ve never met her.”
“She said you pressed her against a wall, kissed her neck, gave her your room key to the Madison Beach Hotel. Where we then spent the night after she turned you down.”
His neck was getting red. “She must have me confused with someone else.”
“You said you’d ‘rock her world.’”
He didn’t answer.
Luciano came with our desserts. “The bomboloni for signorina, the cheesecake for signore.”
“Thank you so much,” I said sweetly. He left. “Anything to say, Alexander? You made a pass at a woman and then called me as your B-list fuck. Why would you do that? You were going to cheat on me!” My voice may have risen a teeny bit.
“Look,” he said, glancing around, his hands up in the universal male sign for don’t make this a big deal, you hysterical female. “We never said we were exclusive.”
“What? We were exclusive! We’ve been dating for two years! We spend holidays together!”
“Calm down,” he said.
“How dare you tell me to calm down!” But yes, people were staring.
“I never said we were exclusive,” he repeated through gritted teeth.
“What does that mean? You get to sleep with other women?”
“Yes.”
The bald-faced admission was like a bucket of ice water. “Do I need to get tested?” I hissed. Thank God we’d always used condoms and the Pill. But I did. I’d need to get tested. Good God!
“Look.” He glanced around. “It’s not like I’m promiscuous, okay? I’m not on Tinder. But yes, I have two other relationships.”
“What?” There was the screeching again. Luciano was huddled with the maître d’ in the front, casting us concerned looks, so I lowered my voice. “Explain yourself.”
He looked at the restaurant ceiling, clearly aggrieved. “There’s Toni in San Diego and Paige in North Carolina. I’ve