Shocking Sapphires - Ann Omasta Page 0,27

she didn’t.

The urge to tell her off was strong, but politeness and small-town values had been ingrained into me from an early age. Instead of cursing at her, I forced my lips to curve up and said, “Yes, and thank you for your help with that.”

For once not taking the credit, she said, “Grant is too nice of a guy to leave you hanging, dear. He wanted to make sure you had another job before we hightail it out of this little burg. He has no reason to stay isolated in the middle of nowhere now that his movie is on hold.”

Her tone sounded friendly, but her words were like hard jabs to my gut. I had desperately wanted to believe that Grant was somehow in the dark about my dismissal and that Eva was pulling all of the strings.

I tried, but failed, to keep the devastation out of my tone when I asked the first question of many that popped into my head, “Grant arranged for my new job?’

“Of course,” she answered flippantly, as if she weren’t crushing my soul.

It had been silly of me to believe that Grant wouldn’t do this to me. I had ached to believe that Eva was evil and somehow manipulating him, but it was starting to look like Grant had tired of me and was hiding behind Eva to keep me away.

That sad truth was confirmed when Eva said, “Now, if that’s all, you can be on your way. We have a lot to do to prepare for our trip home tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?” I gasped, unable to even imagine not seeing Grant or Scout again anytime soon.

“Mm-hmm,” Eva nodded before adding, “Grant can’t wait to get back to his real life.”

Deep down, I had known that life in Brunswick Bay Harbor would be too low-key and boring for a huge star like Grant Chandler, yet I’d allowed myself to believe that he was content here as we circled around him and helped him recuperate.

We had taken him into our lives and protected him like one of our own, and this is how he decided to repay us––by dumping us all without so much as a goodbye?

My hurt feelings quickly morphed into fury as I barged past Eva and said through gritted teeth, “I need to talk to Grant.”

Both goons lunged to grab me by the arms. Struggling against them was futile, but I tried anyway.

Once I realized that I wasn’t going to get away from them and stopped fighting, Eva said in a calm, cool voice, “You need to get it through your thick, dumb skull that Grant Chandler does not want to see you again. Ever.”

After delivering that devastating blow, she whirled around on her spiked heel and strolled back toward Grant’s room. Over her shoulder, she instructed the big oafs that were holding me, “Get her out of here and make sure she doesn’t return.”

Complying with her request, the giant lugs took me to the back exit of the building and unceremoniously dumped me outside.

A couple of paparazzi were milling around the door, hoping for a money shot of Grant or Eva, but neither even bothered to take a single picture of me getting tossed out on my rear end.

21

Molly

I managed to make it to work at my new job at the tavern on the outskirts of town every day that I was scheduled. I plastered on a smile and went through the motions of working, but that was about all I could handle.

When I wasn’t at work, I was sleeping or staring off into space and wishing for the oblivion of sleep.

My life felt so empty without Scout and Grant in it. I’d had to ban myself from the computer because I kept doing obsessive internet searches to see if I could find any tidbits of news about them on the entertainment sites.

I’d also bawled for two straight days after looking up a child development website and discovering that Scout was most likely sitting up on his own and possibly even beginning to crawl. I was missing so many of his firsts, and I was just going to keep missing more and more of them.

Avery was being a great friend. She stopped by regularly to check on me and invite me to do things, but I just couldn’t drum up the energy to participate. I knew she was worried about me, but I had no clue how to break free from this all-consuming depression.

When she’d finally had enough of my moping,