Then, I found out his secret. And on that night, my world imploded. Every fantasy I had of happily ever after, of children and marriage: gone. I was faced with a hole of deceit and had to decide if I wanted to jump in or walk away. I could have ended everything. Broke it off and continued on—tried to find another love, a different happy ending. Instead, I stood at the rabbit hole of hell and looked down. Toed the line of indecision, even while turning down his proposal. I waffled, I moped, and I drowned my sorrows in chardonnay. And then… finally? I squared my shoulders and stayed. Didn’t let on that I knew his secret. But that day, when my fairy tale died? I lost my trust in him, in our relationship. And a few months later, I met Lee.

Lies. A mountain of them between us.

Chapter 22

2 YEARS AGO

A few months after Belize, I was in a convenience store, examining colorful lines of candy, trying to decide which one was worth my change, when he walked in. Out of my normal neighborhood, I had driven down to Palo Alto to visit Brant at work. Stopped in an area I shouldn’t be in because my Mercedes needed gas and my bladder wouldn’t shut up.

I felt him before I saw him, a presence behind me, uncomfortably close, and I turned my head and caught his eyes. Staring right at me. Not evasive, not ashamed. Looking at me in the same way a baby does, innocent and direct, so direct you wanted to break contact but I didn’t. His stare was so unlike Brant’s that I mentally stuttered, caught in this moment in time where we both stared and then he smiled.

Wow. Cocky. Confident. Sexual. So different from Brant’s. Brant’s fixed expression was intensity, his face still and stoic. Brant was a man who listened, then reacted, impulse not a trait in his wheelhouse. Neither was carefree, playful, or flirtatious. This man’s smile was all three, and I was drawn to it, my own smile curving in response.

“Hard decision,” he said, nodding his chin to the shelves.

“Yeah.” I nodded, my smile still on. Like I was a marionette doll, the goofy expression painted in place. I should turn back. Move away. Instead I kept the eye contact, my damaged relationship at the type of fragile place where decision-making abilities should be revoked.

“I know you…” he said slowly, squinting slightly, his smile a little more guarded, recognition dawning in his eyes. Actual recognition, no ‘Don’t I know you?’ flirtation to follow.

I stopped breathing, my smile still in place, dreading yet curious about whatever words would come next.

An ‘aha’ moment when he made the connection. “Aren’t you Brant Sharp’s girlfriend?” He whirled away from me, his head tilting as he scanned the magazine rack behind us, his hand skimming over and grabbing a magazine. A groan slipped through my clenched jaw.

Wired Magazine: the go-to for geeks worldwide—had just proclaimed me Tech Hottie of the Year, an honor that should have been bestowed on someone actually in the electronics industry, not just a girlfriend of this century’s brainchild. Yet there I was, on the glossy cover, covered in nothing but wires, the confident grin on my face making this their bestselling issue so far. Geeks apparently liked nudity, no matter who wore it. And there, in giant letters across my midsection, my appearance’s validation: “Lucky Layana: where Brant Sharp gets his creative inspiration.”

I stopped smiling, reached out and snatched the magazine from his hands, took four steps to the side and stuffed it behind a few issues of Martha Stewart Living.

“Well now, that just answered my question,” he said with a smile, putting a hand on the rack and leaning in, just enough that I could smell the scent of fresh grass coming off him.

God, that’s a good smell. I stole a discreet sniff and then stepped back. So…the gorgeous man didn’t know me. Had just recognized me from the magazine, either the Wired cover or another one. Over the last few months, Brant’s media machine had gone into overdrive, put me on seven of them, the PR campaign headlined by Jillian, a woman who had jumped fully into Team Layana. She and I had talked, the night I found out the Secret. Mended fences in our new common goal to Keep The Secret. The stiffness was still there, but with an objective now shared between us, she had moved bleachers, her energy moving onto things other than ending our union. Her most recent efforts centered on pushing me into the spotlight. I knew what she was doing. She wanted the focus off him, his privacy left intact while the vultures feasted on my flesh instead. It’d been working. I’d done five interviews that month.

The media machine coined me Lucky Layana, due to my supposed inspiration for Brant’s last creation: the Laya. The Laya was single-handedly responsible for increasing BSX’s bottom line by an extra eight figures that quarter. A shining star. All thanks, in the media’s mind, to me. Ridiculous.

“So are you?”

My return to the candy quandary was looking like a lost cause. “Am I what?”

“Lucky.” His voice low, it grated of intentions, desire, and Iwannafuckyourighhere sex.

I looked up, meeting his gaze and was taken aback by the sizzle of chemistry between us. This was nothing like how it was with Brant. This was electricity and danger and raw want, a combination that pushed my feminine buttons and made me reckless. “Why don’t you try me and find out?”

He chuckled, stepped back, the yellow suede of his work boots creaking on the linoleum floor. “You’re not that kind of girl.”

I kept the eye contact, swallowed the apprehension sitting in my throat. This was wrong. This was bad. I should run home, wait for Brant, and forget this ever happened. My voice disobeyed, coming out cool, confident. Exactly as I’d always wished a flirtation to sound, yet this time was when I finally nailed it. “Not that kind of girl? Then you really don’t know me.”