“Did I miss something?” Natalie blurted out. She felt her cheeks flush with a sting of embarrassment. East was next to Kelly, looking like they were some kind of item, and…what the hell?
She’d thought they were going to be together. Her and East. Not Amazon Blonde and East. Sure, Natalie might be awkward, but she wasn’t blind or stupid. She’d seen the way East had looked at her last night. Heard the promise in his voice. The sincerity. He wanted her. Wanted to be with her. At least he had. But clearly something had changed in the past eighteen hours. An entire night had come and gone—she couldn’t bear the thought that East might have spent it with another woman.
But she wasn’t seeing much of an alternative. He still had his hand on the glamazon’s back. He looked directly at her, but there was a hollowness in those amazing eyes of his. Eyes that had once looked at her while he was inside of her. Eyes that had stayed on her when she walked into a room. Eyes that now seemed void of any emotion for her.
“You didn’t miss anything, darlin’. You’re right on time,” East said. He took a sip of his whiskey and turned his attention back to Kelly.
Matt nudged her in the ribs and distracted her from East’s cold nonchalance. “Hey, Mom just walked in. Where’s your date?” he asked.
Natalie looked at East. He just took another sip of his whiskey, not a single emotion on his face. Like he didn’t see her. Like she was back to being Natalie, Matt’s silly baby sister, and not Natalie, the woman she’d thought he really cared about.
“I don’t know where he is,” she said honestly. Her heart rose in her throat. The last sixty seconds had been pure confusion, but clarity was coming in with each breath she took. East didn’t want her. In fact, it looked like he wanted the woman he was with. He couldn’t keep his hands off her. She felt like a damn fool.
No…no this couldn’t be right. He couldn’t be doing this to her. He cared about her. Surely he did. She couldn’t have made all of it up.
“You all right?” Matt asked, not knowing he was witnessing her downfall. No, she wasn’t all right. She’d thought she and East had something special. But clearly she was just another woman he’d cycled through. It wasn’t like she could really compete with Miss Blonde Stick-figure on his arm. Still, she found the courage to lie to her brother yet again.
“I’m fine.”
She’d been duped, but it hadn’t even been East who’d done it. No, she’d fooled herself. Had East ever actually said they were more than sex? Even that hug at her parents’ house…it was probably just him taking care of little Natalie St. Clair, who was so fragile she couldn’t even stand up to her mom.
Her nose tickled, and a sting pricked behind her eyes. She felt stupid. And it was all on display for East.
“So you have no date?” Matt asked quietly as their mother made their way over.
She looked at East one final time. “I guess not. Turns out he was an idiot.”
Or maybe I am.
But hadn’t he told her that only an idiot would turn her down?
Truth or not, it didn’t help the pressure pains in her lungs. Because she couldn’t breathe. It hurt too much. So she just stood there, letting the pain slice through her.
Matt let out a long breath as if disappointed. Natalie was on the brink of falling to pieces. The phantom knife stabbing through her chest intensified. She’d never felt anything so powerful, like her rib cage was compressing in on itself.
Keep it together…
It wasn’t working. She focused harder.
Keep. It. Together.
She inhaled hard, past the pain, past the implosion of her lungs and something very cold, very stale settled over her.
Numb.
It was the first time that she understood what that felt like. It was a welcome feeling. She stood there in her adorable re-worn dress, watching her mother and her judgment approaching, watching the man she’d fallen in love with touching another woman, and she thanked whatever God was out there for giving her the numbness to get her through that moment.
Until the numbness turned into a hollow, throbbing ache that ripped through her again. She didn’t know for certain, but she thought her heart had just crystalized and shattered into a thousand pieces.
She had to get out of there.
Natalie didn’t say a word, just placed a hand over her chest as if something was falling off of her and she was trying to hold it in place. She turned and walked out the way she’d come without saying a word.
East’s first instinct was to stop her, to go after her. But he couldn’t. He wasn’t the man she needed, and he’d fucked with her enough. But he knew he’d never get the look of pain on her face out of his mind for as long as he lived.
“Where is she going?” Lemon-Anne asked as she approached the group. Natalie had pointedly ignored her and continued toward the exit.
“She just needs some air,” Matt offered.