Part I
1
Savannah
Present
The only available parking spot was in front of the fire hydrant.
I narrowed my eyes in exasperation. Of course, on the day that I had to deal with this, there wasn’t going to be a single spot in downtown Savannah. This morning was an uncharacteristic eighty degrees and ninety percent humidity in March, and I had a meeting to get to after this.
But no … my dick ex needed me to get my shit out of his house today, or he was going to—quote—“chuck it out the window.” It didn’t matter that I’d been asking to come over to get my stuff for weeks. He’d refused at every turn. So, while I knew jumping at the first chance he gave me was playing exactly into his hand, I might never get my favorite cardigan back if I didn’t.
“Bastard,” I muttered under my breath.
I parallel parked in front of the fire hydrant, prayed that I wouldn’t get a ticket, then popped the door on my BMW, and rushed to the sidewalk. My heels clicked noisily as I stormed up the front walk of the dilapidated house. Mark had inherited it from his great uncle and didn’t have the liquid assets to keep it in adequate shape despite or because of his flagrant use of daddy’s money in everything else in his life. The number of red flags I’d ignored climbed ever higher.
I rang the doorbell and tapped my foot. Mark had always hated that. So now, I did it with relish while I waited.
No one came to the door though, and my long, straight brown hair was beginning to curl at the end. I rang again, knowing Mark hated that too.
“Christ, Amelia,” Mark snapped as he wrenched the door open. “So impatient.”
Seven months, nine days, and about fourteen hours—that was exactly how long I’d wasted my time with Mark Armstrong.
“Can I have my stuff?” I asked, not keeping the irritation out of my voice.
I couldn’t even reach for my pageant smile. With the snarl I could barely contain on my lips, no one would ever know that I’d won Miss Georgia
“Don’t want to come in and have a drink?” he asked, leaning against the doorframe.
He was exactly my type—tall, dark, and handsome with daddy’s money and an old Savannah surname that matched mine. I’d excused a lot of behavior for how well we should have fit together.
“I just want my stuff. Let’s not do this today.”
His smile lit up at my rude behavior. “Come on, pageant queen. Give me a smile.”
I couldn’t manage it. I just crossed my arms. “Mark.”
“Fine, fine,” he grumbled. “Jesus, never could take a joke.”
A joke. Right.
He kicked a box across the threshold. Actually kicked it.
I reached down and looked through the contents. Of course, my cardigan wasn’t in there. “Where’s my cardigan? The Taylor Swift one.”
“Fuck if I know.”
The same old panic took over me at the anger in his voice. Who knew how close he was to letting out that anger on me? I could never quite tell. Still, I refused to back down.
“You know that’s my favorite. I came, just like you wanted me to, so I could get it back.”
“It’s not my fault that you leave your shit everywhere.”
“Fine. I’ll look for it myself.” I took a half-step toward the house, ready to barrel him down and find that damn cardigan when he burst into laughter.
“Oh, your face. Man, Amelia, you should see yourself. Here’s your fucking cardigan.”
He reached into the room and tossed it at me. It hit me in the face, and I caught it, trying to suppress my revulsion that I’d ever dated someone this mercilessly cruel. It had taken me a long time to see this in him. Everyone who knew him liked him. No one suspected that how he was in public wasn’t who he was in private. And I’d finally gotten tired of it all. Tired of no one believing me and everyone thinking I was crazy for leaving him. At least I knew well enough not to provoke him any further.
“Thanks, Mark,” I said, dropping the cardi into the box and hefting it into my arms.
“You sure you don’t want to come in?” He shot me a licentious smile.
“I’m quite sure,” I forced out, taking a step back.
His smile fell, and irritation flared in his eyes. “I’m over here, doing you a huge favor. I got all of your stuff together. I made myself available for you. And you can’t even do me the decency of coming inside?”
I was never going into that house again if I could help it.
“What? Too good for me now? Who else are you going to find that’s going to want you?”
I said nothing. Nothing that I wanted to say would be productive. I’d heard that from him before. I’d heard it enough to not know up from down. But even if no one else ever wanted me again, I didn’t want him.
Better yet, I was getting the hell out of Savannah soon enough if all went to plan.
“Unless you’re just running back to Ash,” Mark said.
I winced.
I shouldn’t have, but I did.
When we’d first gotten together, I’d confessed everything to him. How I’d loved Ash Talmadge my entire life while he loved someone else. And how when I finally—finally—had my chance, we’d fucked it all up.
Mark knew enough to be dangerous. Enough to make it so that I’d barely seen Ash for the seven months Mark and I had dated. And when we had run into Ash, Mark’s jealousy had run so hot that I knew better than to ever bring him up.
“Thanks for my stuff,” I said calmly, knowing if I rose to the bait that it was his way of holding me hostage. Then, I turned on my heel and all but ran away from his house.
I slammed the box into the passenger seat of my car. I’d go through it when I got into work. I still had some time before my meeting. I was ninety percent sure that he’d purposely kept something else to lure me back to his doorstep. Certainly wouldn’t put it past him.
I ripped the ticket off of my front window with an irritated growl and dropped into the front seat. Great. Just great.
This was just icing on the cake of a terrible day. I revved the engine and shot out onto the Savannah streets. At least I had a reserved parking spot for my business, and I pulled into it with relief. I pocketed the ticket, hefted the box into my arms again, and crossed Broughton Street to Ballentine—the fashion boutique that was my entire life.
I’d graduated from Parsons with a degree in fashion design, and after spending a couple of years in high-end clothing in Manhattan, I’d left that world behind to open my own business. A business that was currently thriving. Doing so well in fact that I had a meeting that afternoon about opening another location. I was excited and terrified, but anything was better than thinking about Mark.
The bell chimed softly overhead as I toed open the door to the store. My assistant was at the register, and half a dozen women were browsing the selections. Normally, I’d have a smile and kind word for every one of them, but I couldn’t manage it. No amount of debutante and pageant work could force a smile out of me today.
“Rough day?” Sasha asked.
“Cancel everything I have this afternoon, except the Charleston meeting.”