I spin around to face her, but I’m afraid to look at her. I’m afraid to see her face. “You see that woman over there?” I ask, not looking. I tilt my head back and to the right. Evie looks around me. “Don’t look!” I whisper vehemently.
“Well, how am I supposed to see her if I’m not allowed to look? Grady Parker, I swear to God, you—” I press my finger to her lips. She mutters around my finger until my hissing at her stops her tirade.
“That’s my old girlfriend,” I admit, wincing.
“Oh.” Evie stands up taller. “Tell me which one again.”
She tugs on my shirt until I say, “Dark hair. Green top. Has the mean little woman with blond hair standing next to her.” I step an inch to the side so she can look around me.
“What about them?” she asks. “You used to date the tall one, I’m guessing?”
“Yes.” Being tall myself, I’ve never liked having to break my neck to kiss somebody.
She stares at me. “And?”
“And I’m not her favorite person,” I say quietly.
She narrows her gaze as she stares at me. “Why? What did you do?”
“Why do you think I did anything?”
She huffs. “Because I know you, Grady Parker.”
“You don’t know shit,” I reply, and I instantly regret it. I try to take it back, but she’s already walking toward them. She’s pulling money out of her pocket on the pretext of making a donation, but I know exactly what she’s doing. She’s paying me back. Evie style.
I watch as she ambles, talking with random people, and then she drops some cash in the fishbowl. “Hey, Grady!” she calls out, her hands cupped around her mouth. “Didn’t you want to come over here and make a donation?”
I wave at her as a little round of clapping commences. “Yeah, be right there.” I walk as slowly as I can towar
d the table, but Evie has already left it. She’s with them. Right there. With the enemy.
I see her stop and admire Sarah-Beth’s blouse. Sarah-Beth grins and tells her where she got it.
“I’ll have to go and see if they have any more,” I hear her say as I walk over. I lift my hand and give Sarah-Beth a half wave that I turn into a head scratch.
“Sarah-Beth,” I say coolly.
“Grady,” she replies, as her nose rises two inches in the air. “Didn’t expect to see you here.”
“Well, I do live here,” I reply.
“Oh, I figured you’d have moved on by now,” she says, her voice cold. And once again it’s amazing to me that I used to admire this woman.
“Why would I do that? My business is here. My friends are here. I can’t think of anywhere I’d rather be.”
“Who’s she?” Sarah-Beth’s friend Allison asks. She glares at Evie, and I can feel Evie get a little taller as she stands there next to me.
“A friend,” I say. I’m about to give all the names and make all the introductions, but Allison cuts me off.
“Too bad that’s all you’ll ever be, sweetie,” Allison says. She looks at Evie like she pities her.
“What’s she talking about, Grady?” Evie asks me. But she has a twinkle in her eye, the kind I see when she’s giving me shit, and I know she’s enjoying this. She doesn’t have a worry in the world.
“Our boy Grady here, he’s a little bit of a commitment-phobe.” Allison reaches up to pat my chest. “Don’t tell him I told you so, though.”
Evie stares at where her hand is touching me and says, “I would suggest that if you want to keep that hand, you take it off his body.” Her voice is sharp as glass, and the threat floats there in the air, just waiting to slam into Allison at a thousand miles per hour. When it finally does, I hear Allison gasp. She does lower her hand, though.
Allison lets out a fake cackle. I know it’s fake because no laugh in the history of laughs has ever sounded so forced. “Grady, have you got this poor woman thinking you love her?” she taunts. “Tsk, tsk, tsk. You shouldn’t give women expectations you can’t live up to, Grady. It’s just not nice.” She turns to face Evie. “You see, our boy Grady here is afraid of commitment. Did I mention that already?”