Brooke’s jaw dropped. “Oh. My. God. You gotta be kidding me!”
“I wish.”
“What was he thinking?” Brooke put her tea down, went to the fridge and pulled out a bottle of Chardonnay. “Holy shit. I need a drink.” She poured a big glass. “I’d offer you some, but…”
“Go ahead. Just because I can’t drink doesn’t mean you shouldn’t.”
Brooke took a lengthy sip. “This is huge. Just imagine the scandal.” Then her eyes narrowed. “Oh wait. That’s why you said Catherine’s single.”
“Yup.”
“And earlier today Gavin went to—”
“Houston. And it wasn’t Hilary who called while we were at the hangar.”
Brooke put it together. “Catherine?”
“Looks like it.”
“Bastard.” Brooke reclaimed her seat. A furious shade of red blotched her cheeks. “So he told you that Catherine’s free again…when? Over your appetizers?”
“No. He never showed up.”
“He stood you up on your anniversary?”
Amandine nodded.
“Incredible. But wait…how did you find out about Catherine?”
“At La Mer, Mark Pryce came to my table to chat. When I told him Gavin was in Houston, he immediately said, ‘Damage control’.”
Brooke shook her head slowly in her “oh no he did not” mode. “So he, Mark Pryce—no relation to the Lloyds—knew. When you, Amandine Monroe Lloyd, did not.”
Amandine nodded, then blinked away tears. “With a little prompting, he told me everything.”
It had hurt so much to hear Mark tell her something she thought should’ve come from Gavin or Catherine. Maybe they thought it didn’t concern her. Amandine had always sensed some distance between her and her husband. There had been times when she felt like he was utterly remote and unreachable, except in bed.
But they couldn’t spend their lives in bed, could they? And it wasn’t like they were spending that much time making love anyway. They hadn’t had sex in over a month. He’d been too busy.
Brooke moved next to Amandine. “Gavin is a heartless ass.”
“But he’s not. One of the reasons why I fell in love is his generosity.”
“A guy as rich as he is can afford to write a few fat checks to charity.”
“It’s more than that.” Amandine took a sip of her tea. “You remember the BlueWheels bankruptcy?”
Brooke nodded. “That was ugly. A lot of people got screwed.”
“Mostly blue-collar workers who’d dedicated their lives to the company, which had promised them pensions, medical, the whole thing. Except the CEO took the money and ran off to Macau. By the time they found him, he’d gambled most of it away.”
“So what’s that got to do with Gavin?”
“He took over the pension funds at the request of the workers’ reps.”
“Really?”
“Yeah.”