Covet

by Rosanna Leo

  covet

  Book 2 Vegas Sins Series

  Rosanna Leo

  COVET

  Copyright © 2018 by Rosanna Leo.

  All rights reserved.

  First Print Edition: July 2018

  Crave Publishing, LLC

  Kailua, HI 96734

  http://www.cravepublishing.net/

  Formatting: Crave Publishing, LLC

  ISBN-13: 978-1-64034-406-8

  ISBN-10: 1-64034-406-3

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to locales, events, business establishments, or actual persons—living or dead—is entirely coincidental.

  Dedication

  For Anise Eden.

  Thank you for being such a good friend

  and kind soul.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Epilogue

  Chapter One

  “Let me get this straight.” Dana Hamill stopped stirring her coffee. “You’re breaking up with me? In a hospital cafeteria?”

  Her fiancé Tommy Parker picked at his muffin. “I just think, given the circumstances, we should maybe take a break.”

  Given the circumstances. “A break. So you’re not suggesting we book a vacation to Jamaica. You mean we should take a break from each other.”

  “Just to, well, re-evaluate our priorities.”

  Dana laughed. She couldn’t help it. This situation was ridiculous.

  “You’re taking it better than I thought you would.”

  “I’m not. I’m really not. If I’m laughing, Tommy, I guess it’s because of the way you decided to end our one-year engagement. Instead of breaking it to me gently in a private location, you decided to do it in a chintzy hospital café, over cold coffee and a stale bran muffin.”

  “I only ordered the muffin because I missed lunch.”

  “Fuck the muffin, Tommy. Just fuck the muffin.”

  The other customers in the café turned to look at Dana. Had she raised her voice? She didn’t care. Her world was crumbling, just as surely as the bits of dry muffin in Tommy’s hand.

  “Let’s take a breath and talk this through.”

  “Oh, you want to talk? Sure thing. We can talk. How about we talk about your tragic sense of timing?”

  “Dana, please try to understand.”

  She lay her hands flat on the table, in an attempt to stay grounded. “We just got out of the doctor’s office. She gave me a life-changing diagnosis. Five whole minutes later, you’re calling it a day.”

  Tommy seemed to wither under her gaze, shrinking lower in his seat. Good. She hoped he’d grow so small he’d disappear completely.

  Maybe he was acting on impulse, blindsided by what Doctor Batra had said. After all, this changed everything.

  In truth, for one crazy moment in the doctor’s office, Dana had seen this coming. She’d felt Tommy start to pull back the moment the doctor uttered the words she never thought she would hear.

  Premature ovarian failure.

  Three little words. Before today, she never would have even strung them together. Taken on their own, each word seemed innocent enough, but used in the same sentence, in the description that would forever define her, they were cataclysmic.

  Tommy’s retreat wouldn’t have been obvious to anyone other than her. It was just a shift in the atmosphere, a gradual movement. A sliver of rejection irritating her skin, even though she couldn’t see the point of entry. His posture had angled ever so slightly away.

  From her.

  As if she was now a thing to be avoided.

  She’d known in that moment but had hoped she was wrong. She’d definitely never expected him to act so quickly.

  He was clearly trying to dodge a bullet.

  No. She gripped the edge of the table. You are no man’s bullet. You are better than he is. This is Tommy’s loss.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Are you?”

  They were quiet for another couple of minutes. She could tell he didn’t know what to say. Hell, she barely knew what to feel. A year ago, she’d just been a woman suffering from missed periods, night sweats, and the odd hot flash. Strange for her age, but she’d attributed her symptoms to work stress. Tommy had been the one to urge her to call her doctor.

  “Dana.” Tommy reached for her hand. “You know me, probably better than I know myself. I can’t lie to you and tell you this…situation isn’t a deal breaker for me.”

  “This situation has a name. Say it with me. Premature ovarian failure.”

  His lips compressed.

  “You can’t say it, can you?”

  “If I thought we had options, baby, I’d be all in, but you heard what Doctor Batra said. Only a small percentage of women like you can conceive.”

  Women like you.

  Did this make her a different category of woman?

  Tommy continued. “Even IVF is a crap shoot, and I just don’t think I want to go down the road of adoption.”

  “What’s wrong with adoption?”

  “Nothing, but I want a child of my own.”

  “Any child we adopted would be our own.”

  Their friends Ginger and Maria had recently adopted a little boy, and if anyone dared to tell them they weren’t “real mothers,” or that Glen wasn’t their “real son,” they might very well get a fist in the face.

  Only this wasn’t about Ginger and Maria.

  Dana understood Tommy was coming from a different place, she really did. He was desperate for a family. Having grown up an only child, he’d been honest from day one about wanting to raise a sizable horde. I don’t want our child to feel lonely like I did growing up. I want to have at least three kids. As a parent, I want to be totally outnumbered.

  His enthusiasm for family had been infectious. He’d always made Dana laugh when he talked about taking their gaggle of children on outings and trips.

  She just had no idea he’d made a distinction between children.

  In fairness, she’d never really considered adoption either. She’d just always assumed pregnancy would happen.

  “I love you and I would like nothing more than to spend the rest of my life with you, but we need to be honest here. I’ve always been clear about what I want from life.”

  “And it’s not a woman like me.”

  “I want to do the right thing. I want to support you. Believe me, I do, but I don’t think I have what it takes to go through this. All those things the doctor was talking about…I can’t face it. I’m not strong enough, Dana. In some ways, I think you’ve always been the strong one.”

  He wasn’t far off the mark. There had been times when she’d doubted Tommy’s fortitude. Even at her grandmother’s funeral, he’d been the one to fall apart. Dana had been the one to greet the mourners, the one who’d kept her head. And when she’d looked to him at the end of that exhausting day, hoping to cry on his shoulder for a while, he’d disappea
red. She’d found him outside the funeral home, avoiding the situation with a couple of her idiot cousins.

  She’d ignored that red flag, even though it had waved at her like the flagman at the stock car races.

  Was she supposed to be the brave one now too? Was this what brave felt like? This sense of repugnant inevitability?

  “I’m scared I’ll have regrets. I’m scared I might resent you ten years down the road.”

  “You’re just scared, period.”

  He turned his cheek as if he’d been slapped. When his pale skin reddened, she fancied she could see the imprint of her fingers. If she thought it would make her feel any better, she’d slap him silly.

  “It’s true,” he admitted in a small voice. “I wish I was a better man for you. I wish I could say this won’t create a wedge between us, but I know it will.”

  For the first time in her life, Dana was unsure of what to do next. She’d always been the steady one, the one who had her life carved out. So far, she’d followed it to a tee.

  She’d gone to college on a full scholarship, had done a Bachelor of Commerce, specializing in hospitality and tourism. She’d landed a plum job with the tourism board right out of college and had moved up the ranks.

  It hadn’t been easy either. As a Black woman, she’d had to contend with her share of good old boys, most of them very old and very white. However, she’d built a reputation on being a solid worker and she was now responsible for booking some of the biggest conventions to Las Vegas.

  When she’d met Tommy Parker, falling in love with his deep voice and Jason Statham looks, she’d known they would build a life together.

  Only they wouldn’t now.

  At college, Dana had had a friend named Melanie who wanted to be a novelist. Any time life threw Melanie a curveball, she merely threw her hands up and shouted, “Plot twist!”

  That’s all this was. A plot twist. It didn’t mean Dana’s story was over. She just had to write a new ending.

  So she’d never conceive. It wasn’t the end of the world. She could adopt one day. She didn’t share Tommy’s aversion to it.

  Or maybe she wouldn’t adopt at all. Lots of people chose to remain childless. She had no doubt they were perfectly happy.

  Only she would have preferred to make the choice for herself. Her choice had been taken from her and now Tommy wouldn’t be there to help her adjust.

  She was on her own. This was her new reality.

  “I get being scared,” she said, “but this isn’t like you. The Tommy I fell in love with wouldn’t end it like this. The Tommy I fell in love with would have shown some consideration. When did you stop being that man?”

  He looked away. “Maybe this is who I’ve always been.”

  “Well, then shame on me.” Rage kicked in. Sneaky and sour, it insinuated itself into her core, making her taste bile. “What if I’d gotten this diagnosis two years into our marriage? What would you have done then? Divorced me?”

  When he didn’t respond, she knew.

  “You’re a selfish pig.”

  “Dana, I’m just trying to be honest without wasting your time. Please don’t hate me.”

  “Hate you? This isn’t about you.”

  “Isn’t it?”

  “Not nearly as much as it is about me. Tell me something. At what point during the doctor’s appointment did you start planning your escape?”

  “That’s not fair.”

  “Life’s not fair, clearly. You didn’t even have the decency to sleep on it. You’ve given me no time to process what’s happening. You’re just taking care of your own agenda. Here I am, in a goddamned cafeteria of all places, still reeling from the news, and you hit me with this now.”

  “I know you have the strength to get past this. It’s one of the things I’ve always loved about you. Besides, it could be worse. You could be sick. You could be dying.”

  “I can’t bear children, Tommy! What part of that don’t you understand?”

  He sat still. The harsh cafeteria lighting accentuated every hollow in his face, creating new ones as well. “I’m so sorry. I don’t want to break your heart, baby.”

  “I am not your baby, and you don’t get to comment on the state of my heart. My heart will be fine without you.”

  It had to be.

  She held her breath, waiting for the first chip chip chip of the invisible chisel, the one that would cause her heart to shatter. But that wasn’t what she felt. Instead, the beating organ inside her began to expand and harden, sitting like a weight in her chest. It was as if someone had just started pouring cement inside her chest cavity. Little by little, it took hold. It set like a newly-poured sidewalk in the sun. The heaviness pressed against her ribs, threatening to crack them.

  Tommy couldn’t break her heart with his flimsy apologies.

  It was unbreakable.

  He reached for her hand and fingered her engagement ring. Tears filled his eyes. His lip wobbled.

  The asshole had the nerve to cry?

  “I remember picking this ring out for you. It took me two hours. When you said yes, it was the happiest moment of my life.”

  Memories of his proposal flashed through her brain. Him, kneeling in the restaurant. All the other patrons clapping when she accepted him. The wonderfully snug bubble of warmth and security that surrounded her.

  “I want you to know I love you. I always will.”

  “Just not unconditionally.”

  He hung his head.

  She would not allow him to play the victim here. Dana wrestled her diamond engagement ring from her finger and set it on the table. The paler strip of brown skin underneath made her finger look so bare.

  “You can keep the ring if you’d like.”

  “Take the damn ring. I don’t need any mementos of this moment.”

  He slid the ring into his pocket. “Will you forgive me?”

  “Are you for real?”

  It was official. She would not pine over this man. She’d dodged the bullet instead.

  Tommy stood.

  “Oh, no, you don’t.” Dana stood and pushed away from the table. “You do not get to walk out before I do, do you hear me?”

  Channeling her musical idol, the great Ms. Diana Ross, Dana sashayed toward the cafeteria exit.

  Don’t look back.

  Her eyes stinging, she hurried down the hospital hallway and found the nearest stairway. Trying the door, she found it open. Escaping into the stairwell, she sat on one of the cold, concrete steps.

  Women like you.

  Dana waited for the tremors and the tears. They were coming. She knew it. Head in hands, she braced herself.

  Only the tears didn’t come.

  They would, of course. Eventually.

  When they did, the deluge might very well sweep her away.

  But not today. She wouldn’t allow it.

  “Breathe.” She rested her palms on her knees. “I’m not dying. This is not the end.”

  It was just an end.

  ***

  This was a night for forgetting.

  With that thought alone in mind, Dana opened the door to Joe’s Tiki Bar. She didn’t choose the spot because it was her favorite Vegas hangout. She chose it because it looked like it hadn’t been anyone’s favorite Vegas hangout in about thirty years.

  All five people inside turned to look at her, but she didn’t let that stop her. Forgetting was best done in a dark, dingy place that wouldn’t attract scores of tourists like the sleek, popular bars down the Strip.

  Ignoring the glowering wooden gods on all the posts and the cheeky hula girls smiling down from every piece of crap artwork, she chose a seat at the far end of the bar. It was darker in that corner because one of the overhead lights had burned out.

  It didn’t matter anyway. Darkness suited her mood right now.

  One man haunted her end of the bar, but he seemed more focused on his drink than on her, so she positioned herself two chairs down from where he sat.

 
; Although he was hunched over his drink, he appeared tall and had long limbs. She knew he had muscles because the fabric of his clothes strained a bit over his biceps and thighs. As she adjusted herself on her seat, she took a discreet look, but not because she was interested in his muscles.

  Her brain craved a distraction.

  He was white and had tawny hair, almost blond. He was handsome, at least from what she could tell of his profile under the muted lights. Although she hadn’t seen him head on, no man with that kind of defined jawline could be homely. He wore jeans and a t-shirt, but there was something regal about his appearance. Then again, maybe it was because he looked so distant and removed. If she hadn’t known he was sitting on a kitschy bar stool made out of fake bamboo, she would have thought he was a lonely king, perched high on his throne in his mountain kingdom, forgotten by his subjects.

  Girl, you need a drink. Yesterday.

  The bartender approached. “Hey, pretty lady. What can I get you?”

  “Just a glass of white wine, please.”

  As the bartender walked away to pour her drink, the blond man next to her spoke. “I wouldn’t, if I were you.”

  At first, Dana wasn’t sure he’d spoken to her because he continued to stare into his glass. “I’m sorry. Did you say something?”

  “I said, I wouldn’t order the white wine here if I were you. They don’t exactly serve vintages.” He turned on his creaky stool and faced her.

  Heat swarmed Dana’s cheeks. He was handsome.

  Frat boy handsome.

  Disney prince handsome.

  No. He wasn’t clean cut enough for either of those. There was something rugged in the cut of his chin, a hint of danger in his cat eyes.

  Disney princes would cower in front of this man.

  She cleared her throat. “Are you a wine expert?”

  “Not officially, but because of my work, I’ve picked up a few things.”

  “What do you do for a living?”

  “A bit of this. A bit of that.”

  “That doesn’t sound mysterious at all.”