The Bride Next Door

by Hope Ramsay

  “I had to give it to her. She was working with Leslie and the tenants. They had a right to know.”

  David blew out a long, exasperated sigh and leaned back in his big leather chair. “You’re right, but did you have to involve Willow’s mother?”

  “I’m right?” Matt turned from the window. “You think I’m right?”

  David nodded. “I hate it when my mother-in-law starts protesting. It almost always upsets someone in the family. But I guess that’s my cross to bear, not yours.” He gave Matt a long, sober look.

  “I’m happy to take the heat for you this time.”

  “Thanks. Your father is probably going to be furious.”

  “Why? I didn’t think he was a big Bill Cummins fan.”

  “He’s not, but he wants to turn you into a small-town lawyer. And mounting crusades is not exactly what small-town lawyers do.”

  “Unless they’re Atticus Finch,” Matt muttered under his breath. Although the protagonist in To Kill a Mockingbird hadn’t intended to mount any sort of crusade. He’d just been trying to get justice for his client. Matt turned back to stare at the protesters. “Do you mind if Arwen and I go out there and say hi?”

  “I have a feeling I couldn’t stop you even if I tried.”

  “Thanks.” Matt turned and hurried down the hallway into Arwen’s cubbyhole office, which was even smaller than his. She looked up from her laptop as he entered, and it struck him that she looked a little haggard and pale. What was up with her anyway? She’d been grumpy for the last two weeks. “You need me for something?” she said in a less-than-welcoming tone.

  “Yes. I need you to get up and leave this office.”

  “What?”

  He took two steps into her cubbyhole, gently snagged her by the upper arm, and gave her a tug. “You need some fresh air. Besides, there are more important things than the next divorce case. Get up.” He yanked her out of her chair.

  “Matt, stop. What are you talking about?” Arwen dug in her heels.

  “Have you read the Winchester Daily today?” he asked.

  “Uh, no. Why?” She shook her head.

  “Because the front page is an exposé of Bill Cummins, his high-handed tactics, and his cushy relationship with GB Ventures.”

  Arwen’s eyes grew round. “Oh my God. Did you give our file to the Daily?”

  He shook his head. “No. I followed the advice of a very smart woman. I gave our file to Linda Peterson. She’s out there in front of city hall right now.”

  Arwen grinned. “I knew I liked you, despite your reputation. Does your father know you did this?”

  “Not yet. But he will eventually. Come on, let’s go join the fun before he rains on my parade.”

  Matt took Arwen by the hand and pulled her down the hallway, through LL&K’s front doors, and out onto the sidewalk in front of city hall. Along the way he stopped at a newspaper dispenser, where he purchased a copy of the paper for Arwen.

  She took one look at the headline—JEFFERSON COUNTY COUNCIL CHAIR HAS CUSHY DEAL WITH GB VENTURES—and squealed.

  “Oh my God. I love you. Thank you for not giving up on this. Especially since I’ve been so out of it these last few weeks. I’m happy someone had a little courage.” And then she threw herself into Matt’s arms and kissed him right on his cheek.

  A mixed bag of emotion slammed into Courtney’s chest as Arwen threw her arms around Matt’s neck. The sound of Arwen saying “I love you” to Matt Lyndon traveled across the space between them like a nuclear missile.

  Courtney froze where she stood amid the protesters. Fury, jealousy, confusion, shame, and a healthy dose of self-loathing combined into a toxic brew that buckled her knees.

  It was almost as if God had decided to punish her for something.

  A moment ago, Sid had announced that he and Leslie were going to elope to Vegas and then move to Phoenix. He’d seemed so proud of himself for arguing Leslie out of her foolish last stand at Dogwood Estates.

  Courtney had been searching for something nice to say about this news when she’d seen Arwen and Matt giving each other intimate face time.

  What an idiot she’d been. All that tender lovemaking. All those words whispered in the dark. The flowers. The cupcakes. Dinner at the Red Fern. All of it was a sham. A game. The usual BS that any Hook-up Artist knew how to manage.

  The pieces of the puzzle suddenly locked into place.

  Poor Arwen. She was so hungry for romance that Matt’s flowers and cupcakes had probably turned her head. And she was probably too ashamed to admit it. No wonder she’d been avoiding Courtney. She probably didn’t want to hear any lectures about sleeping with a player.

  Who did?

  And, of course, since they’d hardly spoken the last few weeks, Arwen didn’t have any idea that Matt had moved in next door or that Courtney had broken her own set of rules when it came to Hook-up Artists.

  An icy pain lanced her heart. How could she have been so stupid? How could Arwen have been so stupid?

  “Hey, hon, are you okay?” Sid asked.

  She shifted her gaze. Unable to speak, all she could do was shake her head.

  “Honey, don’t be sad. Please. For the first time in more than a year, I feel as if I have something to look forward to.”

  And Sid looked that way too. He carried a poster board sign bearing a picture of a bulldozer with the red circle-and-slash symbol superimposed on it. Dressed in a pair of madras shorts and a Grateful Dead T-shirt, Sid bore no resemblance to the ghost of a man he’d been just a few weeks ago. Leslie had changed all that. And Courtney was happy for them, even as her own heart shattered into a million pieces.

  “I’m fine. I’m glad you found a reason to go on living.” She turned away from him so he wouldn’t see the tears welling up in her eyes.

  “No, you’re not fine. What is it?”

  She brushed the tears away with the palm of her hand. “I should have brought my sunglasses,” she said. “Maybe I should go home and get them.”

  “Courtney,” Sid said to her back, “don’t be sad.”

  “I’m not,” she said in a watery voice as she took off across the street, giving Arwen and Matt a wide berth. Not that they would have noticed her. They were holding hands and smiling as they came down the walk from their office building.

  By the time she got home, her tears had dried up and her reeling emotions had settled into a stone-cold fury. She scoured her apartment collecting the stuff Matt had left there—a T-shirt, a pair of socks, a UVA sweatshirt, and a David Baldacci paperback. She dumped them in a heap in front of his door.

  Then came the hard part. Would she give Doom back to him? Or would she keep both cats?

  She spent the next thirty minutes consuming a pint of Ben and Jerry’s Chocolate Therapy ice cream as she considered this question.

  No. For this betrayal, Matt had to lose his cat. There had to be consequences.

  Besides, Melissa, who had hand-raised these kittens, wouldn’t want Porthos to end up with someone who would name him Dr. Doom. And Melissa wouldn’t be happy with Matt for coming into Courtney’s life and ruining her long-standing friendship with Arwen. And for another thing, a woman in Courtney’s predicament needed more than one cat.

  Especially with Sid moving away. That thought brought another wave of tears. Yes, she was utterly alone now. A woman like her needed more than one cat. And the two cats were a comfort, especially right now. Both of them had curled up beside her on the couch, and their contented purrs were the only thing keeping her from flying apart into a million shattered pieces.

  The last thing she expected in that moment was for Matt to come knocking at her door. It was barely 10:30 a.m. She’d expected him to remain at the office, hanging out with Arwen. She’d expected him to stay late at work, the way he almost always did.

  But instead he was pounding on her door, banging away at her resolve. Dammit.

  “Courtney. I know you’re in there. Answer the damn door.”

  “Go awa
y,” she finally shouted.

  “What the hell is up with you? Why’d you put my stuff in the hallway?” The angry edge in Matt’s voice annoyed the crap out of her. Where did he get off being angry anyway? He wasn’t the aggrieved party.

  Aramis, or was it Porthos—sometimes it was hard to tell these cats apart—looked up at her with a pair of green eyes. Somehow the cat seemed to be judging her. It had to be Porthos. He probably wanted to go home.

  She scattered the cats as she got off the couch. She yanked the door open. “I’m not giving Porthos back. You don’t deserve him.”

  He stood there with the patented Lyndon frown riding his forehead and his dark eyes sparking with a fury of his own. “What the hell is wrong with you? Leslie is all upset. She’s starting to think maybe she and Sid are rushing things. How could you be so cruel?”

  “What? I told Sid I was happy for him.”

  “Then why did you run away in tears? Honestly, Sid would have come himself, but I told him I’d haul you back down there. Come on. This is a day for—”

  “Shut up. Don’t. Just don’t.”

  “Don’t what? And what’s with my stuff in the hallway?”

  “You have no clue, do you? You think you’ve completely fooled me.”

  “Fooled you. About what?”

  “You and Arwen. It all makes perfect sense. You with the late nights, and her wanting someone who could romance her. I should have seen it. I’m such an idiot.”

  He stood there blinking at her, surprise all over his handsome face, as if it had never occurred to him that she’d figure it out. What was it about Hook-up Artists anyway? Every damn one of them was so sure of himself.

  “I can’t believe this,” he said.

  “What about it can’t you believe?”

  “Everything.” He huffed out a breath and leaned into the doorframe. “You know, Courtney, you have a serious trust problem. And even though I understand the reasons for it, I’m not sure I can live with it. I sure as hell don’t want to be constantly judged and found wanting. That’s bullshit, you know?” His voice had gone low and hard, the anger red-hot.

  “Really? You’re going to go all Man Baby on me and accuse me of being the problem?”

  “Yeah, I am.” A muscle pulsed in his jaw as he pushed away from the doorframe. He took one backward step. “You should go back and tell Sid and Leslie that they have your blessing.” He turned and gathered his stuff. But before he slipped his key into his front door, he turned and looked over his shoulder. “I want Ghul back.”

  “Ghul? He’s not yours.”

  “You took Dr. Doom that day you left in the wee hours of the morning. You can keep him. But I want Ghul back.”

  “In your dreams.” She slammed the door in his face.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Matt dropped his stuff on the floor inside the door and headed back to the office, head down, teeth clenched, and with a strange hollow place in his chest. The morning’s happiness had evaporated.

  How dare she? After the things he’d done, the things he’d said, the way he’d acted. Didn’t she understand? How could Courtney possibly think that he’d hook up with Arwen?

  Sure, he had become pretty good at picking up women and showing them a good time. But he wasn’t a jerk. He’d never been a jerk. He didn’t cheat on the woman of the moment, even if the relationship was understood to be strictly physical and strictly short-term.

  He did not mess around with the women he worked with.

  And he would never mess around with the best friend of the woman he was sleeping with.

  He was truly insulted by her accusations. Insulted and saddened. How could he possibly continue a relationship with a woman who was that insecure? He’d always be looking behind his back. He’d always be trying to prove himself.

  And wasn’t he tired of doing that? All the time?

  He bypassed the protest, which seemed to have gained momentum in the last hour, and returned to his windowless office, where he threw himself into his chair and sank his head in his hands.

  Damn. He probably should have defended himself. But what was the use? It totally destroyed him to think that Courtney believed he was capable of that kind of behavior. Maybe he should ask Arwen to set her straight. It seemed like the logical course, but that would require him to tell Arwen how much he truly cared about Courtney. And there was still that small matter of trust.

  He was sinking into despair when his desk phone rang. It was Marie Coleman, Dad’s assistant, with the summons Matt had been expecting all day.

  Well, bring it on. After the fight with Courtney, he didn’t care what Dad had to say. He stalked through the hallways of LL&K, a tight knot of hostility twisting his chest.

  Dad’s office was larger than David’s, with an even better view of the protesters marching in front of city hall. The hundred-year-old walnut paneling in Dad’s office had been meticulously restored a number of years ago, and the antique furniture added a sense of decorum and power. The office always smelled faintly of lemon oil and beeswax.

  Dad stood at the window, his hands behind his back, staring at the protesters. Their chants sounded faintly through the paneled walls and heavy draperies. Matt took several steps across the hand-knotted Persian rug before he realized Dad wasn’t alone. Brandon lounged in one of the oxblood leather Queen Anne side chairs, looking relaxed with one leg cocked up over the knee of the other.

  What the hell?

  “Sit,” Dad commanded with a backward wave at the second wing chair.

  “Brandon, what brings you out this way?” Matt asked as he crossed the room toward the chairs. He stopped to shake Brandon’s hand.

  Brandon, one of his oldest friends, gave him only fleeting eye contact. Matt shook off his concern and focused on the remnants of his fury. He took a seat, crossed his legs, and waited.

  Dad finally turned away from the window with a long, exasperated sigh. He settled into the gigantic leather chair behind his desk and leaned forward. “Matthew, I have two words for you: Jerry Beyer.”

  “Who?”

  Dad rolled his eyes—an expression Matt had seen all his life. When Dad rolled his eyes like that it always meant that Matt had screwed up something that Dad regarded as inherently simple. “You’re kidding me, right?” Dad said. “What kind of idiot are you?”

  Matt clamped his teeth together.

  Dad turned toward Brandon. “Explain it to him.”

  “Jerry Beyer is the CEO of GB Ventures, LLC,” Brandon said.

  A few puzzle pieces fell into place. “Oh, okay. I get it. I imagine he’s not happy. So what?”

  “Jerry is one of Heather’s biggest contributors,” Brandon said slowly, as if Matt were too stupid to understand. Heather was David’s sister. She also happened to represent Jefferson County in the United States House of Representatives. Last fall, Brandon had rejected a job here at LL&K to go to work on her Capitol Hill staff.

  “Jerry is furious,” Brandon added. “He’s threatening to withdraw his support this fall unless David calls his mother-in-law off, which David has refused to do.”

  “Maybe not taking money from GB Ventures’s CEO would be a good thing,” Matt said, meeting his friend’s stare. “Come on, Brandon. You don’t want Heather taken down because of the crap that’s going on here, do you?”

  “Who says there’s any crap going on? The Jefferson County Chamber of Commerce named Jerry Beyer its man of the year last year precisely because of what he’s done to improve things. He’s single-handedly responsible for a lot of the growth we’ve seen the last couple of years.”

  “Growth that has displaced people who have lived here for generations.”

  “Come on. We’re talking about progress. We’re talking about growing the county’s tax base. We’re talking about jobs.”

  Matt shook his head. “I’ll give you the tax base but not the jobs. The people being displaced are the ones who work for Uncle Jamie harvesting grapes and tending apple orchards. Or the people
working for Willow at Eagle Hill Manor. Where are those people going to live when every house in Jefferson County costs half a million dollars? And besides that, it’s wrong for the county to help a single developer buy land at less than fair market value. That’s a distortion of the market.”

  Dad slapped his hand down on his desk. “Enough! Matthew, I told you weeks ago that I wanted you to drop this issue. Why didn’t you?”

  Matt stood up. “Because I cared about my client. The people living in Dogwood Estates have all lost their homes because of Jerry Beyer. And if Heather wants to associate herself with a guy like that, then so be it. But if that’s what she’s about, she isn’t going to get my vote in November.”

  Dad stood up. “I don’t give a damn about your vote. It’s your loyalty that I question. I need to know that the people associated with this firm are being honest with me. You and Arwen Jacobs have broken that trust. You’ve given me no other choice but to fire the both of you.

  “Get your stuff and leave the office immediately. Marie will escort you out of the building.”

  Drinking alone at the Jaybird Café was a pathetic habit—one Courtney would try to break next week, or maybe the week after that, when her broken heart had mended. For now, the Jaybird’s exposed-brick walls and scuffed pine floors were like a second home. And the barstools were surprisingly comfortable, even in the afternoon.

  She intended to anesthetize herself before Ryan Pierce showed up and gave her a lecture. She had just finished her first Manhattan when Arwen strode through the front door at 3:00 p.m., pale-faced and red-nosed.

  Another wave of fury washed over Courtney. How dare Matt make Arwen cry? Courtney hopped down from the barstool and intercepted her friend. “Oh, honey, I told you not to tangle with that guy. He’s a total jerk. Come over to the bar, and I’ll buy you as many margaritas as you need. I’ve missed you.”

  She wrapped Arwen in a big hug, willing to forgive her for kissing Matt because, really, Matt was to blame. How was someone like Arwen going to resist Matthew, especially with all his poetry and romance?

  “And I forgive you for everything.”