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“Cassandra,” I said, my voice hard, jogging after her.

“They have history,” Cassandra said, without turning around. “They dated, briefly, after Eli’s divorce. Pretty sure, being an idiot, he dumped her and is now pissed that I dared to hire her at the restaurant.”

“She seems nice,” I said vaguely as we reached the exit door. Frankly, I didn’t give a shit about Eli and his relationship issues at the moment.

“Oh, are you interested?” she said as she pushed through the door, sending sunlight streaming inside. “I think she’s single.”

That was like a swift kick in the gut. “Jesus,” I said. “I’m not—”

I followed her outside, heat roaring in my chest. We were on the back side of the resort. Out here, beyond the concrete landing and steps, thick trees lined a forked path—one side led into the trees and the other around the building.

“Goddammit, will you let me talk?” I snapped.

Right. Yelling—that would solve this problem.

Yet it seemed to work for the moment. Cassandra turned around, fire in her eyes.

“Why should I let you explain yourself? There’s nothing you could tell me that would make what happened this morning okay.”

I gritted my teeth. “Cassandra, it’s not how it seems,” I said. “Between me and Lila.”

“Oh no? What, do you have some kind of open relationship?”

“It’s not like that either.”

“So you were just going to cheat, then?”

To my astonishment, I saw her eyes were wet with tears. I knew, then, why this was so huge. Someone had done this to her. I took a step toward her. “I would never cheat on someone I was married to.”

She frowned, and I realized it had been a strange way to phrase it.

But it was true.

“My dad, he cheated on my mom,” I said. “Several times.” I couldn’t keep the vitriol from my voice. “It destroyed our family.”

The truth was, Dad had left Mom for his secretary—the most clichéd trick in the book. He was now on wife number three.

Cassandra studied me for a moment. I must not have been doing a great job of hiding my feelings now because, for the briefest moment, she looked like she believed me. No, like she wanted to believe me. But she didn’t. And that somehow felt worse than her not believing me at all.

“I was going to fire you,” she said. “But you knew that, didn’t you? That’s why you launched into your little sales pitch. You wooed my brothers and sister right under my nose because that’s what you do, isn’t it? You spin things.”

The heat came back, burning up my lungs. “That’s not fair—”

“Oh yes it is. You think I can’t fire you now? Because I can. I—” she took a breath, hesitating. Then she said, “Actually, you know what? Iamfiring you. Right now. I didn’t want to hurt your wife by letting you go, but you know what? That’s not—”

“We’re not married,” I said.

Cassandra froze.

Fuck.

No one knew our marriage was fake outside of me, Lila, Brynn, and my brother Conrad.

I fisted my hands, but I didn’t let my eyes leave hers. She had to know I was telling the truth this time.

Cassandra’s brows bunched together. “What?”

I gritted my teeth, then absurdly, thought of something my father used to say. He may be the reason for every single one of my issues, but he’d wedged a few gems between his constant disapproving remarks.