Page 234 of Modern Romance October 2025 5-8

Anger flooded Charlotte. If she was a cartoon character, steam would have started spurting from her ears. To be told anything about Dante rankled. When it really shouldn’t! Naturally Jamie knew him better than Charlotte. But a hot possessive streak was overtaking every rational part of Charlotte’s brain.

‘Anyway,’ Charlotte said, lifting the bags a little higher. ‘I’d better get this in the fridge.’

‘Wait,’ Jamie’s voice was urgent now. ‘I just need a moment.’

Charlotte’s throat ached suddenly. Her shoulders felt weighted down.

‘Dante is a great guy,’ she said. ‘I don’t know exactly what’s going on between the two of you, and why he feels like he has to help you with this whole fake engagement or whatever, but before you make him go through with it, I thought you should know something.’

Charlotte could hardly breathe.

The insults just kept coming.

The fact that Dante had told Jamie about their arrangement—or, at least, that they weren’t a real couple. The fact that Jamie was implying Dante didn’t actually want to go through with it. That it was all because he felt a sense of obligation. The very bottom fell out of Charlotte’s world.

‘I’m still in love with him,’ Jamie said. ‘He’s not the kind of guy you easily get over. And the thing is, I think he still loves me.’

Charlotte blinked at the other woman, wondering if she had any idea how much this was hurting her to hear.

‘That’s between you and Dante,’ she said. ‘If it’s true, though, I would never stand in his way.’

Jamie puffed out a breath of relief. ‘Oh, good. That’s exactly what I was hoping you’d say. Will you tell him that? Tell him he’s off the hook, Charlotte?’

Charlotte stared at the other woman, not trusting herself to speak. She just nodded, as a thousand childhood fears and hurts slammed right back into her.

Feeling unwanted.

Surplus to requirements.

Loving someone and wanting, wishing, hoping they would love you back, when they just didn’t have it in them.

Thrust upon someone who wished she’d never been born.

There was second-hand trauma, too, when she thought of her mother and how she’d loved a man her whole adult life who’d already been in love with someone else.

It had destroyed her mother and Charlotte knew it would destroy her, too.

‘Thank you so much,’ Jamie cooed. ‘Allegra’s right. You’re quite lovely.’ And with that, the harbinger of Charlotte’s doom spun on her sneakered heel and sashayed elegantly down the street.

‘Cristo, you took your sweet time,’ Dante muttered, a moment after hearing the front door shut and dragging a hand through his hair as he came into the foyer to find Charlotte standing there, holding paper bags, staring into space.

She looked...pale.

‘Are you ill?’

Her eyes slid to his, staring at him, her lips parted, her cheeks almost paper white.

‘Charlotte, for the love of God, sit down, please, before you pass out.’

‘I’m okay,’ she husked, her brow furrowing. ‘I have to put these in the fridge.’

But she made no attempt to move. She just stared at him, as if she’d never seen him before.

Concern became a tide, surging through him. Whatever was happening he needed to know immediately. He needed to fix it. Even accepting that he couldn’t fix everything for everyone, he knew he would try for Charlotte. He knew she deserved that.

‘Charlotte?’

‘I met Jamie,’ she blurted out, her brows knitting together.