Page 10 of Settling the Score (The Karma Club #4)

There was no dinner, just a heap of canapes being carried around on trays by waiters who seemed to have been trained in the subtle art of not giving out food, because no matter how hard Sienna tried to death stare them into coming her way, they remained relentlessly oblivious.

She was starving . And not for tiny circles of quiche, either, but a big, greasy burger. She thought longingly of the way Luke – the chef at the diner she worked at back in Ashbury Falls – had of crisping bacon and her mouth actually exploded with little bubbles of saliva.

Maybe she could distract a waiter and take a whole tray up to her room? Feast on thirty-seven of the delicate pastries before coming back down, ready to continue with Operation Hurt the Heartbreaker.

‘You look tired.’ She knew Aiden’s voice even without turning to face him. Mentally, she winced.

Was looking tired technically something she could incorporate into her plan? Wasn’t she meant to be some kind of Diana goddess all weekend? Stunning and indefatigable?

‘I’m not,’ she lied, thinking of the shifts she’d had in the lead up to this trip, and the paper she’d had due, not to mention it being her weekend with Melanie sleeping over.

‘I got you a coffee anyway.’

She bit back an actual groan as she turned to face him now.

‘You still drink the stuff?’

‘Drink it?’ She looked at the mug longingly.

‘Not only do I drink it, it would not be an exaggeration to say the most meaningful relationship in my life is pretty much the one I have with coffee. Gimme.’ She held out a hand, ignoring the way her stomach went into backflip mode as he passed over the mug.

Or the way her fingers tingled with the force of exploding fireworks when their hands brushed at the moment of coffee cup contact.

Screw you, body. Talk about betrayal. We’re supposed to be ignoring him.

Definitely not feeling little zippedy zoos when our fingers brush.

She looked away again quickly, sloshing a little of the coffee onto the tiled floor.

‘Sooo,’ he said, and out of the corner of her eye, she caught the way his hand jammed into the pocket of his suit pants.

‘Apart from coffee,’ he said, then trailed off into nothing, as if he realised the inherent awkwardness of asking the supposed one-time love of his life about her current dating situation.

He cleared his throat; tried again. ‘Are you seeing anyone?’

She wanted to shout at him. She wanted to shove him.

She wanted to pour something – though admittedly not the steaming hot coffee – on his head.

She wanted to rage and roar and tell him to go to hell, that of course she wasn’t seeing anyone, because how could she ever, ever trust someone again after the way Aiden had sucked her in then so royally screwed her over?

Once, a long time ago, Bella had kept them up all night reading quotes from The Art of War over a video call, and Sienna vaguely remembered there was a line in there about biding your time, some reference to playing the long game.

Or maybe she was getting mixed up; maybe it was one of Bella’s little bits of war wisdom or something.

Either way, Sienna knew that blurting out her anger at Aiden here and now would be immensely satisfying in the moment, but utterly emptying afterwards.

She hadn’t walked through the emotional equivalent of the fires of hell for a decade to lose her shit at the first provocation from the arrogant piece of work.

‘Not right now,’ she said, sweetly, hoping that he took from that some kind of implication that she had been, up until recently. Then, she added, as if as an afterthought, ‘At least, no one serious.’

‘Cool.’

Cool? Cool ? She ground her teeth and looked across the room, to where all of her supposed avenging friends were dancing their little hearts out with the loves of their lives.

Astrid and Blake, Paige and Olly, Bella and Chase.

All so happy. So oblivious to the currents of rage flooding through Sienna.

As if misunderstanding her, he followed her gaze to the dance floor, cleared his throat and said, ‘Did you… want to dance?’

Only if it meant she could stamp on his foot, she thought mutinously. ‘I mean, you’ve brought me coffee,’ she reminded him, lifting it higher and breathing in the intoxicating fragrance, imitating a smile. ‘I should probably drink that first.’

‘Coffee will wait,’ he said.

She glanced up at him. ‘Whereas you won’t?’ The question came out sharper than she’d intended, reminding them both of the fact that no, he hadn’t in fact waited.

He frowned. ‘That’s not what I meant.’

She took a sip, letting the flavour ride little pleasure waves down to her belly. She was being a coward, she acknowledged. After all, having come this far, why not dance with the man? What was the possible harm in something so perfectly innocuous?

‘I thought you hated dancing, anyway,’ she said, having another quick sip of her drink.

‘You’re the one who said we’ve changed.’

‘Are you trying to tell me now you love it?’

His grin pulled at the fabric of her gut. ‘I wouldn’t go that far. I tolerate it, for the right companion.’

‘Companion? Have you also been reading Jane Austen in your spare time?’

He arched a brow. ‘Is this whole week going to involve you giving me a hard time?’

‘Don’t act like you don’t secretly love it,’ she said with a wink.

He laughed then, the sound raw and husky and so damned addictive. ‘Jeez, Mastrangelo. I’ve missed you.’

It was entirely, absolutely the wrong thing to say.

Utterly disastrous. Because it reminded her of just how he’d left her in the lurch, and how long ago that had been, how long it had been since she’d heard from him, how he’d been perfectly happy to walk out of her life when he was her only, only friend in the whole wide world.

The only person who knew and understood what her life was like.

How much he clearly hadn’t missed her, or he would have come back for her.

She blinked quickly, turning away from him on the pretence of putting her coffee cup on a nearby table.

When she turned to face him, she smiled, though it felt stretched and forced. ‘Sure, okay. Let’s dance.’

They didn’t touch as they walked towards the dance floor, but when they stepped onto it, Paige gave Sienna a subtle thumbs up behind Olly’s back, and Bella winked at her encouragingly.

Sienna drew in a deep breath, turning to face Aiden, expecting him to assume an old-fashioned pose, with one hand on her hip and the other clutching her hand.

Instead, he latched both hands behind her back, drawing her close to him, leaving her to put her hands up and wrap them around his neck.

Bringing their bodies close. So close she could feel his chest, his strong legs, his taut stomach.

All of him. So close she could smell his musky fragrance – a different cologne to what he’d worn back then, but somehow so perfectly him.

So close that when she looked up, she could make out each and every piece of stubble, and the silvery scar that ran down his cheek, from when he was sixteen and a puck had cut across his face when he’d been walking off the rink.

She remembered tracing the line with her finger – back then it had been an angry red and purple, but time had faded the wound.

Like it was supposed to do with all wounds, she remembered.

Only it didn’t always work like that, because time had passed and being here with Aiden, his rejection was every bit as cutting to Sienna as it had been back then.

Worse, because she’d been through so much, like the baby they’d made and lost, and her father’s legal troubles, and her disastrous rebound relationship with Cory.

All without him at her side. All because he’d left her.

She tilted her chin, determinedly focusing on a point to the left of his shoulder.

‘So, your friend Bella. What’s she like?’ he asked, conversationally.

‘Why?’

‘She’s my partner for the wedding.’

‘Ah.’

‘She seems… nice,’ he responded after a beat.

Sienna’s smile was genuine. ‘She’s great.’

‘How do you know her?’

‘Same way I know Astrid.’

‘The airport?’

She felt something like guilt tighten in her gut but she ignored it. ‘Yep.’

‘Seriously?’

‘We were snowed in.’

‘And Paige?’

‘Yep.’

He let out a low whistle. ‘How long were you delayed for?’

She laughed softly. ‘Long enough. Or maybe it didn’t matter,’ she said, after a beat. ‘I think we knew within minutes that we were like soulmates.’

‘Soulmates?’

‘What, you don’t believe in the concept?’

His eyes probed hers and he shrugged one shoulder. ‘Do you?’

She refused to think about how much she’d believed in soulmates, once upon a time. ‘The friendship variety? Oh, I definitely believe in that.’

He made a gruff noise that could have been acceptance, or dismissal. ‘But not romantic?’

Sienna sighed. She contemplated saying something flirty. Teasing him, making him laugh. But he was sailing too close to the wind, and she was only human. ‘Aiden, come on,’ she said, stopping dancing and slowly dropping her hands.

‘What?’

‘Do you really want to talk about our love lives? I mean, I know it was a long time ago, but don’t you find it kind of weird to discuss our other partners with one another?’ She leaned forward then, unable to resist adding, ‘You were my first lover, after all.’

First. Not only.

He had the grace to look embarrassed. ‘I was just showing an interest in your life.’

‘You don’t have to,’ she said with a lift of one shoulder.

‘We’re nothing to one another now, and that’s fine with me.

And I presume it’s fine with you. We’re just here to support two people we love as they get married.

Beyond that… we don’t need to say or do anything to one another.

’ It felt like the throwing down of the gauntlet.

Or it felt incredibly stupid, given what she was supposed to be doing.