Page 27 of Settling the Score (The Karma Club #4)

If you’d asked him a month ago what his idea of perfect R Chuck smiled back. It was like another blade, slicing through his side.

Would Sienna want him to move home? To be in her life again?

Or would she rather start fresh with someone else, like Chuck?

She’d obviously been seeing guys in the ten plus years since they’d been a thing, so why hadn’t she got married? His heart skipped. Why hadn’t she had kids of her own? Because she’d been too cut up, after what had happened to their baby?

He took a long drag of his beer, trying not to think about what that must have been like for her. How devastating. How heart breaking.

How she must have hated him for not being there. For not answering her damned calls. For ignoring her, when she was reaching out because she had needed him to hold her and make everything better. Or at least to stop it from hurting so much.

He’d failed her.

What right did he have to even contemplate trying to get back in her life?

Because wasn’t that the crux of his fears, when it came to Sienna?

Not that he’d lose his focus on the game, like he’d told her.

But that he’d hurt her, one day, like his father had hurt his mother.

That he had those same genes, those same emotions, that same volatility bubbling beneath the surface.

He might have learned to control it from a young age by being the exact opposite of his father – by answering emotion with ice, by being cold and calculated instead of driven by feeling – but that didn’t change the fact those feelings were there.

Just like they were now, as he watched Chuck tuck Sienna’s hair behind her ear, earning a shy sideways smile from her, that made one of his hands threaten to form a fist, so he buried it deep in the sand instead and forced himself to look away.

To stare deep into the flickering flames while his pulse calmed down and he got a grip, once more.

He had hurt her.

Just like he’d sworn he never would.

He hadn’t meant to.

He’d thought leaving her would save them both from the inevitability of that. He’d been wrong.

He wasn’t wrong now though. At the end of this week, he would walk away from her for good – for her sake. No more fantasising about Ashbury Falls and the quiet, contented life they could have, if they were different people. No more wondering what she’d say if he even suggested it.

There was this week, and then, there was nothing. And that was okay by him. It had to be.

* * *

‘I know you can run, but I’m wondering,’ Chuck said, voice low, face close enough to her that Sienna presumed she was the only one to hear him.

‘Wondering what?’ she prompted, when he let the sentence taper off.

‘When I can collect on that dance you owe me.’

‘Dance?’

‘I beat you, fair and square. That was the prize, remember?’

She raised a single brow. Their race – and his stipulation for a prize – had completely slipped her mind.

‘What’s the matter? Don’t know how?’ he teased.

She arched a brow. ‘You’ve seen me dance.’

‘But you haven’t danced with me yet,’ he pointed out. ‘Isn’t that an oversight, when we’re partners?’

‘For the wedding,’ she said with a small smile.

‘Right.’ He grinned, and her smile naturally widened in reply.

He was effortlessly, roguishly charming, and super easy to be around.

‘So, how about it?’ He held out a hand to her, nodding his head in the direction of the makeshift dance floor in the dimly lit space in front of the DJ.

Quite a few people had gravitated that way and were dancing to the heavy beat of the song.

‘Hmm.’ She wrinkled her nose. ‘I guess you do raise a good point. I mean, I know I can dance, but you might have two left feet.’

He nodded sagely. ‘That’s true.’

‘And if you do, there’s still time to swap you out for a better model.’

‘Brutal,’ he said with mock offence. ‘Are you saying you won’t accept me despite my imperfections?’

‘Are you actually admitting you have imperfections?’

He laughed. ‘You sound surprised.’

‘You just seem a little, erm, how do I put this?’

‘Full of myself?’ he asked, but there was no offence in his features.

‘I was thinking sure of yourself,’ she responded, with a shake of her head. ‘That’s a small, but important, difference, you know.’

‘Is it?’

‘Well, yeah. I mean, my words are kind of a compliment, yours are not.’

‘Then let’s choose your turn of phrase. I’m sure of myself, yes.’

‘Except when it comes to dancing?’

‘How about we go find out,’ he said, standing and holding a hand to her. Sienna looked at it, her heart shifting a little. Not at the prospect of dancing with Chuck, but at the prospect of dancing with him in front of all these people. Or rather, one person in particular.

But that was silly.

Aiden and she were no longer a couple. They’d both had a lot of water under the bridge since they had been. Besides, Chuck was just a friend of a friend. Sure, he flirted like a dog chased its tail, but that didn’t mean anything. It was harmless. Fun.

‘Sure.’ She put her hand in his and pulled up to her feet, their bodies almost bumping into each other courtesy of the uneven sand.

‘Where are you two going?’ Paige asked with a wiggle of her brows.

Sienna looked down to see that Olly had come to join their group, and was sitting behind Paige, arms wrapped around her waist, chin resting on her shoulder.

Paige looked blissfully happy. Sienna’s heart lifted at the sight of them, just like it did when she saw Astrid and Blake together, or Chase and Bella.