Celt. (Den of Mercenaries #2)(2)

And second, and this was the most important, she would never, ever, speak to Rob again.

To say he had broken her heart was an understatement. Worse, she had been the one to catch them together, in her bed, after she had returned home early from a trip out to California to see her family.

She hadn’t felt anger at seeing them together.

No, that came later.

The emotion that had consumed her was something else entirely. She had never experienced anything like it before, and after waking up days later with a pain in her chest like her heart was trying to explode, she hoped she never would again.

But that was over three years ago, back when she still lived in the brownstone with her then roommate, Lauren. She wouldn’t lie and say that she didn’t still feel a pang in her chest when she saw the two of them together—hard to avoid your ex when he was dating your cousin, even when you tried to avoid them both—but she had moved on.

Or at least she thought she had.

Waking up in his bed didn’t allow much credence to that.

Dropping to her knees, she scanned the floor, finding her other shoe beneath the bed like it had been kicked under there. Keeping hold of it and its pair instead of pulling them on, she attempted to ease out of the room, but froze when she heard Rob shift. Braving a look back, she hoped he was still asleep and was merely moving to get more comfortable, but unfortunately for her, his sleepy gaze was trained directly on her face.

“What time is it?” He looked to the clock, answering his own question, then back to her. “You don’t have to leave. We can …”

“This was a mistake.” Amber was more than a little thankful that her voice didn’t waver despite the way she felt. “I’m not sure how we got here exactly, but this won’t happen again.”

Running a hand through his messy hair to push it back out of his face, he looked thoughtful for a moment, then understanding dawned. “Piper and me … we’re on a break, remember? I told you about it last night.”

She didn’t hate Piper, even if her cousin gave her every reason to, so ‘break’ or no ‘break,’ that didn’t make her feel any better. To her, a break still meant they were in a relationship, but were going through a rough patch.

So now, Amber had done the very thing that had been done to her.

Great, she was definitely going to be sick.

“It doesn’t matter, Rob. This still shouldn’t have happened.” Twisting the knob of the door, she pulled it open. “Let’s pretend like it didn’t, okay?”

“We didn’t have sex if that’s what you’re thinking,” Rob was quick to say.

Thank God for small favors. “Even better. Let’s pretend I was never here.”

“Amber, wait.”

Why she chose to stand there and listen to what he had to say, she didn’t know. “What is it, Rob?”

He shoved the covers off his legs, striding over to her with only a pair of boxers on—she hadn’t realized how much she hated boxers until after they broke up. When he reached for her hand, she immediately took a few steps back.

“There’s something I’ve been meaning to talk to you about,” he began carefully, his eyes scanning her face. “Ever since we broke up, I’ve been thinking that—”

She tuned his words out as she gaped at his audacity. He couldn’t be serious. He couldn’t possibly be about to say what she knew was at the tip of his tongue.

“I made a mistake,” he finished on a rush, looking at her with an expression that told her he was hoping for some other reaction than the one he was about to get.

“You’re not serious…”

Maybe years ago, that would have been what she had hoped to hear, but not now. Back then, she would have wanted to believe that it was a mistake, that he still loved her, and she was still the only person he wanted to be with. She would have forgiven him, moved past the indiscretion, and they could have continued on with their lives—even if she hated herself for it.

But no, he had humiliated her, then made it worse by actually dating Piper, and showing up to their family events with her like no one would notice.

No, it definitely wasn’t a mistake.

“This, even if nothing happened, was a mistake, Robin,” Amber continued, using the name she knew he hated. “Whatever conversation we had last night, or whatever notion I entertained talking to you, was a mistake. You cheating on me with my cousin and staying with her for this long is not a mistake. Just … leave me alone. Don’t call me.”

This time, she didn’t linger, not even when he called her name again.



* * *



Back home, Amber scrubbed the night away in the shower, lathering up her hair, not wanting to think about where she had been and who she had been with. It was better left as another bad memory.

Since it was only ten in the morning, and she didn’t have any plans for the day, she popped a couple aspirin, and ate greasy diner food she had grabbed on her way home. There was nothing quite like fat and calories to cure a hangover.

Amber was flipping through channels when her phone rang. Leaving her plate, she sidestepped the towering boxes that overwhelmed her living room—trying to sort through it all was not at the top of her list of things to do at the moment—and dashed for her phone before it could stop ringing.