What He Never Knew (What He Doesn't Know, #3)(109)

“I didn’t think of anything,” I reminded her. “I bought season passes for my husband to give to him on his thirty-fifth birthday.”

“Your cheating husband,” she reminded me, steering us left toward the street lined with sports bars. And though my face didn’t show a single sign of weakness at those words, my stomach tightened into a knot.

Belle was literally the only person who would ever know that Carlo was unfaithful, other than the woman he cheated on me with — and not even she knew that I knew. I’d only told Belle after Carlo had passed away, mainly because I knew she’d speed up the process of his death before the good Lord could take him if she found out about his infidelity.

Belle was the kind of best friend who loved fiercely. She was honest with me always — bluntly so — and she never let me get too comfortable in my little land of control. Just when she saw me slipping into any kind of complacency, she would challenge me.

I hated her as much as I loved her for that.

Still, while I knew I’d need someone to talk to about Carlo’s infidelity, someone who knew the whole story, sometimes I regretted telling her. Where I was all about suppressing, boxing difficult emotions away and focusing on tasks I could complete, Belle was a processor.

She was not the kind of girl to let something go.

Especially this kind of something.

“And I say this with the utmost respect for you and him and all of God’s creatures,” she continued, drawing a cross over her shoulders with her free hand. “But he’s not here anymore, Gemma. May he rest in peace.” She paused. “And also, be castrated in the name of Jesus, amen.”

“Belle.”

“I’m kidding.” She paused again. “Sort of.”

I was ashamed of the small smile climbing on my lips in that moment. If he was still here, if my original plan had actually come to fruition, these types of jokes would be fine to make. After all, what woman didn’t support her best friend after she was cheated on? Comments of castration and ill-bidding were welcome, and most certainly expected.

But when he was no longer breathing, when cancer had taken his life before I could take my life back from him, it wasn’t the same. It was cruel, and heartless, and it produced a type of guilt that sat low and unsettling in your stomach.

This was my entire existence, it seemed, for the past several months.

“While I appreciate the attempt to make me laugh, I’m not ready to make jokes about Carlo like that,” I said softly. “I probably won’t ever be.”

“I’m sorry,” Belle said on a sigh, squeezing my arm as we flowed with the crowd. “Really, I am. That was too far. You know me, I can’t help but make jokes, even when it’s wildly inappropriate. Remember when my cousin had a funeral for his cat?”

“And you made a cake that looked like a litter box with little pebbles of poop, and wrote Sorry your cat hit the shitter, at least you don’t have to change any more litter on it with hot pink frosting?”

Belle pointed at me. “Exactly. I’m awful at death, it makes me feel itchy and so I resort to humor. Apparently, very poorly placed humor. But,” she continued, taking that finger she had pointed at my face and re-directing it to point at my lady bits. “Let’s bring this back to the real subject at hand, which is that that region is about as dry as the Sahara Desert.”

I rolled my eyes, pulling my arm from where it was wrapped around hers to fish in my purse. I rummaged around for my lipstick as we made our way toward the South Loop bars.

Play the humor card, Gemma. You’re good. Everything’s okay.

“This region is just fine, thank you,” I told her, gesturing to my crotch as I finally found my lipstick. I rolled the burgundy tube up, pointing it directly at my best friend. “It gets plenty of action.”

Belle scoffed. “Oh, right. Forgive me for thinking a twenty-nine-year-old woman might want something more than a dildo with three vibration speeds.”

“Four,” I corrected, smoothing the deep burgundy cream over my top lip and blotting it together with the bottom. “And this twenty-nine year-old woman is perfectly content.”

Belle huffed, and for the rest of our walk to the strip of bars we frequented after games, she continued, on and on about the importance of my libido not going stale and my vagina getting action.

This was part of what infuriated me about Belle, and part of what I loved — she could argue a fish into buying an oxygen tank. In Belle’s mind, she always knew what was right and what was wrong, and she had all the right words to convince you, too.

It was one of the things that made her a successful entrepreneur.

Belle started her own interior design firm as soon as she graduated college. In fact, she already had clients lined up, thanks to outshining the full-time employees at her internships. And, luckily for me, she needed an assistant — AKA someone to run her life. Where she was great with the people, with the design, I was great with the numbers, with the organization, and together? We made the best team in Chicago.

She never crossed over — she hung her boss hat up in the office and wore her best friend hat, instead. But, regardless of if we were on the clock or not, Belle was just a boss kind of lady.

And she was adamant about this particular job.

By the time we finally hit the strip of bars we were aiming for, I was in desperate need of a drink, and for my best friend to drop the subject.