There is such a thin veil between love and hate.
Lydia had never been malicious, not like them.
Not until that day. Maybe that's why it had hurt so bloody much. But standing here, watching her now, I remembered the way she'd appeared nervous, unsure. It had inspired tenderness in me then, and witnessing her discomfort today aroused the same instinctive protectiveness. And it burned. Heartburn, then, yes.
God, Lydia.
I cleared my throat just as Lydia came up to us, holding her tray out. "Cream puffs anyone? They're sweet and luscious." She smiled sweetly, her eyes challenging me not to look at her cream puffs, the ones threatening to spill out of her shirt at any second. I coughed into my hand, just barely managing not to choke, turning away slightly as Lindsey glared daggers at her. "No? Well, your loss. You'll never enjoy cream puffs like these ones. One hundred percent all natural ingredients. Nothing phony." She looked pointedly at Lindsey's cream puffs, obviously overinflated with phony ingredients. Lindsey gasped, placing her hand on her throat and widening her eyes as if she couldn't fathom the bold, impudent behavior of the girl serving her food.
With that, Lydia whirled away, to offer her cream puffs elsewhere. I pressed my lips together, not knowing whether to laugh uproariously or kill someone—possibly myself. Jaysus, help me.
Lindsey heaved out a disgusted breath. "God, Brogan, you've got to consider hiring classier help. Being from the working class yourself, surely you understand what's acceptable and what's not. You'd be completely within your rights to fire her on the spot. You're showing remarkable restraint." She clasped my arm, rubbing her phony ingredients against me. "It's very generous of you," she sighed, "but as you know, your staff reflects directly on you . . ."
I shook her off. "So do your friends." I looked around at Lindsey's followers, the women who were standing there idiotically waiting for their next instructions from the leader of their den of stupidity. "You'd all be wise to remember that." I enjoyed Lindsey's outraged intake of breath as I walked away.
The rest of the party went by far too slowly for me as my guests took their time drinking my liquor, eating my food, and making themselves at home on my property. I made the rounds once or twice but couldn't stomach more than that. Lindsey and her brainless bunch had apparently left early, but the mindless self-centered chatter of the other overinflated egos in attendance was more than I could handle today. Especially when I constantly had one eye focused on Lydia as she moved through the crowd as if she herself were the hostess of this mess of a party even though she wore the uniform and role of a servant.
I might have even been able to see the humor in it if my emotions weren't all twisted in a tangle of frustration, anger . . . and guilt. I felt like the biggest bastard who had ever lived.
Finally, finally, the guests started leaving, and I breathed a sigh of relief. Fionn and Eileen had evidently had a grand time witnessing my misery, standing off to the side and cheering each other and placing bets of some kind or another. Miserable Benedict Arnolds that they were. They finally came up and said their goodbyes, not seeming to mind in the least that I focused my most evil glare upon them and told them I was happy to see them go. They walked off laughing.
Those dwindling stayed another hour and then I made my way inside and tipped the staff that was packing up. Lydia was helping to clean the kitchen and when the catering staff began leaving, Therese gave Lydia a big hug and winked at her. Lydia had apparently won her over, too. Therese barely gave me a glance as she picked up the last of her things and headed for the door. And I was the one who had given her an overly generous tip.
Checking outside that everything was cleared away and all staff gone, I returned inside feeling relief that the party was over.
"Lydia?" We needed to talk. The kitchen was clean and empty, so I went upstairs, but both her bedroom and bathroom door were open. Frowning, I returned back downstairs. My heart picked up in speed. She wouldn't have left, would she? Why shouldn't she? I was a fecking arsehole to the nth degree. What reason did she have to stay? If it were me, I would leave after today, too. I should be happy to be rid of her. This had all gone arseways, just as Fionn had predicted.
So why did I feel a desperate misery descending over me?
I turned when I heard a small sound come from the living room, my heart hammering as I rushed in. Lydia was collapsed in a chair, her feet sitting on the coffee table, her high heels on the floor beside her. Relief swept through me. She hadn't left. But then my eyes moved to her feet. Oh feck. Her feet looked awful—swollen, with angry red welts in several places where her shoe straps must have been. I entered the room and sat down on the coffee table in front of her, taking her feet into my lap. Her tired eyes cracked open half-mast. God, she was exhausted. Another wave of guilt crashed over me. It must have taken everything she had in her to perform the way she did today. And yet she hadn't cracked, not once. And she hadn't let on about the state of her injured feet either. I felt . . . proud of her, yet also fearful and confused.
"Unhand me you spiteful villain," she slurred, but then she let out a deep moan of pleasure when my thumb pressed into her arch. I prayed she didn't feel what that sound did to the place right above where her foot was now resting.
"I have turned myself into a villain, haven't I?"
She cocked one eye open. "A conscienceless devil," she agreed. "Balor himself."
I let out a startled chuckle. "You remember that story?"