Page 20 of Falling for the Unexpected

Chapter 6

Kyle

To say that the phone call from Simone had surprised me would be an understatement. Trent, Addie, and I usually had lunch together, so leaving the office without a bunch of questions from the two of them hadn’t been easy. During the drive to the diner, all kinds of thoughts ran through my head. The scene I’d witnessed on Jim’s birthday was still weighing heavily on my mind. I tried to focus on the seriousness of Brad’s hostility toward Simone, but images of her curvy body in her tiny, pink bikini kept creeping in.

“Kyle, focus. She needs your help, not a lechery lawyer,” I muttered to myself. It wasn’t very professional of me to have these sorts of thoughts about a potential client. Especially one who was married. It didn’t matter that she was seeking a divorce.

I’d spent a lot of time during the last week thinking about Simone and how she was doing. I worried about her and Stella in a way that I hadn’t expected since we weren’t much more than acquaintances. But something about her drew my attention. Simone was naturally quiet for someone her age, but I didn’t mind that. She was poised, and clearly took her responsibilities as Stella’s mom very seriously. She probably thought more about her daughter’s own happiness than she did her own and that had been more than evident last weekend.

My grip on the wheel tightened as I thought about how shitty Brad had treated everyone, especially his own family. I’d had awful parents and knew firsthand the sort of pain that caused a child. It pissed me off on a whole other level to see him treat Stella poorly. He had done everyone a favor by leaving early, as the rest of the day had gone smoothly.

Jim didn’t believe in birthday gifts and the only request he’d made was for all of us to show up, and for Simone to bring her famous brownies. However, none of us ever listened to him so me, Addie, Trent, Erik, and even Ian, all the way from South Carolina, had pitched in to give him a year’s worth of weekend golf at Torrey Pines—with Marla, of course. Those two did everything together. Trent added professional lessons for both of them as well. After he’d opened his other gifts and cards, we’d spent the rest of the evening hanging out outside around the fire pit and shooting the shit. Without Brad there to destroy the good mood, we’d all had a great time—even Simone, once she had finally relaxed and let her guard down a bit.

Now, I was going to spend more time with her if I took her on as my client, and help her with her divorce.

When the guys and I were younger, we had barely tolerated Brad since we’d all seen right through his games, and we would do everything in our power to ditch him. Marla had never seen how manipulative Brad could be until recently, and would occasionally bribe us to spend time with him. Jim had decreed that we had to include him when Brad complained about how we were mistreating him. Playing the victim card he had cultivated to perfection as an adult. That’s what I had to watch out for during this entire ordeal if I represented Simone. I could see Brad totally throwing her under the bus to protect his fragile ego.

I pulled into the parking lot of the small diner, grabbed my leather messenger bag just in case I needed to take notes, and headed in. The place was always packed on the weekends but on weekdays it was usually pretty quiet.

I walked through the door, the bell alerting the wait staff that a customer had entered. My eyes started searching the restaurant to see if Simone had already arrived. There, in the back corner booth, I found her. She was hunched over the table picking apart the paper napkin in front of her. As though she could feel my stare on her, she lifted her head and our gazes locked.

I smiled at her and started to make my way across the restaurant. I took a seat on the bench across from her, setting my bag down next to me.

“Hi,” I said, greeting her. That’s when I saw her red-rimmed eyes up close and the dark circles underneath. It was obvious she was exhausted and emotionally drained.

Before Simone could respond, our waitress—CeeCee, an older woman with white fluffy hair, blue eye shadow, and a nice smile, interrupted us. She took our drink order and gave us each a laminated menu and rattled off the day’s specials. After I ordered water and Simone ordered lemonade, we made a show of perusing our menus for about a minute before setting them down at the end of our table.

“Thank you for meeting with me,” she whispered, after another full minute had passed.

I watched her tear another napkin apart, piece-by-piece. “Of course. Anything for a friend,” I said, echoing my sentiments from last weekend. Briefly, I placed a hand on hers in an attempt to still her fidgeting. She stopped and looked at me. “Hey, things will be okay. I’m here to help you. Want to tell me what happened?”

I hadn’t planned on jumping right into discussing what was going on. I had wanted her to lead the conversation, but I’d sensed that she needed to talk to somebody and that it’d be easier for her if I initiated it. She removed her hands from under mine and hid them under the table. I drew my hand back as well, still wishing I could comfort her in some way.

“Um… I decided to end things with Brad last night,” she started, her voice hoarse. She sniffed, eyes downcast. “He was cheating on me.” Her words broke at the end. She was trying to hold back her tears.

It was clear she was embarrassed by Brad’s cheating although she had no reason to be. This didn’t make her look bad, it only reflected negatively on him. He’d cheated on Addie. Cheating on Simone, unfortunately, wasn’t surprising. In fact, thinking about it, he’d probably been cheating on Simone from the start of their marriage. The reason they got married was so fucked up, all of us should have seen this coming. From what Jim and Marla had said back then, Brad had ‘appeared’ to get his act together. Clearly, he’d always been good about concealing his true intentions.

CeeCee returned with our drinks and we both ended up getting the half sandwich and salad special. After she left, I switched into lawyer mode. I needed to remove the personal element and try to get answers. It was the only way I was going to be able to help her.

“Are you sure he was cheating on you?” I asked, opening my bag and taking out a legal pad, pen, and my glasses. Treating this like any other meeting would help both of us. I put my glasses on and gestured at her to continue.

“Well, considering I walked into my bedroom and he had his dick halfway down Tiffany’s throat, I would say I’m sure,” she said bluntly.

Well, fuck. I wasn’t expecting that. There was no expression on her face but I saw her eyes flash with anger and her jaw tighten. I’d never seen that side of Simone before. When Brad was around, she was meek and quiet, carefully treading in dangerous waters.

I wrote down Tiffany’s name, and I knew exactly who she was. Erik was going to flip out once he learned of this, but it wouldn’t be from me even though I felt an obligation to inform him.

“And he planned it so I would walk in on it,” she added. “He wanted me to catch them in the act.”

I looked up at her. The cheating didn’t come as a huge surprise but the fact that he’d done that in their bedroom with the intent to hurt Simone was inexplicable.

“I should have known he was messing around with her. She always gave me an attitude any time I called or visited the shop,” she continued, sighing. “I should have known better. He had a history of it…”

We were both quiet for a second, both of us looking at each other and thinking about Addie. I moved on quickly. “Simone, are you positive you want to file for divorce?” I asked. She wouldn’t be the first person I met with who decided cheating wasn’t enough of a reason to go through the painful and time-consuming process. But because I was so familiar with her situation, and I doubted anyone would want to stay married to a guy like Brad, I knew she had more than enough cause.

She looked directly at me and I could feel the daggers she was shooting at me.

I held up my hands in surrender. “I agree with your decision,” I admitted, “but I just want to confirm that you’re ready to move forward.”