No Longer Fair To You Chapter 06
I was totally distracted at breakfast the next morning. I had no idea how to even bring the subject up.
Should I just come right out and say it, or wait until the night before our trial marriage officially ended?
A sudden burst of loud laughter snapped me out of it.
I looked up just as Anderson walked into the room.
He was tall, with heavy, prominent brow bones that made him look completely unapproachable whenever he cast a glance upward.
Clayton was pointing at Anderson’s sweater, laughing hysterically. “Andy, what the hell is that cheap thing you’ve got on? It’s completely hideous. Has your taste really tanked that much? Look, if you can’t afford clothes, I’ll spot you the cash. You don’t have to humiliate yourself by actually wearing that out in public.”
It was a beige sweater with some seriously uneven stitching.
I’d embroidered a sleeping cat near the hem, but since I wasn’t exactly a pro at knitting, from a distance it really just looked like a dark clump of thread.
My ears burned with embarrassment. I hurried over and quietly tried to pull a loose thread off the sweater.
Anderson stood perfectly still, just letting me snip the thread away.
He glanced over at Clayton, who was still laughing, and said completely calmly, “I didn’t buy it. Ellie knitted it for me for Christmas.”
Clayton’s smile vanished instantly.
After Anderson headed out for work, Clayton lingered at the table, eating his breakfast painfully slowly.
I wondered if he was worried about running late, but figured it wasn’t my place to ask.
I was just about to head back to my room to finish up some work when he spoke up, sounding suddenly awkward. “Hey, where’s my Christmas present? You don’t have to hide it. Hand it over.”
I stopped dead in my tracks, totally baffled by how shamelessly he could demand a gift from me.
I’d always been big on traditions.
For every single holiday, big or small, I used to get gifts for both of the Hewitt brothers—everything from ties and cufflinks to headphones and massagers.
That was until I found the scarf I’d given Clayton sitting in the trash.
His total disregard for the gift perfectly mirrored just how much he disliked and looked down on me.
If someone was just going to toss my hard work in the garbage, I was only going to give presents to the person who actually wanted them.
“I didn’t get you one,” I replied flatly.
Clayton’s cocky expression completely crumbled. “Why not?” he demanded immediately. “Andy got one. Why didn’t you knit a sweater for me?”
Catching how eager he sounded, Clayton paused and sank back down into his chair. “Not that I actually care about your gifts anyway. It’s just incredibly obvious that you’re playing favorites.”
Then, he slowly started making excuses for me. “Alright, I guess knitting a sweater does take a long time. I’ll give you a few more days. By the way, don’t embroider a rock on mine. It looks childish.”
I just stared at him for a second before it finally dawned on me that he’d mistaken my embroidered cat for a rock.
Flushed with a hot mix of embarrassment and anger, I glared right at him. “I didn’t make you one, and I never will. That gift was exclusively for Andy.”
Clayton stared at me in total shock, probably because he’d never seen me push back like this before. “Fine, whatever. You don’t have to be a jerk about it. Your temper is getting worse by the day.”
He shoved his chair back, paced across the room, and finally threw his hands up in utter exasperation. “Damn it, I didn’t want your terrible sweater anyway! It’s hideous and unpresentable, just like you. It’s for the best. Now I don’t have to throw it in the trash.”
See? I knew he would’ve just thrown it away.
I rubbed my eyes and kept the thought to myself.
Anderson wasn’t like that at all. He’d told me he liked it, and he actually wore it out of the house the very next day.
Anderson was good. Clayton was bad.
