Free Stone Cold Charade (A Stone Family Novel) by Kathleen Royce Page B

response.
    “It would be great if I didn’t feel like
a babysitter, watching a bunch of spoiled brats. Max is as loony as everyone
says! He and his granddaughters are stuck up snobs who think the working class
owes them! They think people who work for them are just there for their
personal enjoyment and entertainment,” he felt Alex’s approach and refused to
turn around to see the shock that he knew would be evident on her stunned face.
    Alex was locked into place, too
mortified to leave. She couldn’t believe she was actually hearing him
correctly. His friends were too far around the corner for her to hear anything
but their muffled response, but there was no mistaking his next betrayal.
    “Alex is a pathetic, lonely rich girl
with too much time on her privileged hands. She’s just a frightened, frigid
little virgin afraid of her own shadow. A man would have to want to sleep with
an icicle to take her into his bed. Besides, she looks like something the cat
dragged in on a rainy day with that outrageous hair and chubby body,” he
declared, laughing.
    She saw the look of repulsion on his
friends’ faces and felt the color leave hers before surging back up into her
cheeks as they heated with embarrassment. Hastily, she looked around to see if
anyone had noticed her presence, praying that no one had. Not wanting anyone to
know that she had overheard the conversation she backed up. Slowly, not wanting
to draw anyone’s attention, she escaped down the hall toward the back door.
    He fooled all of them. Ty’s final act of
betrayal against her and her family was a tough pill to swallow. She had just
been a bothersome kid he was forced to be subjected to because he worked for
her grandfather! His treachery shredded apart her confidence and crushed who
she believed she was. His caring and friendship had all been a carefully
orchestrated charade.
    Alex's thought of all the things she had
shared with him though the years. The moments replayed in her mind, burning a
hole in her brain. She had revealed all of her dreams and fears to him, and he
had been laughing at her behind her back the entire time! The hardest part was
the realization of how stupid she must have appeared to him, pouring out her
heart to someone who could care less what happened to her or how she felt. It
had just been a job. Ty was like everyone else. He was being nice to her and
her family because of what he had to gain from them! She would never be able to
trust him again, or anyone else, for that matter.
    Spinning around Alex slipped out the
back door, the silent tears running down her anguished face.
    When he was certain she was no longer
behind him, Ty excused himself from his friends. He had known the exact moment
that she had returned to the party, and he intentionally allowed her to
overhear what he said about her. He wanted to hurt and embarrass her, and he
watched through a window as she fled the party moments after he had succeeded.
    Deciding to go shortly after Alex left,
he drove Amanda to her apartment. She realized he was upset, and wisely decided
not to remark on his strange behavior at the party. Instead, she looked out the
window in silence.
    As he said goodnight to her at her door,
he came to the conclusion that his relationship with Amanda was coming to an
end. It didn’t matter anyway. Alex and Jenny were leaving for school soon and
he didn’t know how much longer he would be staying in Wilkinson. It was just a
matter of time before he broke it off completely anyway.
    When he got home, he went straight to
the liquor cabinet, something he rarely did. Sitting in the recliner next to
the fireplace, he proceeded to get as drunk as humanly possible in order to
stop from thinking about what he had just done. He had set out to kill what
Alex felt for him, and he was certain that she would never speak to him again;
not after humiliating and embarrassing her and her family in public the way he
had. He toasted himself in silent mockery, knowing