Kelvin looked at me with pity as I stood in front of him, holding a plate full of mashed potatoes and mac and cheese. Pity. He invited me to eat dinner with his family after forcing me to be his fake girlfriend and then dumped me in front of them, and he had the balls to look at me with pity?

Oh... well... maybe I looked pitiful.

He reached a hand out, but I pulled away. "Vons, baby." Eww, those words sounded gross coming from his mouth. "Some women-you-just can't handle me because I'm too much man for you. I worried this would eventually happen, but you just insisted that we'd be perfect together."

I stared.

I blinked.

Did he really say all that? Did he mean it?

My mouth opened and my gaze fell to his pajama pants as I processed his words. His Hans Solo covered pajama pants. Not only was I dumped at dinner in front of his family, but he did it in Hans Solo pajamas. I'd hit an all-time low.

How did this become my life?

Right.

Dead bodies and blackmail.

Story of my life.

"So... I can leave then?" He didn't expect me to stay here and eat. Did he?

His eyes widened at my question. I swear he was trying to say something with his expression, but I wasn't fluent in asshole. "I know this will be tough for you, but you'll have to find a way to move on. I'm sure the right guy for you is out there somewhere."

My chest ached. Yeah, the right guy was driving to Portland, but I'd spent the last month pushing him away.

I nodded at Kelvin. It looked like he had more to say, but I didn't want to hear it. Without a glance at his family, I turned, making sure not to catch anyone's eyes, and headed for the front door. My legs seemed to work with no input from me and somehow, I made it through the house and to the porch.

No point in saying goodbye to anyone.

Outside, the chilly breeze almost knocked me off my feet. Why was February so cold? I'd left my coat inside on the chair by the door, but no way in hell was I going back for it. After all that, I'd take my chances with frostbite.

I'd almost made it to my car when a hastily yelled, "Vonnie!" stopped me in by the driver's door.

Kelvin ran up next to me with my coat in his hands. He had on a pair of dirty white Crocs and a coat three sizes too big for him.

"I didn't want you to forget this," he said.

I snatched it from him with a growl. "Thanks."

"Listen, I'm sorry about what happened in-"

"What the hell, Kelvin?" my words cut him off. "I did this as a favor to you as a friend."

He tugged at the collar of his Hans Solo shirt. "I know. I'm sorry, but I met this girl at the morgue."

My brow furrowed. "Was she dead?" Where was this conversation going?

He crunched his face together. "No, she's getting her masters in occult studies. I had to break it off with you so my family won't think I made our relationship up."

"But you did make it up!" I threw my arms in the air and then shoved them in the sleeves of my coat. "And you didn't think to warn me?"

My hand got stuck inside the coat and I had to shove it through with an umphf. The outside of Kelvin's house smelled like a cooking chicken. Did someone break out an air fryer at their party? Was I missing fried chicken?

"It was more authentic this way. You can't act."

"I can too!" I jammed the zipper parts together and tugged up to tighten my coat but missed. My hands were stiff from the winter air, and they tingled when I touched the metal.

Kelvin cocked his hip to the side along with his head. "I saw you in the sixth-grade play."

How dare he? There are no small parts, only small people!

Living in a small town sucked sometimes. People used your past against you. "Not everyone has the skills to act like a mouse, Kelvin. The nose piece was ticklish!"

"I just wanted my family to think I was cool enough to dump Vonnie Vines. Leia is kind of nerdy." He rubbed at his chin and spoke to the ground.

I struggled with my zipper, still unable to tug it up and close my damn jacket. "You don't say," I deadpanned.

It would have been funnier coming from the dude decked out in Hans Solo if I wasn't so cold. Finally, the zipper caught, and I fastened my coat closed.

"You could have at least warned me on the taco casserole." I would have looked it up on Pinterest or asked Anessa to make one for me.

Kelvin had the decency to flinch. "But don't you see? Now they'll appreciate it when Leia brings her Oreo puff dessert."

"So I was the sacrificial lamb for Leia?" And I didn't even get any Oreo Puff dessert?

"Please, forgive me," he said, pleading with his hands together in front of him.

I stared him down, narrowing my eyes until they were slits.

He'd called me cool, but he'd also embarrassed me in front of his family. And lied about me. Like sooo many lies.

But the cool thing. Plus, I needed his help with the dead bodies at the morgue. There were definitely going to be more dead bodies. We lived in Pelican Bay, after all.

I balanced my weight from foot to foot, growing colder by the second.

"Fine. Since you called me cool and I am incredibly cool." I tugged on the top of my coat, bringing it higher on my chin.

Kelvin smiled.

"This time," I added for good measure.

His smiled slipped.

"Keep your eye out for my real boyfriend. You'll be able to spot him because he's hot, super tall, has an obsession with guns and knows how to kill a man fifty different ways," I said, ticking off each item on a finger.

Some of it might have been a slight exaggeration. Broadrick had never told me the exact number of ways he'd learned to kill someone.

Kelvin swallowed hard.

Too bad for him I hadn't finished yet. "And never comment on a woman's weight ever again unless you want to die."

He held his hands up in surrender, and then he jammed them into his pajama pants pockets. "Yeah, sorry. It seemed the most effective, but I thought you were going to kill me. Your eyes went all murderish."

"Yeah, well," I said and pulled my car door open. "Don't do it again."

"Never," he said and gave me a salute as I closed the door and started the engine.