“Tired? You kidding me? Her ex is a total waste. She’s got a real man now—you think she’d tire of that?”
Cringing, I shut off the video and whip my phone across the room. It slams against the wall, but luckily I’ve got a heavy-duty case for occasions such as this. This isn’t the first time I’ve thrown my phone over something stupid I did, which then became national news.
There’s a sharp knock on the door, followed by, “Everything okay in there?”
I guess Ty heard my phone greeting the wall. “It’s fine,” I bark.
He opens the door anyway. Nosy bastard. He scans the room, spots my phone on the floor and says, “I guess Claudia called.”
“Yup.” I glower at him. “Why the hell did you let me speak to them last night, Ty? You know I wasn’t in the right state of mind.”
“Let you?” he echoes. In a rare occurrence, Tyrese actually looks pissed off at me. “Brother, you were out of control last night. Snapping at peeps, smoking all that shit you shouldn’t have been smoking. I tried to haul you away from the vultures. Watch the video again. Closer, this time. I’m sure you’ll see your punk-ass arm shoving me away when I tried to step in. Spoiled brat.”
My eyebrows shoot up. “This spoiled brat pays your bills,” I say tightly.
He looks wounded, and I immediately feel guilty.
“I’m sorry,” I mumble. “I shouldn’t have said that. I’m just...hungover and mad. But I’m not mad at you, okay? You did what you could.”
I don’t know if he fully accepts my apology. He simply nods and then ducks out without another word.
Look at me, alienating another person in my life. Awesome.
I call Claudia back. After she yells at me for five minutes, we discuss the statement I need to make. The public apology to Vaughn’s douche bag boyfriend. I can’t believe he was over at her place last night. Why is she still with him?
And why is he still with her? The whole world thinks she’s my girlfriend—how can he stand that?
Bitterness lodges in my throat. I guess it doesn’t matter what the world thinks. It only matters what Vaughn thinks. What Vaughn wants.
And it’s not me.
But I still need to make things right with her, and when Claudia mentions the charity benefit I supposedly agreed to attend tonight and had forgotten all about, I realize it’s the perfect place to apologize to Vaughn—a public event where she can’t slap me. She can wear a pretty dress, listen to some good music, eat some good food. The CF Society always puts on a great spread.
Claudia packs as many of these fund-raisers into my schedule as possible, as if giving money away offsets my asshole behavior. Wonder if Vaughn will see it that way.
Except when I bring it up to Claudia, asking what time I should send a car for Vaughn, she’s quick to say, “No, Vaughn’s not coming with you tonight.”
I clench my jaw. “Why not?”
“Why do you think, Oak? Because she’s furious with you.”
My stomach sinks. “You spoke to her already?”
“No. She’s not answering her phone. Neither is Paisley.” Claudia’s voice tightens. “So, yes, I’m taking that to mean that she’s not happy about you belittling her boyfriend’s masculinity.”
“Well, goodie for her. She still works for me. She can’t bail on an important event just because I insulted her stupid boyfriend.”
“Normally I would agree with you, but Vaughn can be unpredictable. I’m not sending a pissed-off fake girlfriend to this event with you. Who knows what she’ll do.”
Claudia has a point. “Fine. So when can I see her again?”
“Give her a couple days to cool down. By then you’ll have given your public apology to W, so I’m sure that will help.”
“Okay,” I say, feeling disheartened. “Just send me the statement you want me to make—”
“Oh, you won’t be making it,” Claudia says firmly. “We’re writing a statement, I’ll send it for your approval and then we’ll release it to the media. You will not be speaking with them directly. Not after last night.”
Since I hate speaking to the media in the first place, I’m okay with this.
HER
I’ve never been dumped before.
I guess that makes sense seeing as how W was my first real boyfriend. But it still feels terrible. It’s awful and soul-crushing and has the power to turn a normal, solid-head-on-her-shoulders girl into a blubbering mess.
Like a total loser, I cried myself to sleep last night. I was midsob when I finally drifted off. And then the dreams came. Terrible, terrible dreams that involved W throwing bricks at my head while Oakley kept jumping in front of me to deflect them. At one point he started singing and the bricks stopped midair.
A therapist would probably have a field day with that. Me, I’m just exhausted from dodging dream bricks all frickin’ night.
To make matters worse, Claudia has been calling all morning. I finally had to shut off my phone, because I am not in the mood to deal with her or Oakley or any other living human today. All I want to do is curl up on this patio swing and pretend that last night didn’t happen.
The back door hinges squeak, and I jerk in surprise when my sister lowers herself next to me, a plate of the tres leches cake I made last night in her hand.
“Here,” she says.
“It’s ten thirty in the morning. Way too early for cake,” I say weakly. My throat is raw from crying. I rub it, but the pain doesn’t go away, because it’s inside me.
“It’s never too early for cake.” She smiles gently. “I know you’re more of an ice cream moper, but we ran out. I ate it all last week.”
“Seriously?”
Paisley shoves a forkful of cake into her mouth before answering. “Yes. I think I’m in love with Oakley’s cute bodyguard and so I ate the entire carton to cheer myself up. But cake does the trick, too. Try a bite. You’ll see.” She extends the fork to me, but I don’t want it.
“You’re in love with Ty?” I squawk in surprise. I mean, I suspected she had a crush on him, but the L-word? Seriously?
“Okay, well, maybe not love. But I really like him.”
“You’ve only met him once,” I point out.
She shakes her head. “Not true. He’s around Diamond sometimes,” Paisley admits. “But he’d never date me because I work for Jim’s brother and that’s too close for Ty’s comfort. Besides, I’m concentrating on my career, so it wouldn’t matter if he liked me back.”
“Wow. I had no idea.”
She shrugs. “It’s just a crush, and I usually forget about it until I run into him.” She takes another bite. “And like I said, something sweet usually fills my cravings.”
“Cake has never made me feel better.” I think of all the sweets that were delivered to the house after Mom and Dad died. Not one of them had filled the ache. The only thing that did was being with W.
“Not true. W is your cake. Was your cake,” she corrects.
“You mean, fatty and bad for me?” I mutter, because we both know she never liked him.