I spent the next ten minutes washing my mouth out thoroughly and holding an icy, cold washcloth to my face. The swelling went down enough around my eyes that I looked human again, even though my face felt damned near frozen by that point.
I exited the bathroom and found Camille sitting on the end of her bed, tapping away on her phone. I figured she was texting Kim and was proved right when looked up and smiled grimly.
“Kim’s ready to ditch our plans in Chicago this weekend and come down here to help us kick his ass instead.”
I barely cracked a smile as I shook my head. “Nope. Let’s hit the road, otherwise we’re going to get stuck in rush-hour traffic up north.”
“Are you sure you still feel like going, El? Kim will understand if we – “
“Hell yes, we’re going. I’m not about to let that lying, cheating bastard ruin this weekend for us. He’s not worth it. Besides, I need time before I have to face him again.”
She looked at me closely, then told me quietly, “There were some texts from him over the past hour, asking you to call him. He also called you and left a voice mail.”
I laughed bitterly. “I would have thought he’d be too busy fucking DD to even bother. Somebody probably saw me, and now he’s trying to do damage control. He has to keep up the act as the loving boyfriend, after all.”
“Do you want to listen to the message, or I can if you want me to.”
I debated for a few seconds, then shook my head adamantly. “No. I don’t want to hear what he has to say, or what fucking excuses he’ll try to come up with” My voice cracked, and I could feel the tears starting again. “I can’t deal with that right now, Camille. I just can’t.”
I knew I needed to confront him with what I’d heard, but there was no way in hell I was doing that until I was calm andcollected, with no hint that he’d managed to devastate me with his lies.
“That’s understandable, honey,” she assured me. She pulled my phone from her back pocket and powered it off before handing it over. “There, now you don’t have to listen to it go off if he keeps trying to reach you. Are you ready to go?”
“Hell yes. I don’t even want to be in the same city as him right now.”
“OK, then, fuck him. Let’s get this show on the road.”
I laughed, but there was no real humor in it. “Fuck him…no, that’s DD’s job now.” My stomach lurched at the thought, and I felt the tears threaten again as I pictured him with her.
“Then I hope his dick turns green and his balls rot off.”
A thought hit me, and my heart dropped to my toes. We had both gone to get tested the other day. Thank God our results haven’t come in yet, so we hadn’t ditched the condoms yet.
I slipped my phone in my purse, and we left a few minutes later. After I told her that I didn’t want to talk about Dante anymore, Camille did her best to keep my spirits up, mostly by blasting music out of the speakers and singing along. Loudly, and very off-key. My best friend had many talents. Singing wasn’t one of them. The noise made it impossible to think though, so that was something anyway.
An hour into the trip, she pulled into a fast-food restaurant, insisting that we both needed something greasy and full of fat to cheer us up. After two bites of my cheeseburger, my stomach clenched and threatened to bring it all back up. I tossed my unfinished burger back in the bag and took a big sip of my diet soda.
Eventually, we made it to Chicago, pulling to a stop at the curb in front of Kim’s townhouse. She must have been watching for us, because I had barely opened my car door before she was rushing down her front steps to sweep me into a hug, before doing the same to Camille. I pretended not to notice their brief, whispered conversation as I got my luggage out of the back of my SUV and carried it inside.
Mercifully, my cousin didn’t mention Dante, so I assumed that their hushed exchange had been Camille warning her that I didn’t want to talk about it.
A short time later, we were sitting in her living room, catching up on everything except Dante.
“I saw the picture that Mia posted to Instagram of them standing at the ship’s railing as it set sail this morning. It looks like they’re all having a great time without Dr. Douchebag and the Raging Thundercunt there.”
I cursed as I realized how stupid I’d been. “Shit, I can’t keep my phone turned off. What if the kids need to reach me? Dammit!” Since they were somewhere off the coast of Florida heading toward the Bahamas, I doubted I’d hear from them, but I wanted them to be able to reach me if it was an emergency.
I got up and got my phone out of my purse, looking at it warily as if it were a coiled snake getting ready to bite.
“Here, let me have it,” Kim demanded, holding out her hand for the phone. I gave it to her, then watched as she powered it on. I heard several notifications pinging and recognized them as texts and voice mails.
Kim scrolled through the screen for a brief moment, then looked up at me.
“Do you want to listen to the voicemails, or read the texts? There are a ton from him, but also from Pop, Cowboy, and somebody named Lincoln.” She bit her lip, then looked at me again.
“They’re either asking you to call them, or just asking you to check in to let them know you got here OK.”
My heart broke all over again at the thought of the men I’d come to care for. My relationships with them were now tarnished, too. I’d known it was a mistake to start anything with Dante. I’d known it would make things awkward with his family. I’d fucking known better, and I wanted to kick my own ass.
