Page 76 of Animal Beats

I got it.

22

HAYDEN

My press release went out a couple of hours ago—several hours too late to combat all the videos on social media. Although they portrayed Río as a happy drunk, they still portrayed him as a drunk.

Luke’s words ring true. “You were in charge of him. What happened?”

If only I knew. One minute we were in bed together, having what I thought was a fantastic time. He couldn’t have faked it. Can men even do that?

I shake my head. Whatever. Something changed between our cozy hotel room and the boat, but I can’t figure out what it was. He arrived primed to drink every single person under the table. Rather, under the boat. We didn’t get into a fight. I simply don’t know what drove him to pound the alcohol.

As for taking the plunge? The boat struck some waves, which knocked Río off-balance. If he were sober, there wouldn’t have been an issue. In his inebriated state, well, into the river he went.

He acted like a jerk the whole time, though. Why did he hit on that woman? He never even said thank you to me for saving his sorry butt.

Get this through your thick skull, Hayden: he’s never going to change.

All this is water under the bridge—literally. My focus has to be on making money, especially since Bennett has to know I lost the bet. I need to pray my press release appeases the label, assuming they even saw any of the videos. Who am I kidding? Of course they saw them.

Ignoring all the panicked voices in my mind, I open my camera roll and curate a photo dump for social media. UC’s profiles have lots of pictures, but a few more will definitely help to deflect the poor coverage from this afternoon.

Nese stops by. “Hey! Saw your guy went for a swim.”

“You could say that.” I take some clothes from her and hang them on the racks in The Closet.

“Why are you so upset? It looked like harmless fun to me.” She moves the hangars around, putting pieces of paper with the guys’ names on them.

“He was drunk.”

She shrugs. “Yeah. So? I’m sure he’s sobered up by now.”

“I was assigned the task of keeping him sober. Luke chewed me out for my failure.” Not going to mention anything about the twitchy label.

One pierced eyebrow raises.

“Keeping UC in line is a hard job.”

She puts her hands on her hips and laughs. “This is probably the understatement of the year.” Her pixie cut swishes. “Still, Luke—and Coop for that matter—could take a page out of Río’s book and go wild sometimes.”

I can’t picture either of them as freewheeling as Río. Needing to change the subject, I show her some of my candids. “Think these would be good additions to their socials?”

She scrolls through my camera roll. “Damn, girl. Your talents are wasted on PR. These are great.”

“Thanks.” Small consolation considering what happened today, but it’s still nice to hear. “I’ll post these now, before the concert. Hype up the fans.”

“Especially that one of Tris. He looks adorable dancing. Is that from Madrid?”

I smile. “Sure is.” I point to the women in the background. “Don’t you recognize them?”

Nese squints. “I think this one hooked up with 007.” She points to another. “She bagged Tris.”

“Yup.” I pause. “Who got Coop?”

Her face scrunches up. “He has his choice of women and I’ve seen ladies throw themselves at him. He’s nice to them, but ends up going back to his room alone.”

“Maybe Río should take some lessons from his best friend.”