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Savage takes the joint from me. “The engagement part was a beautiful lie, but we really are together and totally committed.” He looks at me, his expression saying, Please, let that be a true statement. And when I smile and nod, Savage grins and exhales in relief.
Sasha takes the joint from Savage and sucks on it. “I figured the engagement had to be a lie for Mimi’s sake. If you’d actually proposed to Laila, you would have spammed me beforehand with a thousand texts. ‘Sasha, how should I ask her?’ ‘Sasha, where should I ask her?’ ‘Sasha, what should I wear when I ask her?’”
Savage chuckles. “I was sixteen and had never asked a girl on an actual date before, dude. You always give me hell about that.”
“It was cute the first ten times.”
“It wasn’t ten times. Three or four, tops. And that was back in high school when I had no game. I’m a grown-ass man now. A rock god, if you haven’t heard.”
“Wait, what?” Sasha deadpans.
“I’m on magazine covers and everything.”
“Wow.”
“I’m also a judge on Sing Your Heart Out.”
“No.”
“True story.”
“Impressive.”
“If I wanted to propose nowadays,” Savage continues, “I wouldn’t need to ask for your or anyone else’s help to do it, any more than I need help walking onstage and performing for tens of thousands of people who’ve paid good money to come see me.”
“Gosh, you’re so fancy.”
“I am. If I wanted to propose, I’d slay that shit, dude, all by myself.”
“Well, pardon me, Mr. Famous. My bad.” Sasha looks at me, her dark eyes sparkling. Clearly, bantering with her cousin is one of the great joys of Sasha’s life. But I can barely function in this moment. Does the cheeky speech Savage just gave signal he’s thinking about proposing to me in the finale, in order to grab that bonus the producers offered him? I mean, assuming I’m still around by then. Frankly, I wouldn’t blame him if he did it. In fact, I want him to do it to earn himself some easy money. Plus, I can’t deny the idea that I might get to look into The Beast’s eyes and hear him say those magical words—”Will you marry me, Belle?”—is incredibly exciting to me. Even though my brain would understand the fakeness of the moment, my heart would nonetheless enjoy getting to feel, if only fleetingly, like a princess in a fairytale.
Sasha picks up her wine glass again, while I pick up my whiskey. “Well, I’m glad you told Mimi such a lovely lie. I can’t remember the last time I saw her smiling that big.”
Savage replies to his cousin, and an entire conversation ensues, but my attention is flickering in and out. I’m bursting at the seams to tell Savage about my epiphany on the staircase—namely, that I saw him with Sasha in Las Vegas, and every action and reaction of mine since then has been tainted by that misunderstanding. I should wait to tell him everything in private, I decide, since my revelation about Sasha will undoubtedly make a whole lot of other dominos fall—dominos that will surely whip up quite a bit of emotion inside me. But, still, I can’t resist asking Sasha a few pointed questions about that fateful day.
I wait for a lull in the conversation between Savage and his cousin, and then ask, “Sasha, did you ever visit Adrian during our tour?”
She nods. “Once. Your show was brilliant, Laila.”
“Thank you. Which show did you see?”
“Las Vegas. It was Adrian’s birthday weekend. Our birthdays are five days apart, so he flew me and a couple of my friends to Las Vegas to celebrate, as a birthday gift to me.”
“No, flying you to Vegas was my birthday gift to me,” Savage corrects.
Sasha rolls her eyes. “See what I’m dealing with here? This year, he flew me and my friends to Vegas. Last year, he bought me a house for my birthday. And all I ever give him as a birthday present is the same thing, every year: a bottle of his favorite whiskey and an extra-long massage.”
“That’s all I ever want,” Savage says.
“Speaking of me giving you a massage,” Sasha replies. She raises her palms and kneads the air, like she’s massaging invisible shoulders. “Let me at that famous body!”
Savage chuckles. “I think I’ll take a rain check, actually.” He looks at me and his dark eyes flicker with heat. “No offense, but I’d rather get my knots out a different way tonight.”
“Oh,” Sasha and I say at the same time.
Savage stands and extends his hand to me. “Come on, Fitzy. Time for bed.” As I take his hand and rise from the couch, Savage says to his cousin, “I don’t care what time it is, or what X-rated noises you might hear coming out of my room, if Mimi takes a turn or wakes up and needs me—"
