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My admission seems to have taken some of the fire out of her, but she’s clearly not convinced. Stepping away from the hallway, she finally takes a look at something other than me and my body barely covered by sheets. She stops in front of the closet and cracks open the door. Instead of finding Rusty’s jerseys or custom tailored shirts, a row of neatly spaced button-downs stares back. Melly snorts, shaking her head at the view, and for a brief moment I think she might burst out laughing.
But then she closes the door and slowly turns. I barely breathe as her sharp eyes take in the general disarray around us. Besides my clothes, the garbage can is knocked over, my bra is on the desk lamp, and there’s a hastily torn open Intimacy Kit next to the bed.
“Well,” she says, and steps over what I think is my underwear. “You and James.”
I tread lightly. She might seem calm, but something’s lurking just below the surface. Right now Melissa reminds me a lot of a spider, and this feels entirely like a trap, luring me in.
“I don’t know if I would say me and James, exactly.” I motion to my sheet. “Could I put something on?”
She gives me a clipped “Of course,” and I stand up, sheet wrapped securely around me, and head for the bathroom.
Safely inside, I look at myself in the mirror again. I’m the same Carey from ten minutes ago, but I feel like a totally different person. Or, rather, I feel like the same Carey who got into the elevator yesterday, not the one who woke up this morning refreshed, relaxed, sexed, and wondering if—for once—someone might be completely on my team.
I don’t want to look at myself anymore. Shaking my head, I pull on the thick white bathrobe from the back of the door and head out again.
My boss is at the window, her blond hair white in the early light. With a nervous glance toward the door, I wonder when James will come back. A few minutes ago, I wanted him to hurry. Now I want the barista downstairs to take their sweet time. I wouldn’t wish this conversation on anyone, and I certainly don’t wish Melly’s ire on James.
“So how long has this been a thing?”
I turn at the sound of her voice.
I’m not exactly sure what to tell her, because I’m not sure myself. “It’s new.”
She lets out a small, humorless laugh. “Right. That’s why you two are always huddled together. Why he’s always looking at you. Why you’re always talking. Because it’s new.”
I think back over the last few days and can’t really argue. It might have started as camaraderie, as us against them, but somewhere along the way it changed.
“I don’t know what’s going on with you, Carey. It’s always been you and me, a team. But lately …”
“We are a team. What’s happening between James and me isn’t about work.” For once, I don’t add, I didn’t think about you for an entire night.
But of course Melly would never believe this. She turns around, arms folded tightly across her chest. “Isn’t it? I used to be able to depend on you—for everything. You were in my corner, and I was in yours.”
“I don’t understand where this is coming from. None of that’s changed.”
“You disappeared yesterday,” she says.
“The luncheon was winding down.” It’s hard to admit it, but I suck it up: “I was totally wiped and needed a break.”
“So you left without even telling me? With James?” She throws up her hands. “I’d just given you a shout-out in front of some of the most influential people in entertainment and then you made me look like a liar by vanishing and leaving Robyn to wrap up the party.”
My heart drops. “Melly—”
She brings a shaking hand to her throat. “I trust you with details of my livelihood and my family. You know things about me that no one knows. And I help you—”
“I would never talk about any of those things. To anyone.”
“Really? Not going to have a rough day and commiserate together about the mean boss?” she says, going for flippant and not quite making it.
She, I realize suddenly, doesn’t want me getting close to James because she’s worried I’ll confide in him, tell him what I do and don’t do behind the scenes. She has no idea that her own husband has already done that. Even now, I try to downplay it or change the subject whenever James brings it up. Melly has to know I would never have said anything on my own. She has to know that I’m more trustworthy than that.
I take a step closer. “You’ve known me since I was sixteen. Do you really think I would do that?”
She blinks several times before her shoulders lose some of the tension. “No,” she says. “But lately I feel so out of control of everything, and you know I don’t handle that well. Between Russell and Stephanie, the book, the tour, and the announcement—I’m losing track of everything. I’m not ready to lose you, too.”
