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It would be seven long days without her, but I would manage.
Somehow.
Chapter 17
Valona
“What if this was his plan all along, Pip?”
I sighed with frustration as I checked in on the girls—Belle, Bridget and Keri—doing their homework in the living room. Trey had been gone for two days already, and other than one quick call last night, nothing but radio silence.
Pippa laughed while she rubbed her growing belly. “What, find a super hot neighbor to have wicked sex with? Good plan I’d say, since it works out for both of you.”
I knew what she was doing, but it wouldn’t work. Not this time. “No, to find a single mom to babysit so he doesn’t have to give up his precious modeling career. That plan.”
All the sympathy that was once in my best friend’s eyes vanished. “You’re serious?” Her tone was thick with disbelief. “Listen to me Valona, and listen good, you need to stop being so damn insecure. It’s not a good look for you, and it’s not fair to anyone. Not to Trey, and certainly not to your girls.”
I frowned. “What do Bridget and Belle have to do with anything?” Were they affected somehow by what was going on with me and Trey and I was just too self-involved to notice? “Did they say something?”
“No,” she sighed and shook her head. “But do you want them to grow up thinking that being beautiful and smart and bubbly isn’t enough? That no matter how great they are, they will always feel insecure about themselves?”
“You know that’s the last thing I want.”
Pippa sighed in relief, almost as if she thought I might say that was exactly what I wanted. “So why is this the example you’re determined to set for them?” Before I could even part my lips to answer, Pippa went on. “Do you really think so little of Trey, or is this the age thing rearing its ugly head again?”
The age thing was just a thing, and it always would be. Even if by some stretch of the imagination, Trey and I managed to go the distance, the issue would always be running in the background. People would stare and wonder why he was with me, they would whisper about our age difference, and yes, it would bother me. Forever. But that wasn’t my only issue.
“Come on Pippa, even you have to admit that the timing of his trip is a little suspicious.”
“I don’t have to admit any such thing. You said yourself that he had no idea he had one more contractual obligation. He did seem genuinely confused, right?”
I shrugged, because I hated when Pippa started to sound like a TV lawyer.
“Right?”
I nodded. “Shocked would be a better description. He was surprised to hear his agent’s voice, and he really didn’t know there was any work left for him.” I hadn’t missed his agent’s tone over what he called retirement nonsense.
“Then take him at face value until you have a reason not to. You can’t punish every man going forward because Rodney was a cheating bastard. Trey hasn’t given you any reason to doubt him, has he?”
I could admit, at least to myself, that he hadn’t. “He’s gone out of his way to prove that my misconceptions about him are wrong. Part of what I like about him is that he’s honest about how much it bothers him to be judged solely because he’s so good looking.” I shook my head though, because thoughts and comparisons to Rodney were inevitable. “Rodney never gave me any reason to doubt him either.” Not even in hindsight, knowing what I knew now did I see the signs.
“Consider yourself wiser now. If there are signs, real signs, and not just the doubts and insecurities you’ve conjured up in your mind, address them head on. But honey, you have to let Trey make his own mistakes and pay for them, not Rodney’s mistakes.”
Was that what I was doing? At this point, I couldn’t be sure. My nerves were too raw and right on the surface, and it was probably due to the amazing lovemaking session we had right before he fled to Paris.
“How can I not be insecure when he’s going to spend the next seven days in the most romantic city on earth surrounded by gorgeous young women who are paid to be gorgeous?”
“Easy,” Pippa sat back and smiled, her sympathy had returned. “Just know that he’s always had access to those women, and still, he chose you. Not them.”
Pippa’s parting words stuck with me long after she was gone. Rodney had been gone for more than a year now and still, I hadn’t mourned his passing, hadn’t grieved the loss of the man I loved for more than half of my life. He was gone, but he was still here with me in so many ways. Rodney’s final act hadn’t just been a betrayal, but decimating to my self-esteem. Why had he planned to leave his family? Was it really for a woman not much younger than me, and if so, what had I done wrong? What had it been that was the final straw for him?
