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“Fin, you must come to morning yoga tomorrow,” Paris said. She was one of those brilliant, bossy, sorority types who expected everyone to fall in line with her. Fin was only too happy to if it got her Paris as a donor.
They exchanged pleasantries for a while, and then Paris put her hand to her ear. “Oh, I’ve dropped a diamond earring.” They all looked down. “It must be somewhere here in the grass.”
Cal flattened his hand between her shoulder blades, the sign for stop, but it was just a lost earring. She kept her eyes down on the lawn searching for something shiny walking in the direction Paris had waved, but when she looked up again, Paris and Cal were where she’d started from, facing off. Cal had his hands in his pockets. Paris had her hand on his chest, standing in his space, and she was wearing both her jeweled earrings.
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nbsp; That was a dirty trick. And to think it was done with an earring poured salt in the gaping wound that was Fin’s pride. She couldn’t believe she’d ignored Cal’s warning and fallen for it. Or that she couldn’t call Paris out for it if she wanted her money.
That really sucked.
Women like Paris had ignored, insulted, and demeaned Fin when she took their orders, brought their meals, and poured their drinks because she was invisible to them. She wasn’t a waitress now, and Paris wasn’t her way to a decent tip, but the imbalance of power was the same. Fin was still invisible, even wearing criminally expensive sequins, still dependent on Paris’s generosity, except this time, she could use it to do good in the world, so she wasn’t going to shove Paris or pull her hair or find a plate of truffles and dump them on her.
And wasn’t that thinking like a grown-up.
Except, the woman had her hand on Cal and had contrived a diversion to do it, and he’d known it was coming and tried to warn her. Which didn’t explain why he was tolerating Paris’s touch, and that made Fin feel like lying on the lush green grass into which her heels were sinking and kicking and thrashing.
She had no choice but to act the part. She took her shoes off and marched back to Cal’s side. “See you found it. That was lucky,” she said, swinging a shoe in Paris’s direction and not letting go. “Cal, however, isn’t lost, and you can’t have him till I’ve finished with him.” That part apparently, was jealous-as-hell fake girlfriend who Cal fake kissed the stuffing out of because some old guy suggested it.
Paris laughed. “Rawr. Got yourself a kitten who thinks like a tiger, Cal. Don’t stress, Fin, your man and I go way back.” She ran a manicured nail over his jaw. “I finished with him before you were even on the scene. You and I are going to be friends. He just told me all about your charity.”
Cal pulled on his earlobe. No, she was not okay. She didn’t brush hair behind her ear to signal him back. Why was he tolerating Paris’s touch and her proprietary prowling? “This one likes to exaggerate, Fin,” he said. “She likes to start wars, bet on the victor, and humiliate the loser.”
And Fin was the loser in this scenario because Cal wasn’t doing anything to deny he’d been with Paris. He’d only told her half the truth when he’d said Paris would hit on him. He’d never said they had a history. She didn’t know what to do about that. Why did he kiss her like it meant something when it obviously didn’t?
“Fun game,” she said, staying in character as more of Cal’s acquaintances closed in on them, but she couldn’t keep up the charade. She ignored his stay with me cue and then his outstretched hand and his pointed look. While he was busy answering a question about stock prices, she muttered, “I’m going to go wash a bad taste out of my mouth.”
She made for the marquee. She’d get something to drink. She’d ditch this party and go down to the beach.
The music was louder in the tent, and the alcohol was flowing. She had a barman make her a highball with deadly amounts of Bacardi and gulped it down. All of that took less than five minutes. She expected the heat behind her to be Cal. The graze of a hand over the back of her thigh to be him, saying it was time to leave together, because of course he’d know she was upset.
“I’m fine.” Going to the beach by herself in the dark was a dumb idea, but she wasn’t ready to be alone with him yet; she’d hang out here for a while.
“So fucking fine.” Two hands on her ass.
Not Cal. Fuck. She tried to jerk away.
Hemmed in by the bar, she couldn’t turn her body, but she didn’t need to move to know it was Alex because he was all over her, pressed to her back, his face to the side of hers.
Anger flaring tight, she jabbed him ineffectively with an elbow. “Get off me, fuckwit.”
He slid his hands around her waist, over her ribs to plump her breasts. She bucked against him, trying to push him off.
“You came looking for this, but if you want to pretend, I’m all for role play,” he said.
If she’d been wearing her shoes she could’ve stomped a heel into his foot. “I said get off me.” She said it louder, and the barman looked at her and then looked away. No one on Alex’s payroll was going to help her out. There were other people at the bar, backs turned, eyes twitched away. No choice but to cause a scene. She tried to head butt him, but she was too short to break his nose or his hold. He laughed the whole time. So, she picked up her highball glass and smashed it over his head.
Everything moved quickly then. Alex yelled and let go, people scattered, the barman appeared in front of her with a worried expression and said, “Oh shit.”
Oh shit indeed. She’d smashed a glass on her host’s head. She spun around. Alex was holding his face. There was blood between his fingers and a slice of lime on his shoulder, but he looked otherwise very alive.
“You bitch, you fucking bitch.”
“I told you to get off me.”
“I’m fucking bleeding.”
“I didn’t come looking for you. I didn’t ask you to maul me. What do you expect?”
