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Harry put her glass down, still half full. “I don’t think you’re a screw up. You’re amazing.”
Rielle ducked her head. Of course she’d done well, but at the cost of an unfathomable pit of grief and fear. All they’d achieved was built on tragedy. Rand would’ve been happy with less and she had no idea what would make her happy.
She shot Harry a look; maybe she wasn’t so smart after all—couldn’t she see what Jake did? “Don’t they say appearances can be deceiving? You’re in TV. I figured you’d know that better than anyone.”
“I was going to ask you about Jake.”
“What about him?” Rielle said startled, feeling like Harry had been in her head.
“About you and him.” Harry smiled, sympathetically. “Looks to me like you’re pretty gone on each other.”
Rielle stiffened. All those knots were back in her neck, clenching with a vengeance. “Why would you say that?”
“I look out for stuff like that. Like you said, I’m in TV.”
“Then you’d know that he’s Mr Nice Guy, Mr Family Values. Not exactly a good fit with me.”
Harry picked up her glass again and sipped. “You’re very hard on yourself, Rie.”
Rielle shrugged. “Yeah, so imagine how hard I can be on anyone I don’t like. You hurt Rand in any way and I’ll hunt you down and make you wish you’d gone to a different high school.”
Harry clinked her glass against Rielle’s. “If I hurt Rand in any way, you have my full permission to make me regret the day I was born.”
And as if on cue, Ceedee pushed Stu into the pool. Rielle stood with Harry and watched tomorrow’s celebrity gossip coverage unfold live.
Roley, How and Rand moved at once. How grabbing Rand to stop him going anywhere near Stu. A clever move. Rie shot How a look and mouthed a thanks. Roley, playing the clown, hugged Ceedee, and laughed at Stu as he tried to climb out, shoving him back in the pool with his foot, only a snatched ankle away from being in the drink himself.
A roar and a lunge from a dripping Stu rising out of hip deep water brought Roley undone. The two men grappled, but Stu was enraged and Roley was fish food. He splashed in head first and came up with a splutter of laughter, his hair in his eyes and his t-shirt wound around his chest.
A leggy brunette in a flame red mini dress promptly jumped in beside him. She said, “You’re cute,” and surprised him with a chlorinated kiss.
“Hear that Stu, I’m cute,” Roley called.
The rage washed off Stu but not the jackass. He reached a hand up to the brunette’s friend. “Care to come for a swim?” Without waiting for her response, he grabbed her wrist and yanked her into the pool.
Rielle watched as Jake went to Ceedee. He was trying to get her to turn away, not to watch as Stu mauled his new wet playmate, kissing her neck, making her giggle theatrically. She left her drink and went to them, though maybe Jake would be able to break through to Ceedee, where she’d long failed to.
Ceedee was shaking. She grabbed Rielle’s arm. “He’s a bastard.”
“Yeah, so walk away,” she said, like she’d said a hundred times before.
“I can’t.” Ceedee couldn’t even look away.
Rielle looked at Jake. He’d moved to try to block Ceedee’s view. “You can if you don’t want him to keep treating you like this,” she said.
“He doesn’t mean it. He’s always sorry afterwards.”
“Then he does it again. He always does it again.”
Ceedee nodded imperceptibly, but Jake caught the quick dip of her head. “Then he’s not sorry and every time you forgive him, you let him get away with treating you like this. It’s abuse, Ceedee,” he said.
She gasped and spun to him “It’s not! I don’t! It’s not my fault. You can’t blame me for his behaviour.”
“Not your fault, but you aren’t helping if you give him a free pass,” he said.
“I don’t. I’ll give him hell.”
Jake jerked a thumb over his shoulder to where Stu was still frolicking. “Will you let him crawl into your bed tonight?” He knew as well as Rielle did they shared a room. He was pushing her hard.
