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He put his hands in his pants pockets. “I’m sorry.”
“What?”
“Not sorry I’m here. I deserve to be here. I’m sorry that makes it tough on you.”
Sarina waved both hands in front of her face, blinking rapidly. “Wait, that was you apologizing to me. That’s never happened before.” She dropped her hands and stung him with a mean dry-eyed expression. “I think I’m going to cry.”
Yeah, he deserved that too.
“All right, I don’t see asking you nicely to leave is going to achieve anything so you get to stay. But I’m officially furious with you.”
“Unofficially?”
She broke eye contact. “There is no unofficially.”
But there was, there always was. He’d been wrong to think the four of them weren’t still friends. He’d wait her out. Three heartbeats at best.
“Zarley’s dress is incredible.” There it was. Too soon to mention Cara, he’d
do that by email when Sarina wasn’t pissed at him. “Zarley is incredible. What does she do?”
Where did you meet would’ve been easier to answer. He’d say a dive bar and it’d be amusing. “She’s a Business Studies student.” He bit down on his back teeth. He should say it, he wasn’t uncomfortable about it, but others would be, Sarina could be. “She supports herself as an exotic dancer.”
“She’s a stripper?” Sarina’s brows lifted and she shot a disbelieving look Zarley’s way then she punched him again. Same place, just as hard, made him grunt.
“No, but she’s an entertainer. A pole dancer.”
“Oh, wow, no wonder she has that body. Good for her.”
“She’s an ex-USA Olympic team gymnast. You should see her dance, she’s incredible.”
Sarina shook her head and her earrings tinkled. “Don’t try to impress me with your newly discovered human side. I don’t care about your love life.”
“Of course not.” She wanted every detail.
“She clearly didn’t think the, you know, was bad taste.”
He folded his arms, widened his stance and Sarina took a step back. “The you know you promised to forget.”
She turned toward the room and looked at him over her shoulder, already in motion. “Oh hell, that was before you crashed my party,” she said, and left him standing there.
It took time to work his way back to Zarley. A lot of people wanted to catch his eye, have a word, wanted to know what he was doing now. Plus staff, a stockholder or two, a couple of journalists, and Owen.
“Please tell me you’re not drunk,” Owen said, drawing him out of the crowd that’d gathered. He wore a similar suit to Reid’s, but Owen’s wasn’t fresh out of a tailor’s bag. He had family money and knew his way around social events in a way Reid had long envied, because Owen wore his wealth lightly, never showing it off, and working like he had a thousand years of debt to pay off and a national obligation to be humble. You’d never have known the guy was privately cashed up.
He patted Owen on the back. “Nice suit.”
“Gate-crashing.” The whisker of a smile. “Sarina already asked you to leave.”
“She did. It’s not her fault I’m here.”
Owen rubbed a hand over the top of his short crop of blond hair. “God, Reid. Why?”
“It should never have gone down like it did. This is still my company.”
“No, it’s not. Shit happens. It happened to you because you were an asshole to work for and we have a no asshole rule. We made that rule together. You and me, Dev and Sarina.”
“But I was an asshole who knew what we needed to do.”
