by Ray, Marika
Our tormenter was still here, sitting between us even now.
After a moment or two of silence, she flipped her hand over, lacing our fingers together there on the tabletop. The corners of her mouth tipped up, the sight of which lifted all the dark and heavy thoughts swirling in my head.
“How about we perform an exorcism?”
That was not what I expected her to say. “A what now?”
She giggled and my heart rejoiced at the sound. “An exorcism of sorts. We’ll help each other move past all his bullshit.” She lost the smile and leaned a little closer. “And then when he’s truly gone, you and I will have our chance. For reals this time. Whadya say?”
My entire being strained toward her like a moth to a flame. I squeezed her hand in celebration. “I say, hells yes. Hewitt who?”
Her snort-burp rang out and all was right in the world.
21
Gabby
“Slow down. I don’t understand you, honey.”
Natalia was screaming into the phone, her words hard to decipher with all the heavy breathing. She could be running from a psychopath or in the middle of a hot and sweaty horizontal session with Frank, it was hard to tell.
“Frank thinks I cheated on him!” she yelled loud and clear.
I pulled the phone from my ear and sent a meaningful look at Rhett. He obviously heard her from across the table. My next door neighbors probably heard her. He put down his forkful of scrambled eggs and feigned exhaustion. These couples wore drama like a designer label.
Putting the phone back to my ear, I addressed Natalia in my most calming voice. “And did you cheat on him?”
“No! I would never!” She huffed a few times. “I mean, I did kiss that guy I’m in that one photo shoot with next week, but that was only because he instigated it. But I most certainly didn’t cheat on Frank.”
I rolled my eyes and prayed for strength. “Did Frank see you kissing the model?”
“Yes. But this whole thing is so stupid. I have to kiss other men all the time for work. It’s no big deal.”
I frowned. “Were you on the set when he kissed you?”
“Well, no. It was on the street, outside the studio where we’d just met with the photographer and went over the plans for the shoot. Frank was there early, surprising me with dinner plans.”
“Uh-huh. Seems to me Frank has reason to be upset. Kissing other men while strictly at work is one thing. Kissing them randomly on the street is something entirely different.” At her indignant huff, I hurried to continue. “Put it this way, Natalia. Would you be upset to see Frank kissing a coworker?”
Her trill laugh made me wince and turn down the volume on my cell phone. “Darling. He works with goats. If I caught him with a goat, I’d have bigger things to be worried about.”
Rhett’s cell phone rang on the kitchen counter, the Def Leppard song reminding me of high school dances when we all thought we were so cool to be rocking out to old-school rock ’n roll. He jumped up to get it, probably all too happy to get away from the drama oozing out of my phone and into my ear like those brain worms Rhett warned me about. I watched his fine form stretch the boundaries of his T-shirt right before he answered the phone.
“Okay, so what’s happening now?” I was on shaky ground here. I had a best friend, but Lily-Marie had never crossed this solid line in the sand. Cheating was never okay in our books, so I’d never had to come to the rescue for this kind of offense. Did Natalia want me to come over? Honestly, I was on Frank’s side, if there were sides to this debacle.
“What?” Rhett’s shocked voice had me frowning and moving closer to him to see if I could hear what was happening on his call.
Natalia kept screeching in my ear about technicalities and how she was innocent. I turned the volume down on my phone a little bit more until the sound was merely annoying chatter in the background.
“Wait. So they got out of the fence? Can’t you just round them up with your truck or something?” Rhett ran his hand through his hair, the movement lifting his shirt and leaving a sliver of tan, toned abs showing. Despite the panic happening on the end of our phone calls, my mouth watered and my breasts ached, clearly turned on and tired of being ignored. I didn’t think another cold shower would cut it any longer. Here we were, pretending to be in love, complete with all the loving glances and soft touches, which led to hot kisses that were far from fake. That orgasm the other night wasn’t fake either. This unbelievably hot man had stated more than once that he wanted me for real, which undeniably meant even more orgasms, and yet I continued to drag my feet.
I truly was insane.
“Gabby?” A loud shriek brought me back to the moment. I’d left Natalia ranting on the phone. I guess she’d wound down enough to realize I wasn’t listening.
“I’m here,” I assured her.
“So, what do I do?” she pleaded. Even little Milly, my goddaughter, didn’t put that much whine into her pleading. Perhaps Natalia missed her calling and was more of an actor than a model.
I tapped a finger against my lips, thinking it through. She assumed I was the voice of reason and I didn’t want to let her down, despite her crazy situation. “Hang tight. I’m going to see if Rhett and I can talk things over with Frank and get you two communicating again. Okay?”
“Oh, that’s a good idea! Yes. Okay. Call me immediately. Oh, and make sure he knows it was a mistake and nothing more!”
“Will do. Talk soon.” I hung up before she could give me any further instructions.
Rhett hung up at the same time and we both stood there staring at each other in a daze.
“What the hell is going on?” I asked, on the verge of nervous laughter.
“We have a goat emergency,” Rhett said with a straight face.
“We have a cheating emergency,” I responded.
“Let’s rescue two goats with one trip.” Rhett winked at me and I lived off that little thrill in my stomach that told me no matter what happened, as long as he and I were on an adventure together, we’d be fine. He grabbed my hand and I held on tight.
* * *
The scene we arrived at was far from normal, yet what I’d come to expect from the way my life had been since agreeing to be on the reality show. Rhett’s dilapidated vehicle had gotten us to the mountainside behind Pasadena, the ride longer than normal since the engine couldn’t handle anything beyond fifty miles an hour. Forty-seven honks later—yes, I counted them much to Rhett’s amusement—we met up with Frank, who looked like a city slicker turned cowboy. The cameraman scrambled out of the back of Rhett’s car and conferred with Frank’s cameraman.
Frank always had an interesting style, but this one took the cake. Bright turquoise snakeskin boots, swear-to-God Wranglers that displayed a surprisingly nice backside, and a red and white checkered flannel shirt with the sleeves cut off. The cowboy hat straight out of Crocodile Dundee completed his look.
I was impressed.
“Thank God you’re here! I’ve got three of them in the trailer, but there are seventeen more roaming somewhere. We need to get them back before they get too far.” Frank took his hat off and wiped his brow with a handkerchief that had seen better days.
“What happened?” I muttered, putting my hand to my forehead to block the sun. The scrub brush dotting the hillside didn’t look super inviting.
“Damn client had some shitty fences. Neighbor had a pretty goat in heat swinging her hips and enticing my billys. They eat the most grass, you see, so I have all males. Clyde took one sniff and off he went, head butting the fence until it fell. The whole lot of them stampeded!”
Frank was waving around his hat, spilling more words than I’d heard him say since I met him.
“Oh sure. It’s always the female’s fault, huh?” I put my hands on my hips, getting a little heated about the whole thing. “You know, Frank, it doesn’t matter what she wore or didn’t wear, or if she twerked her cute little goat ass, she didn’t ask those billy goats to stampede. Maybe your goa
ts should have had better manners.”
“Okay…” Rhett put his hand over my mouth and spun me away from Frank. “We’re going to get searching. Just pick them up when we find them?”
I managed to look over my shoulder as Rhett dragged me away. Frank scratched his head like I’d just blown his mind.
“Yeah, yeah, just pick them up and haul them back to the trailer.”
Rhett, being a smart man, didn’t remove his hand from my mouth until we were well out of shouting distance. Given that I liked his hands on me, I allowed it.
“Bejesus, woman. And you think you’re boring? You just about started a #metoo movement over some fucking goats.”
I couldn’t explain it, but I was still hot around the collar about Frank blaming the whole stampede thing on one female goat. “I’m seriously peeved about it and I don’t even know why.” I spotted movement out of the corner of my eye. “Over there!” I pointed to a startled goat, eating grass behind a bush.
We both took off running, halting just a few feet from the goat, who looked ready to flee at a moment’s notice. Rhett put his hands out and approached slowly, crooning to him in a soft voice. Oddly, I was jealous. Of a goat.
“That’s a good boy. Just want to make sure you get home, buddy. Wanna take a ride with me?” He was now almost within touching distance of the goat.
“Um, yes, please!” I cackled. I had unfortunate timing and faulty volume modulation. The goat startled like I’d shot him and darted to the left.
Rhett, too, jumped left and tackled the thing, both of them rolling on the ground, making noises I couldn’t repeat even if I tried. I stood by, helpless, unclear what the protocol was in a goat fight. Rhett finally stood, victorious, the goat in his arms, its legs tucked under and useless. The goat’s baleful expression was enough to make me bite my lips to keep from laughing. Rhett was covered in dirt, which only made him hotter in that unfair way men have. If it were me, I’d look like a lifelong homeless woman.
We hiked to the trailer and deposited Vincent van Goat—according to his name tag—back in his pen before taking off to find more just like him. It didn’t take long for us to create a tag team system. I startled the shit out of the goats, right into Rhett’s arms. We rescued five more like that before we stumbled upon Natalia standing in front of Frank by the trailer with her hands on her hips.
“Dammit, Natalia. I told you I’d call you later.”
Rhett grabbed the waist of my jeans and pulled me to a halt before I got to her.
Natalia turned, did a double take, then looked Rhett and me up and down with a wrinkled nose. “You didn’t call me back. I texted you like twenty times.”
I splayed my hands. “As you can see, we had a goat emergency to fix first.”
Frank shuffled back a step or two each second Natalia’s head was turned in our direction. The guy clearly didn’t want to be talking to his wife. And quite frankly, neither did I. Natalia huffed at me like kid-napping—damn, the puns were a’flowing today—goats off a mountainside was ridiculous.
“Why don’t you let us deal with this first and then we can all chat?” I smiled broadly, remaining perfectly calm despite the sinking feeling I’d made a wrong turn somewhere. Why was I the designated moderator between these two? I wasn’t a marriage counselor. Hell, I wasn’t even in a goddamn relationship!
Natalia screwed up her face, which was impressive, given the amount of toxins in there preventing those types of expressions. Where there’s a will, there’s a way, I supposed.
“Forget the stupid goats already! Frank! Where do you think you’re going? We need to talk about this morning. Who cares about the boring goats!” Natalia’s thin arms were flailing around like she was being attacked by a pack of bees.
Frank halted his backward shuffle at her words, his spine straightening. Oh shit. I knew that look. That was the look of indignation when someone who was supposed to love you called your baby ugly. I got that same look every time Hew would tell me I was boring. Well, I’d get that look and then I’d slink off as that little bitch voice in my head confirmed it. Frank must not have had that bitch voice because he did the opposite of slink off. He charged forward and towered over Natalia, those bushy eyebrows drawn together like butt cheeks in a prison group shower.
“How dare you? You know how much my job means to me. My goats are part of my family and right now, even though they’ve wandered off, they treat me far better than you, woman.” He nearly spat the words, Natalia’s eyes blinking with each one like they were a physical blow.
I glanced over at Rhett, who stood there with his mouth turned down at the edges. His hand was still at my waist, like he was ready to grab me and cut and run at a moment’s notice.
But then the strangest thing happened. Natalia slumped, her shaking hand coming up to press to Frank’s chest.
“You’re right. I’m so sorry. I know you love those goats, baby. I don’t know what I was thinking. I guess—I guess I was so worried about you thinking I cheated on you that I just couldn’t wait another minute to make things right. Martin kissed me outside the studio and I pushed him away. Probably not as soon as I should have because I was so startled. I haven’t had another man’s lips on me for real since the day I met you, baby. I would never cheat on you. Please believe me.”
Frank stood completely still, like he was trying to verify the accuracy of her explanation. Natalia started stroking his chest, her body melting into his. When Frank dipped his head to kiss her, Rhett put his arm around me and silently steered me away. A few cringeworthy moans floated over on the wind. Neither of us said a word until we’d climbed over another hill and could no longer see them. Or hear them, thank God.
“Well, that was interesting. Guess all is well with those two.” I looked around, thinking we’d better get back to rescuing goats. Rounding them up was oddly satisfying. Maybe I missed my calling as a goat wrangler.
When Rhett didn’t answer, I looked back at him standing there studying me. Now that I thought about it, he’d been quiet for such a loquacious guy.
“What?”
“See, this is where we have to talk about things.” Not one dimple winked at me from Rhett’s face. My heart dropped at his serious tone. All the fun of our goat adventure was sucked away with one little sentence.
22
Gabby
“Talk about what?” I asked cautiously.
Rhett stepped closer, reaching down to take my hands in his. I stayed on the balls of my feet, feeling like I needed to be ready to run. Crazy, I know, but that’s how I felt when men said we needed to talk. Nothing good ever came from that phrase.
“Natalia called the goats boring and you flinched. I watched your face and it was like you retreated somewhere else in your head.” He leaned in closer, the faint freckles on his cheeks visible in the sunlight. He whispered, “Where’d you go?”
Well, shit. He wanted me to talk about Hew. Which was at the top of my list of things I didn’t want to talk about. Although I had promised him at dinner to work through our issues together. That idea sounded better when it was a future endeavor that could be pushed off indefinitely, not tackled right here, right now. I changed my mind. I preferred the toe dipping method, not cannonballing into the deep end.
“But the goats—”
“Will be fine for a few minutes. Answer the question, Gabriella,” Rhett cut me off and squeezed my hands, impatience clear in the way his eyebrows lowered over his eyes.
Okay, fine. Time to rip the Band-Aid off. I straightened up, mentally seeing me pull on my big girl panties. They were remarkably similar to grandma panties.
“Okay, tough guy. I was remembering all the times Hew inferred or outright said I was boring. Seemed a pretty familiar phrase, minus the goat reference, mind you. I could sympathize with how pissed off Frank would be hearing that.”
Rhett nodded. “Good. I was thinking that was where you’d go. And did it make you angry?”
“Hell yes, it made me angry.”
/> “Why?”
I wrinkled my nose and shifted from foot to foot. “Well…because…that’s a mean thing to say!”
“Was it true? Were you boring?”
My jaw gaped open. I sputtered. “No! Well, okay, maybe sometimes.”
Rhett kept nodding and suddenly I wanted to hit him in his bobblehead. “So, you got angry because part of you believed what he said was true. What if you believed you were super fun instead? Would that statement of his make you angry still? Or would you laugh it off because it was so unbelievably stupid?”
My eyes darted back and forth on his face, trying to answer all those questions and think it through. “I guess it wouldn’t matter as much because I’d know it was false.”
Rhett’s eyes lit up and his eyebrows relented, returning to their proper position on his forehead. “Exactly! So the problem isn’t what he said, it’s your own thoughts in your head about yourself.”
I stared at him, mouth still open, probably catching flies out here on the mountainside. He made so much sense I hated it. How did this guy, younger than me, figure me out so quickly? Had I hired Dr. Phil as my fake boyfriend?
I yanked my hands out of his grasp and rested them on top of my head. He looked at me, confused at my reaction. Welcome to the club, Tesoro. Then I popped my hands off my head and made a firework noise with my mouth.
“Mind blown,” I whispered dramatically.
Rhett’s face transformed into a huge smile, both dimples coming out of hiding, like a double-barreled weapon, taking me down in a blink of an eye. He yanked me in and wrapped me in his arms. I snuggled in deep and inhaled him.
“Ew. You kinda smell like a goat,” I said into his chest.
His body shook with laughter. “We’re wrestling goats off a mountain. Tell me how boring we are now.”
I poked him in the side, making him jump. “I get it, okay. I’ll trade my granny panties for neon pink sparkly ones.”
