****
Two and a half hours later my mood was still dark as I lay next to Phoebe beside the kidney shaped hotel pool. Anonymity suited me because my temper was foul after the texts with Hettie. I wasn’t mad at her, I was fucking furious with myself.
“That bad, huh?” Phoebe probed gently.
Everyone around me appeared to be having fun and I was in my own personal hell. Kids splashed in the pool, while young couples cuddled on sun beds. I rolled onto my back and faced the sky; there were no clouds. The light-blue color was a blank canvas. Turning my head, I looked at Phoebe who was sitting hugging her knees to her chest.
“Huh?” I muttered, and felt my brow crease due to my pissed off mood.
“Thank Christ. I thought you were dead the way you were lying there motionless, staring up at the sky. Anyone passing would mistake you for some junkie who had OD’d. You had me worried for a minute.”
I swung my legs to the side of my sun lounger and sat up. “Next time I reminisce tell me not to act on it. Seeing Hettie was a terrible idea.”
Phoebe sat looking at me, but said nothing.
“Fuck it. Let’s go dancing. I wanna get blind drunk,” I suggested, trying to shake off the dreadful feeling in my gut.
Phoebe smirked, knowingly, “Oh yay! I love drunk, Gray; he’s sexy and fun,” she replied, as she stood up and gathered all her shit together that was lying around. Tugging on the elastic of her bikini bottoms with her thumbs, she fished them out of the crack of her ass, smiled at me while I watched her, and turned to walk back to the room.
“Come on rock star, keep your eyes on where you’re going, I don’t want you hypnotized by my ass cheeks and falling over a small child on the way back to the room.”
I smirked remembering exactly why I hung out with Phoebe. She had always been able to lift my mood, and she took no shit from me. Apart from Hettie, I hadn’t met anyone who was as straight with me as her.
Phoebe did her best to cheer me up. As soon as we entered the room, she set up her music on her phone and connected it to the Bluetooth mini speaker she had. Dance tunes with an uplifting beat pulsed through the hotel suite as Phoebe stripped out of her bathing suit with no inhibitions about being naked, and grabbed a towel. She bounced on her toes to the music, tits jiggling, wiggling her ass in time to the song that played, until she eventually wrapped the towel around herself. I knew she wasn’t trying to entice me, she was just free spirited.
Lifting the phone, she called for room service. “Please may I have a bottle of tequila, a twelve-year-old malt whiskey, and vodka.” The person on the other end spoke for a few seconds. “No we have that stuff in the wet bar. Oh, but can we have some sloppy joe nachos with chicken.” Replacing the handset on the phone, she looked inquisitively at me.
“What? We’ve already had a few alcoholic drinks from the pool bar, and no lunch. I’ll be drunk by the time the club’s open if I don’t eat something.” She had a point. No one should party on an empty stomach, but I still snapped back.
“What, are you my fucking mother? I want to get rat-assed drunk tonight and forget about everything.”
“Forget about Hettie? Listen, you know I wouldn’t turn you down for sex, but I really don’t want you to fuck me again if you’re going to be thinking about her while you’re doing it.”
“I can accept that, I’m not a total sleaze. I know I said I wouldn’t while I was dealing with the shit going on in my head, but if we ever do slide back, my attention will definitely be on you not some fantasy or memory.” Even though I said it, I knew I wasn’t interested in anyone at that moment apart from Hettie. And that particular firework looked like a dud. At that moment, I could have kicked my own arse for going after her again. She was with someone else, and I figured I had to let it go. I also had to play fair with Phoebe.
“Your word is good enough for me,” Phoebe said, and suddenly darted toward the bathroom door. “I call dibs on the first shower,” she shouted, giggling as she ran past me. I reached out trying to stop her and grabbed her by her towel, accidently swiping it clean off her body. Phoebe shrieked, but it didn’t stop her from beating me to the door. I heard the shower start before she shouted, “You need to up your game, rock star, you’re getting sluggish in your old age.”
****
After an hour of preparation, we left the hotel suite having eaten all the nachos and had drank more than half a bottle of tequila between us. A small buzz from the extra alcohol lifted my mood. In my head I had pidgeon-holed Hettie, to focus on having fun with Phoebe. She was right, the previous two days had been heavy and I had become broody and difficult to be around. Drinking helped me to shake off the dark thoughts.
Taking a cab, we asked the driver to take us to the best nightclub in town. He took off like a man on a mission. Weaving in and out of traffic for about ten minutes he eventually pulled up at the curb of a huge, brightly lit and trendy looking nightclub with ‘Zone’ written in big jagged, edgy letters above the canopied door. Stepping out of the cab, I stuck my hands in my pockets and mumbled to Phoebe about the size of the queue.
“What queue? You’re a fucking rock star. They should be paying you to be here,” she said. Dragging me toward the doormen, she whispered, “Own it.”
Reaching the security guys, Phoebe flashed them a smile. “I hope you’ve got a decent VIP area, we want to be left in peace here. Gray doesn’t get much of that in Europe or Asia. Thank God there are still some little spots in the world he’s yet to be discovered.”
Watching the door guy glance to me then to Phoebe, I smirked when I saw he wasn’t going to admit he didn’t know me. “Sure, great to have you with us, Gray. Michael inside will show you to the VIP suites upstairs.” I smirked that he’d picked up on my name and nodded a ‘thank you’ in his direction.
Talking into his sleeve, he informed his host inside we were on our way and it was hilarious to watch how one person pretending to know me gathered pace inside. Free champagne, canapés, and an introduction to a couple of American celebrities ensued, and half an hour later we had all bonded like we were some secret club and were talking like old friends.
Being honest, I had never seen any of them before in my life. Most were from an American soap opera I’d never heard of, but they were great fun to be around. I was giddy when one of them actually knew who CraVed was and talked in detail about a couple of songs he had liked from our album.
After a couple of hours, Phoebe asked to leave the VIP area to go down to the main dance floor, mainly because there was a great club atmosphere down there, and we both loved to dance in the crush of bodies on a crowded dance floor. I was just about to take her there when someone grabbed my sleeve.
“Hope you don’t mind me saying, but your girl is stunning,” Slim, the lead guy from the soap, remarked as he nodded toward Phoebe. She really was a fabulous girl. “She is,” I agreed, even though she wasn’t technically my girl.
“Pity she’s taken. I’d definitely be tapping her if you weren’t.”
“Mind your manners, the lady is with me,” I snapped, closing down his disrespectful comment, and immediately saw his cocky attitude shrink. Slim glanced over at Phoebe who was standing just out of earshot. “She’s awesome. Too good for you, mate. Too good for me for that matter,” I admitted with a frown. Since arranging to see Hettie, my thing with Phoebe had felt fucked up. Without dismissing myself from his company I took her by the hand. “All right, Pheebs, come on, show me your best moves,” I prompted with a smirk. The light in her eyes shone with excitement as she smiled at me while I led her down to the dance floor.
Chapter 9
On a loop ~ Hettie
After breakfast with Gray my heart was in pain. I felt battered and bruised from the old wounds that opened the moment I laid eyes on him again. After our reunion my mind was stuck on a constant replay of how he’d looked, the way he sounded with that sexy London accent, the things he’d said to me, and the memory of his finger
s threading appealingly through his soft hair. The dirty, straight talking questions about Harris had struck me like a blow to the chest. He was even closer to the mark than he realized about the attention Harris had paid me lately.
Saturday evening’s dinner with Harris—the one that he’d begged me for—was forgotten because it appeared like he’d received a better offer from his work colleagues, an offer that wasn’t extended to me.
During our early years, life with Harris had been a lot of fun and he was the only man who had ever partially healed my heart after Gray. However, for the previous year, despite talking about our future, if I was honest, I’d sensed he was stalling about us firming up on our commitment to marriage and children. Gray’s appearance hadn’t shaken my relationship with Harris; it had forced me to face the truth of it.
Switching on the TV, I sat down heavily in the chair while I thought about what had changed. When things had gone awry with my relationship with Harris. I’d felt uncomfortable when Gray had pressed me about him and worse when it dawned on me that Harris took me for granted and wasn’t interested in our future.
All the time I’d thought we were building a life together and Gray was right. Harris’ behavior and attention toward me was consistently lacking. By choosing to network instead of spending time with me it had opened my eyes. He wasn’t interested in taking us to the next level as a couple.
Pulling my cell from my purse, I reread the text messages from Gray. When I came to the final message from him, I felt my heart sink as the text had the same impact as it had the first time I’d read it.
Gray: Okay, it seems like this is where I bow out. I’m not sorry for crashing back into your life. I guess it was selfish of me, but I couldn’t come back to Miami and not see you again. You’re the most beautiful girl I’ve ever been with, Hettie. Inside and out. Don’t settle. Make sure he gives you everything.
Panic ripped through me when I read the message again. It felt like my heart had been flipped over and crushed. I wished for a second it would stop beating. I knew Gray meant what he’d said. He stepped away to let me live my life. I hadn’t replied at the time—there was nothing left to say. That message was prior to Harris treating me shabbily again. Before I could change my mind my fingers typed out my reply.
Me: You sprung up out of nowhere yesterday, Gray. How am I supposed to deal with all of this? With you? It appears I am free for a late dinner after all if your offer still stands, maybe we should talk.
It took courage to send it, knowing it would probably lead to more heartbreak, but the pull of Gray was too difficult for me to resist. Seconds after sending the text I was full of remorse because I felt I’d already cheated on Harris for even wanting to go, then I remembered his disregard for me again and I didn’t care. He’d shown so little consideration when he changed his plans and excluded me.
Don’t wait up. That was as good as saying I was unwanted company, wasn’t it? For the following hour, I checked my phone telling myself that Gray hadn’t seen my message, but by the time 10:00 pm had come and gone, I figured that he’d decided that reconnecting had been a bad idea.
Wandering into my kitchen, I grabbed a can of soup from the cupboard, opened it, and poured it into a bowl. I set the microwave and leaned back against the counter waiting the three minutes I’d programmed it for when my phone alerted me that I had a text message.
Harris: Everyone from work has decided to go clubbing. Today has been awesome. It’s the most fun I’ve had in a while. How has your day been?
Is he fucking serious? Typing furiously, I hit send before I’d even considered the implications of what I had written.
Me: My day has been awesome. Remember that college friend I told you I had breakfast with today? Well he was a bit more than that when we were in college, but nothing serious. Turns out he’s a rock star now and about to hit it big in the US. He asked me to dinner tonight, but I turned him down because you begged me to spend time with you. Now that you’ve found a better offer, I’ve just messaged him back to tell him if his offer still stands, I’m in. I’m looking forward to my evening with him because this morning was lovely. Most fun I’ve had in a while too. He made me feel amazing.
My breathing was shallow and fast as my temper got the better of me, and seconds after I’d sent the message Harris was on the phone.
“You never told me it was a guy you were meeting this morning,” he stated sternly.
“You never asked.”
“So who is he? Are you really going to dinner with him?”
“I told you, someone I knew from when I was at college. And yes, I am going to dinner.”
“What’s his name?”
“Does that matter?”
“Of course it fucking matters. Do you think I want my girl going off to dinner with some dirty fucking musician? You know the reputation they have?”
“I know him and more about him than by his reputation. He lives up to every rock star fantasy a woman could think of. Gray’s a fabulous guy. Seriously hot, fun, and very attentive.”
“Implying I’m not any of those things?”
“Well to be honest, I’ve not seen that side of you for a while, Harris. In fact you only appear to have remembered I exist this evening after I sent that text. If that’s what I have to do to gain your attention…”
“Honey, you know the pressure I’ve had with—”
“Don’t say it. Don’t you dare fucking say it. I’m tired of hearing about your career, your promotion, your great fucking colleagues. You know what I’ve noticed these past few weeks? Where are my friends? We only socialize with yours. Every single function we’ve been to for the last six months has had to do with your work. Then you beg me to spend time with you tonight, begged me, Harris, and, where are you? With your fucking co-workers, that’s where. How do you think that makes me feel?”
“You’re right. I’m sorry. I’ll come home.”
“No. I don’t want you to come home. You’ll only be miserable. Stay with your fun work friends. I’ll go to dinner with Gray. Don’t wait up…or maybe we’ll arrive home at the same time, who knows.”
Cutting the call before he could finish, I threw my cell onto the granite countertop, enraged. My whole body vibrated from the effort of my rant. Now what? Two dinner invitations and I was reduced to eating a can of tomato soup. Seconds later my cell began to travel across the granite countertop as it vibrated, my favorite picture of Harris and me smiling up from the screen. My instinct was to let him stew but I hated fighting, and I hated being ignored after an argument, so I answered.
“What?”
“Meet me. We’re going to Zone.”
“Because I am going to have dinner with a rock star?”
“No, because I need to have you with me. You’re right, I was being selfish. I guess I got carried away and took you for granted, but I want to do better. I’m sorry, please, Hettie, meet me?” His voice was full of remorse and I wasn’t sure I believed him. Had he really been that self-absorbed that he had no idea what it had been like for me? Then again he had been so self-absorbed, I felt his apology could well be genuine.
I was usually very honest, but I didn’t tell him that Gray hadn’t called me back when I texted to tell him I accepted his invitation. I wasn’t sure I’d really have gone after my conversation with Harris anyway. At the very least I felt I had given Harris a rocket up his ass about how he’d been treating me.
“What time will you be there?” I asked, still debating whether or not to give in to his demands.
“We’re just leaving the country club now so I expect we’ll be there in about forty minutes. I’ll wait outside for you,” he offered.
“Okay, but I’m warning you, Harris, don’t you dare ignore me if I come with you.”
“Promise, honey, you’ll have my undivided attention.”
Forty minutes was no time at all to prepare to go clubbing, and with the fifteen minute cab ride to get there, I had
even less time. Concluding the call, I ordered a taxi to take me to him, and ran around like a blue-assed fly finding something to wear. The only thing suitable was my red slinky dress in a figure hugging material, and a tiny black wrap. Quickly, I added some smoky blue-gray eye make-up, a few squirts of perfume, and dragged a brush through my long hair. Our intercom buzzer sounded just as I finished, so I grabbed my purse and headed down to meet the driver at the door.
During the ride, I promised myself if Harris ignored me, even once, I was going to call him on it in front of his colleagues. I had reached my limit with his behavior, and if Gray’s visit hadn’t been well timed, it was pertinent to my feelings about Harris.
As I neared the club, nerves began to bunch together in my stomach. It said a lot for our relationship when I was in a cab on the way to meet Harris and still wasn’t one hundred percent sure he’d actually be where he said he would be. For a second I wondered what I’d do if he wasn’t, but as we rounded the corner I saw him standing with a tall redheaded woman near the entrance. I just knew she was Diane, the great girl full of fun that Harris had gushed about in his text.
I was almost out of the cab before he noticed me, but when he did he came running over waving, and pulled out his wallet to pay the driver. Handing him two twenty dollar bills he slipped an arm around my waist. “Glad you made it. Come on, there’s someone I want you to meet.”
Walking me toward the redhead, I said, “You must be Diane, pleased to meet you.”
Both Harris and Diane looked puzzled at how I knew who she was, but I didn’t elaborate. “Shall we go inside?” I asked, nodding my head toward the entrance. Without waiting for Harris, I stepped out of his hold and tried to look confident as I walked ahead of them. I knew by the look Diane had given me when I said her name that she had designs on Harris, but I didn’t have any particular vibe other than friendship on his side.
Notes On Love Page 9
