Chapter Eight
Gia: SOS.
Cal: When and where?
Gia: Casablancas. An hour.
Dylan: Rain check. Grav is at my mom’s, and Rhy and I finally have time for evening sex. You’ll have to shake the very fabric of time and space to remove my thighs from his ears.
Gia: I SAID SOS.
Dylan: Is it SOS-my-life-is-imploding or SOS-my-GHD-died-and-they-don’t-make-that-model-anymore?
Gia: The former.
Gia: Although the latter technically counts as life-altering too.
Dylan: Ugh. FINE. See you there.
Cal: Me too 3
“So what did you want to tell us?” Cal munched on deep-fried fish fingers at Casablancas in Bryant Park.
She looked adorable in her mustard-colored overalls, only one shoulder strap done, flowery long-sleeved shirt, and red-tipped fringe. “You sounded upset in the text messages.”
“Yeah, I was ready to cut a bitch.” Dylan pulled her long raven hair into a messy bun.
The Super Bowl was playing in the background on giant flat-screen TVs across the restaurant. “Is it your mom? Is she doing okay on the new experimental medicine?”
Calla and Dylan were my best friends. They were true crown straighteners. I’d found them through Tate, who was close with their husbands.
Unlike Tate, both my friends and their husbands were surprisingly sane, not to mention delightful.
Cal’s husband, Row, for instance, was a Michelin-starred chef who opened this New York joint for his wife just so she’d have a place to eat her favorite fish fingers and fries whenever she was in town.
They also offered high-end sushi, though, which was what Dylan and I were eating.
People around us jumped up from their seats and cheered. I guessed someone scored in the game.
I knew nothing about American football. In truth, it had no business being called football at all. They were using their hands mostly.
“No, it’s not about Mum. She is doing fine, though, thank you.” I flashed them a tired smile.
Dr. Stultz told me they were running some cognitive and physical tests before they put her on the drugs and were now waiting for the results. I guessed no news was good news.
“You know you can always ask us to watch over her or keep her company if your workload is too much,” Dylan said.
“I know.” I took a sip of my Cuba libre. “And the same goes for you two. If you ever need me, I’m here.”
“Friendship is not a quid pro quo relationship,” Cal pointed out. “Sometimes you’ll need us more than we’ll need you. You were there when Dylan’s daughter was kidnapped and she went through a panic attack. We’re not keeping track of who is helping who and how much. We just want you to be happy.”
“Thank you.” I smiled.
We tried to flag down a waiter, but the game reached its halftime mark, and all the patrons started ordering at once.
It was a bit chaotic, with semi-drunk football fans trying to grab the staff’s attention, before Dylan stood on the leather bench and cupped her mouth.
“Someone better come tend to this table, or everyone’s getting fired. Calla Casablancas is in the house.”
Not ten seconds passed, and a harem of waiters arrived with more sushi and more cocktails for us.
I waited for the servers to leave before I opened my mouth again. There was no good way to tell my friends I was soon to be married to the man whose voodoo doll was their last birthday present to me. Especially as I hadn’t even bothered pricking it with needles. I threw it straight into a fire.
“Oh! I forgot to tell you,” Dylan blurted out, her smile lighting up her face.
“Rhyland and I found an amazing place on a dude ranch just outside New Haven.” She snatched her phone from the table, scrolling through her gallery to try to find a picture.
“It has a stable and a huge space to build Gravity a playground. It’ll be great to go there on weekends. ”
“Well done, him. Congratulations,” I exclaimed. Gravity was Dylan’s daughter. Rhyland was in the process of legally adopting her, and she was the center of their lives.
“He’s such a great dad.” Cal put a hand over her heart. “There’s nothing sexier than a man who steps up and raises someone else’s kid.”
“I’d say your man is sexy too, but he is my brother.” Dylan made a finger-in-mouth gesture.
I giggled into my drink, immediately feeling lighter. Gosh, I loved my friends.
“I can’t believe Rhyland wore you down.” I shook my head, smiling. “Cal said you were anti-relationship to the extreme.”
“No lies detected. And look, I’m still no man’s peace…” Dylan caught the two cocktail straws between her scarlet-painted lips, sucking on her Salvador Dalí concoction. “But for him, I’ll sign a congeniality accord.”
Tate is going to be a terrible father , I thought grimly. Nothing like my own dad. Not, of course, that we were ever going to have children.
I promised myself I’d be as disagreeable as possible to ensure he’d want to get rid of me.
“Anyway, you were saying?” Dylan turned her attention back to me. “What’s your SOS situation?”
I wiped my sweaty palms over my dress. “Yes, well, I know it’s a bit shocking but—”
“Gia!” Dylan coughed out her cocktail. “Oh my…what the fuck ?”
She pointed at the TV. I whipped my head to the screen above our heads, confused.
“Holy shit!” Cal slapped her mouth. “I’m about to have a heart attack.”
My blood froze in my veins.
Tate did it again.
He beat me to it.
On the screen played a commercial featuring one of Hollywood’s most desirable it girls, all flawless makeup and designer clothes.
She congratulated the third richest man in the world—Tatum Blackthorn—on his engagement to Gia Bennett. The ad was for a preppy jewelry store.
“Choose elegance. Choose decadence. Choose timeless perfection. Choose Citoyenne. After all.” Claire Larsen sashayed felinely along row upon row of glittering jewelry, wearing a table napkin I supposed could pass as a white dress.
“Tate Blackthorn, the smartest man in the world, bought his fiancée a ring here.”
A doctored picture of Tate and me sitting together with my hand resting on his lap filled the screen. It was a mash-up between a picture of me smiling at an event while sitting next to my father and a picture of Tate from Cal and Row’s wedding.
He photoshopped a picture of you together, looking happy and loved up , my mind screamed. This is how you end up as an episode in one of Cal’s true crime podcasts as a woman who got chopped up to pieces and was found inside her husband’s fridge.
This was a level of toxic I didn’t even want to explore.
Every set of eyes turned their attention to me.
Larsen concluded the Super Bowl ad with the words, “Citoyenne Jewelry: because if the future Mrs. Blackthorn wears it, so should you.”
Deadly silence engulfed the restaurant. Both Cal and Dylan stared at me with their mouths hanging open.
Dylan was the first to recover from Tate’s… Tateness .
“I’m just… I…” Her jaw went slack. She closed it. It went slack again. “You hate him.”
Cal looked like she was about to cry. “Is this…what you wanted to tell us?”
I inclined my head, my heart sinking all the way to the bottom of my stomach.
“Tell us it’s a joke, G.” Cal cupped her mouth.
I shook my head, holding back my tears. “It’s the truth.”
“And this…you agreed to this?” Dylan swallowed. Her eyes shone.
I nodded slowly. “I agreed.”
“But…why?”
“It’s complicated, but…yeah.” I bit my lower lip. “It’s true.”
“He bought a Super Bowl ad to announce your engagement,” Dylan cried out, trying to recover, to lighten up the mood. “This is so extra and so Tate. It was either that or pissing on your leg in Madison Square Garden and barking at every man who glanced your way.”
“Thank you for the emotional support.” I flattened my napkin in my lap, straightening my posture.
“So…” Cal glanced around, unsure. “How did it happen?”
“We struck a deal.” I cleared my throat. “He helped me get Mum in that trial program, and I, in return, have to pretend to be his loving wife. He wants to ruin my life.”
“I’m pretty sure what he wants to ruin is your uterus.” Dylan squinted. “He’s always had a thing for you.”
“That’s rubbish. He loathes me,” I moaned, letting my head drop between my arms on the table. “He just transferred me to human resources, and now I have to fire people for a living.”
“There’s no other way?” Dylan went bone-white.
I shook my head. “The trial Mum’s been accepted to…” I left the rest to their imagination.
Cal’s eyes went soft. “I’m so, so sorry.”
There was a beat of silence before Dylan piped up again. “I mean…he is superrich, handsome, and literally obsessed with the oxygen you breathe…”
My eyebrows snapped into a frown. “I’m not even attracted to hi—”
“You told me you’d fold for him like a cheap lawn chair.” Dylan raised her palm to stop me. “Remember? At Alix’s wedding.”
“That doesn’t count. I was drunk,” I balked.
“Drunk admissions are always truthful.”
I picked up a paper napkin, scrunched it, and tossed it at Dylan. “So what if he’s hot? He’s still a meanie.” I felt myself smiling. It was the alcohol, surely. And the exhaustion that came with being sad all the time because of Mum.
“Have you fucked him yet?” Dylan wiggled her brows. “Does he come lava? Poison? Tar? Asking for a friend.”
“No,” I spluttered, actually giggling. Dylan had the uncanny ability to make light of the darkest moments. “But I moved into his bloody apartment as part of our deal. I’ve been doing my best to avoid him. I’ve actually bought individual Cheerios cups and bottled water to survive in my room.”
I couldn’t risk bumping into Tate in the kitchen. Not since I almost kissed him.
“Wait, isn’t he thrice divorced?” Dylan munched on the edge of a fry. “Don’t be so stressed. By all available data, this marriage is going to expire before a can of lentil soup.”
“Those cans are good for, like, a decade.” I scowled, looking between my two friends.
“Don’t worry. We’ll go to our husbands and pressure them to make Tate call it off,” Dylan promised.