Chapter 6 #2
“I want you to know that I agree with you completely and that her jewelry designs are hideous,” Sybil says. “But I could… in some alternate universe… understand how people would think they’re not completely disgusting. And they could… maybe… even veer into the realm of pretty?”
I don’t say anything.
The silence on the line stretches out.
“But obviously not this universe,” Sybil adds. “That we live in. Together. Another one. Far away. A bad one.”
“Right,” Emma agrees. “Would you be open to us continuing to hate her but liking her jewelry?”
“No!”
“Fair enough,” Emma says, closing the matter and pressing forward with the practical questions. “How did they even meet?”
“I have no idea! She probably sought him out on purpose, like the self-serving, social-climbing little life-ruiner that she is,” I spit out, instantly shocked at my own words. I sound more like a Real Housewife than the Nikki B. the world saw on their TV screens.
I’ve always been a girl’s girl, and I know all of this is just as much—if not way more—Aaron’s fault.
But Cara is the one who let her boyfriend go on a national show to promote himself and, ultimately, her jewelry line.
Cara clearly didn’t care what the ramifications of that would be—so long as it might help her out in the process.
And now Cara is here. In my house. And I’m the one who’s supposed to welcome her with open arms?
“Do you think your life was really ruined?” Willow asks softly.
Yes, I want to say, but don’t. “It could have been. It very nearly was.” It took me so long not just to move on from what she and Aaron did to me, but also to recover my reputation and career.
To even begin to be taken seriously again.
“Ugh, why is this happening now that my life is finally working again? I mean if this gets out, and blows up, which no doubt it will, I could lose the FitGirl partnership.” The team at the subscription service had made it clear that they were eager to partner with me because of the success of my athleisure line—not the LovedBy connection.
If anything, they seemed to want me to downplay that aspect of my past, saying it didn’t really “resonate with their wellness-focused clientele.” I let out another sigh.
“This really could mess things up for me in a big way. It’s just so…
so selfish of them. Like, my lord, Coop, just pick another girl.
Literally any other girl on the planet!”
I heave a breath, then push on. “And another thing—Cooper is basically a child. He’s not even old enough to know he’s in love!”
“I was,” Willow responds. And it’s true—she met the love of her life when she was only fifteen, in one of the most gut-wrenching, romantic sagas I’ve ever known, outside of a Nicholas Sparks novel. “I’m not saying Cooper has what I have,” Willow says, “but he might?”
There’s silence as the girls seem to consider this possibility. That Cooper might actually be in love with Cara. Which is ludicrous. But apparently being coupled-up themselves—all three are now married or engaged—has made my friends soft.
“Guys, come on. You know Cooper. He’s never been serious about a girl before, and now, all of the sudden, he’s engaged to her? It doesn’t make sense. Something weird is clearly going on.”
“It is very weird,” Emma concedes. “What are the chances of this even happening?”
“Exactly,” I say. “It’s suspicious, right?”
“What does your family think?” Willow asks.
“They are fine with it! My mom was weeping when Cooper announced their engagement.”
“Seriously?” Sybil asks. “They know she’s Aaron’s ex, right?”
“Of course they do! And my mother literally thinks we’re going to share a room?
” I bark out a sarcastic laugh. “That’s not going to happen,” I tell them, already deciding to take my still-unpacked suitcase right back out the door with me.
“I mean she could murder me while I’m asleep for all I know!
This whole thing is already so Single White Female–coded. ”
Willow’s tone is placating. “Nikki… I don’t—”
“I think we should consider it a small but definite risk,” Emma interrupts.
“Thank you!” At least someone else on this call is thinking rationally.
“Do you have any pepper spray?” she asks, but before I can answer, there’s a knock on my door, and Cooper pops his head in.
“Gotta go, y’all. I’ll keep you posted.”
“If she murders you,” Emma says by way of goodbye, “I promise to avenge you.”
“You are the sweetest.” This time, I say it with no fakeness at all.
I disconnect the call and meet Cooper’s look of wry disappointment.
“She’s not going to murder you.” He sits on the bed across from me.
“So you say. You barely even know her.” I uncurl from the fetal position and sit up to face him. “How could y’all spring this on me like this? I feel like I’m back on LovedBy.” The kind of environment where shocks and surprises are thrown at you on purpose just to see how insanely you’ll react.
That seems to pull Cooper up short. “Mom and Dad were supposed to tell you when you got here.”
“You should have told me before I got here,” I correct.
“We were worried you might not come.”
He’s right. I wouldn’t have come. I wouldn’t have given up my apartment in LA yet, or I would have secured a new one, or hell, I would have flown to Timbuktu before knowingly putting myself in the same room as Cara Lancolm.
“If it makes you feel any better, Cara feels awful.” It does. Slightly. “I told her you were cool with us.”
Of course he did. “You lied to her?”
“I just… skipped ahead a little.”
“What does that mean?”
“Nikki, I know you,” Cooper says. “You are going to get cool with it. Eventually. Though you are way more whacked out about this than I thought you’d be…”
I sigh, hugging a throw pillow to my stomach. As far as Cooper is concerned, he’s probably right. Whether or not I feel cool with it, I’ll certainly act like it. I’ll press my own discomfort deep, deep down into the dark recesses of my soul and put on the happy face that everyone wants to see.
While praying with every fiber of my being that this relationship falls apart before it can cause my life to.
I try a different angle. “Do you really know this girl, Coop? How did you even meet?”
“At Sullivan’s on Fifth.” Of course. Sullivan’s is a known LovedBy hangout in Nashville. Aaron and his buddies used to frequent it whenever he was in town. Could Cara have been lurking there, trying to “accidentally” run into him? Did she cozy up to Cooper to try to make Aaron jealous?
“Look,” Cooper says, “I love her. You’ll love her, too, once you get to know her.”
“I know enough.” I turn toward my suitcase and start digging through it to find something not covered in motor oil.
“The Aaron stuff is in the past,” Cooper says from behind me.
I hate how it sometimes feels like my siblings can read my mind.
“Cara has fully moved on. I thought you had too? They haven’t been in touch in years.
” He rises and heads toward the door. “Anyway, it would mean a lot to me for you to accept her. Your opinion really matters to me.”
It’s one of the most vulnerable things he’s ever said to me, and I’m taken aback by it for a moment.
But then he ruins it by saying, “And if you could get cool with this on the faster side, that’d be great. Cara’s family is coming over. Like, right now.”
“Why?”
“To celebrate the engagement. Duh.”
“Duh?” I repeat. “Duh?” I round on him, pointing my finger into his chest. “What. The. Hell. Cooper? They knew too?” I’m rewarded by the vague glimmer of fear in his eye before he darts out the door.
Classic little brother. It used to be that he’d fart in my room and then run out and hold my doorknob, trapping me in my own room. Now he’s more grown up. He’s trapped me with something far worse than a boy fart—his fiancée.
Realizing Cara herself could come up here any minute looking to put away her own stuff, I hurriedly wipe my smudged mascara and get changed.
I pull a red gingham top and skirt set from my luggage, steam it in mere seconds, and slip it on with cute sandals.
I give my hair a quick brush, then grab my suitcase and haul ass over to the front stairs this time.
With one hand on the banister, I let out a deep breath.
I can do this. I’ve done harder things without caving.
The doorbell rings, and I can hear my mother greeting Cara’s family as I descend the stairs with the heavy suitcase in one hand.
I can see a middle-aged man standing in the front foyer, who must be Mr. Lancolm, and there’s someone else behind him. A guy about my age.
I pause halfway down the stairs.
His clothes are different, but the crooked smile is the same.
It’s Tomato Guy.