Relaxing, I grinned at her. “It’s an ass-kicker.”
She licked her lips nonchalantly. “Speaking of ass-kickers—am I going to get to meet Surfer Boy while I’m here?”
I focused my attention on fishing my phone out of my back pocket as I lied, “He’s got a competition he’s training for so I’m not even getting to see him this weekend.”
Jessica groaned. “Well that sucks.”
I closed my grip around my phone, fighting the urge to hurl it across the room at her. “Very much,” I said sweetly.
I sent Miller a text message telling him that we were ready whenever he got back from his workout. Right after I hit send, my phone rang yet again. My mother. I groaned, but shot Jessica a look. “Be right back. My mom won’t stop until I take this.”
Slipping out the front door, I paced the lanai as I answered. “Hey, sorry I missed your call before, I—”
“Willow, I’ve got bad news.”
My heart flew into my throat. “Dad?” I gasped.
She made a strangled noise, and I leaned against one of the wooden beams of the house. What if something had happened to him? What if—
“Willow, Clay called a little while ago.”
My heart slunk its way from where it was lodged inside of my throat, and for a moment, it felt like it dropped out of my body completely.
Because the moment Mom had said my attorney’s name—even before she started saying things like agency and appeals process and new court date sometime next year—I knew that it was over.
Chapter Twenty
The first drink that I took that night scorched the back of my throat, making me choke, making my eyes water. I didn’t know if the tears were from the pretty blue bottle of SKYY vodka or the sobs I’d been swallowing back ever since Miller had picked me up and I told him my plans had changed for the night—that I wanted to go back to Jessica’s hotel room.
So since I couldn’t figure it out, I took another shot and then one more, just to be sure.
Jessica lay beside me, her blue eyes glazed as she stared up at the recessed lighting above our faces, which cast a reddish glow. “You sure you don’t want it?” she whispered, gesturing her hand out to the nightstand, to where the other half of the blue pill she’d downed an hour ago sat.
Of course I wanted it, but I shook my head. My phone vibrated in my back pocket—probably Cooper again. I ignored it.
She traced her tongue over her lips and sat up for a moment to look at the door to her room. Miller was on the other side, waiting for me as I’d asked. “We can still get him to take us to that club,” she said, dropping back down and giving me a little smile. She scooted her hips across the memory foam, closing the space between us until our hips brushed. “It’ll be fun.”
“I’m fine here,” I argued. But I wasn’t fine. My head was spinning and my stomach pitched violently because I’d left my dinner untouched and I felt myself slowly slipping further under.
And yet, I caught myself sitting up, swinging my legs over the side of the bed to pour yet another shot.
Because I’d lost.
Because I wanted to escape.
Jessica murmured something inaudible and I half-turned to see that she’d closed her eyes. “My show isn’t going to work out,” she said at last, referring to the pilot she’d been shooting earlier in the summer.
I lost. I’m never going to see him again. I lost.
I massaged my temples, trying to get that thought out of my head. I’d think about it tomorrow or the next day. I’d think about it when it didn’t hurt so bad to think. Instead, I’d focus on Jessica. “You don’t know that,” I said and she opened her eyes, turning her head to me to give me a cold look.
“Let me Willow it down for you—I got fired. I’m not going anywhere with it,” she said, and my mouth pinched together. I crossed my arms tightly over my chest, turning my back to her once again, as she continued, “You’re lucky.”
Sucking in a harsh, nauseating breath, I clenched my hands into the fabric under either side of my arms. “I’m not.”
She snorted, and then coughed, and I saw her come up on her elbows again in my peripheral vision. She gave me the most incredulous look she could manage. “Of course you are. You’ve got a good role and—” Then she paused, laughter taking over her body as she rolled over onto her stomach. Placing her cheek on the smooth comforter, she reached out and hooked her fingertip in one of my belt loops. “You’ve got a boy with more daddy issues than you’ve got.”
I flinched the moment she mentioned Cooper, snapping my gaze around completely to meet her eyes full on. “Don’t talk about him like that, Jess.” She could say whatever she wanted about me but I didn’t want his name mentioned tonight. Not when I was doing this.
Jessica wouldn’t drop it. “Oh come on, I’m sure Sunday dinner has been a f**king disaster at his place when you add you and James Dickson to the equation.” She resumed her glaring match with the ceiling and the lighting, waiting for me to say something.
“What are you talking about?”
She made a hysterical sound that was part laugh, part sob, before demanding, “Don’t you see it?”
She was talking in circles and the vodka was making its way to my head, to the rest of my body. The only thing I saw were the spots that would eventually become the darkness I wanted so badly.
When I didn’t answer her she rolled her eyes. “James Dickson’s his dad.”