Page 92 of Dirty Rich Cinderella Story

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

Lori

I walk ahead of Cole and down the hallway, aware of him at my back closely following me. Tara is sitting at the far side of the table, and I sit down one seat over and across from her. Cole joins us and claims the spot across from Tara. Tara looks at me. “Apologies, Ms. Haven. I deal with being tabloid fodder often and I woke to headlines about me being a drug dealer, and killer, on the very day I’m hosting a breast cancer charity event.”

“Apology accepted,” I respond.

“Let’s get started,” Cole says. “I’d like to move this upcoming interview here to the hotel, and I need to feel good about what we’re doing before I push for that.”

“I’m ready,” she says. “Where do we start?”

“Tell us how you got involved,” he says, leaving her room to hang herself, which he’d already told me he’d do, just as the police will as well.

“Apparently, because I fucked David Curry ten thousand years ago, I must have drugged him,” she blurts.

“Didn’t you just tell TMZ you didn’t sleep with him?” I ask.

“I deny everything with TMZ, per my manager.”

“No comment is the only answer you have to anyone from this point forward,” Cole states.

“Okay,” she says simply.

“It seems a wide stretch that the police would assume your guilt because of a long-lost connection,” Cole comments.

“It’s not long lost,” she says. “We’re still friends and occasional fuck buddies. Some people are just better at being fuck friends than real friends. We were those people.”

“You don’t seem very broken up about the loss of a good friend,” I observe.

“We fucked six times,” she says. “We didn’t share life stories. We didn’t contemplate everlasting love. And it hasn’t even hit me yet. Right now, I’m scared for me. They’ve taken away my ability to grieve for him.”

It’s cold and callous, but not without believability. I don’t like Tara, but that doesn’t make her a killer, and I can’t call her a bad person for flirting with Cole. She doesn’t know he’s with me, and let’s face it, he is hot.

“Tell me about the police encounter you had,” Cole orders.

“They came to the door,” she says. “I told them I needed an attorney to talk to them. After what happened with my father, I wasn’t taking any chances by saying one single word without you.”

“Why would they come to your door?” I ask.

“David called me last night, so I was in his recent calls. He wanted to get together. He was a good fuck, but not good enough to look like shit today for the party.”

“How do you know they’re accusing you of giving him the drugs?” Cole asks.

“They didn’t,” she says.

“You told me they did on the phone,” Cole reminds her.

“They wanted to question me. I assumed.”

“Why would you assume such a thing?” I ask. “What don’t we know?”

“I was in rehab last year after my father was in the press,” she admits.

“Does your father know this?” Cole asks.

“Yes,” she says. “He’s very disappointed. Outside of him and my agent, no one else knows. They’ve kept it out of the press. If it gets out, it’ll drive the insurance costs up on my films and reduce my dollar demands.”

“But the police don’t know that, as far as you know?” Cole presses.

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