Page 34 of Played

“They sent me flowers.”

Trudy sips her wine and asks. “Who’s they?”

“The Harris family.”

Her brows furrow. “What for? Oh, for the Care Bear?”

“Aye.” I nod. “I was foolishly hoping that Ethan had something to do with it.”

“Well, he obviously did. How else did they see the stupid bear?” She scoffs.

“True, but I mean, the idea of sending me thank you flowers. I was kind of hoping that Ethan was behind that.”

“Come on, Freya. You don’t know. It could have been anyone in that family. It could have been Laney or even Caleb for all you know.”

“True. But part of me just hopes.”

“You must be hammered, Freya. That’s the way to tell. When you start pining, yearning for Ethan again, I know you’re toasted.” She says, pulling the wine bottle away from me, closer to her, and then she goes one step further and puts it on the tv console table, way out of my grasp. That’s when my phone pings, indicating that I have an email. “No. You’re off tonight.” Trudy argues, as I look at my phone on top of the coffee table.

“What’s this?” I say, brows furrowing, looking at the display. “It’s an email from Laney McAdams.” I open it. “Holy fuck. It’s a wedding invitation.”

“It’s a what?” Trudy barks in disbelief, setting her wine glass down. She looks at my phone with me. “Holy fuck!” She laughs. “These people are nuts! Why would they invite you!”

My eyes widen, realizing what she's saying.

“You’re Caleb’s ex! And Ethan hates you! Oh...my....God! What are they thinking!”

Then I get defensive. “First of all, I’m not Caleb’s ex. We were never together. Second, Ethan does not hate me. If he did, he wouldn’t have taken that stupid bear, like you said.”

“And why are they emailing invitations? How tacky is that? Like, shell out a few bucks and toss a stamp on it, geez!”

“The wedding is next weekend, Trudy. They would never have enough time to send and get responses by then.”

“Can you say...shotgun wedding?” She pokes.

“Well, Laney is pregnant, and from what I understand, they want to be married so that it’s easier to adopt Peg.”

“And so she doesn’t look like a whale walking down the aisle.” Trudy scoffs.

“Well, it is valid.”

“But they’ve been together a day. God, rich people are crazy!”

“Hey!” I shout/laugh. “I mean, I'm not exactly a billionaire, but I've got money, and I'm not crazy!”

“I’ve got money, too, honey. But I wouldn’t try to pull off half this shit, girl.” Trudy’s tone is matter-of-fact. “So, are you going to go? It’s in goddamn South Carolina.” She does a double-take. “Oh, even better. At the Ford family ranch. More crazy rich people.”

“Since when are you so judgemental of billionaires?” I chuckle.

“Crazy ones.” She points out.

I just laugh. Then Trudy sobers. “Wait a minute. None of the Harris family met you, right? Just Caleb and Ethan?”

I nod. Not knowing where she’s going with this.

“And you gave Ethan the bear to give to the kid, right?”

“Uh huh. What’s your point?”

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