Page 60 of Liar & Champion
“This isn’t my bathroom,” I said, but I was smiling. He was just so good, so right, and I’d missed him. I kissed his nose.
“Can I move your things in here?” he asked, looking directly into my eyes. “Then you can use the extra room as your painting studio.”
Was I actually going to sleep in his bed every night? Would that be okay? I smiled and shrugged. “Okay.” If he saw my stuff, my needles, then we’d have a conversation. Maybe I did want to tell him the situation. Maybe he deserved to know. If he was feeling guilty about having a cold and heartless marriage, then how could I not feel guilty for not telling him all the details so he didn’t have to feel bad about it? He was a good man. The best. I was definitely going to hell for taking advantage of him. Oh well. I could cope with hell. My life on bad days was exactly that. I was born for it.
Chapter Nineteen
LIAR
The hotel had six pools and more hot tubs. I was determined to lounge by a different pool every day for the next week, because, you know, a girl’s got to have goals. When I woke up, Nix was gone, but he’d left the bed covered in yellow tulips, which made me feel like I must be the heaviest sleeper in the world, because how had he gotten up and covered the big bed with tulips while I snored blissfully away? Oh well. I really did love tulips, I just liked Nix more.
I hadn’t brought a swimming suit, so I wore a pair of Nix’s exercise shorts and a sports bra for the pool. I’d have to go shopping eventually, but it seemed like such a waste of time when I could lay in the sun and doze off instead.
The pool I chose was on the roof, and it wasn’t as functional as the other lap pool on the roof, because it was more of a garden oasis, so it felt private because the pool wasn’t one big square, but several branches that came into the surrounding pavement with tons of potted plants between each little semi-private patio.
I was lying there, drinking my three different kinds of waters, when I heard a huge splash and then shortly after, a guy came out of the pool, tripped on my lounge chair, and then kept running. A girl in a bikini came out of the pool a second later, butshe didn’t trip, no, she was like a gazelle, leaping after him with the grace of a ballerina. He had no chance. Should I interfere?
“You said that we’d have breakfast together!” she yelled, but they were out of view behind a screen of plants.
“That’s a pick-up line. It’s not a literal thing. And I don’t even eat breakfast, ever. I’m on a liquid diet. I don’t actually remember picking you up, but how about I give you some money so you can get your own breakfast? How’s a thousand? I don’t have more than that on me cash, but if you ask at the front desk…”
I got up and peered around the palm tree, because I knew that voice, and that flash of blue eyes was making me suspicious.
“Trevor?” I asked while he was going through a pair of pants that he wasn’t wearing. He was wearing underwear, or maybe that was a swimming suit. It was awfully tight and small for a swimming suit. Maybe it was one of those French ones.
He looked up at me, panicked. “Did I say I’d get breakfast with you too?”
I laughed. It really was Trevor. He was one of Beastie’s rich, worthless friends who we’d spent time with last summer, boating, hiking, jumping off of things. “You don’t remember me? I’m hurt.”
The girl whirled around on me and grabbed my hair, her brown eyes bright with malice. “How dare you cut in while I’m getting what I deserve?”
The next second, she was off me, and Trevor threw her in the pool with a satisfying splash. He didn’t look at her, instead he was studying me. “Morphine, right? Beastie’s bestie? Sunshine Ray Wilson.”
I beamed at him while I touched my hair, trying to see if she’d yanked any out. It hurt. “You remember me. I don’t remember your last name.”
His eyes were duller than usual and he leaned close to whisper, “I’m sober. That means that my memory is terrible. I can’t forget anything. So, Morphine, are you going to give me an inside on your supplier?” He nudged me a little bit. Ow.
I laughed and shook my head. “No way, then my prices will go up. To each his own.”
“You’re a monster.”
“Thanks. You too.” I turned and went back to my lounge chair, because being attacked by that girl had worn me out. Fine, I’d woken up tired. This was a slow day, not a rumble with crazy chicks day.
He sat down on the end of it, crossed his foot over his knee and smiled at me. “What brings you here? Where are we?”
“Las Vegas.”
“Beastie’s here?”
“No. I haven’t seen him all summer.” So much honesty, but Trevor could find out the facts if he wanted.
He raised a brow. “You’re solo? Do you want a travel companion? We can swap needles.”
I laughed. “I’m not traveling, I’m lounging. And the way you treat women is terrible.”
“That wasn’t a woman,” he said dismissively.
I made a face at him. “You might want to take that back. You don’t use someone’s body and then discard them afterwards as not a woman.”
