Page 58 of House of Deceit

We all squeal and gossip for hours. Rebel does tarot readings for everyone. I’m not sure she knows how to really give a reading, but it is fun all the same.

Molly goes first.

“What’s your birthday?” Rebel asks, getting out her various charts.

“May 20th, 1996.”

I try to make mental notes of everyone’s birthdays to add to my notebook later, but the drinks start making my brain fuzzy and I’m not sure they’ll stick.

Deep into the night, people start dropping to the pull of the Sandman, but instead of going back to their rooms, they all sleep on the floor.

Molly and I are lying in her bed, somewhere between tipsy and drunk.

“I need you to not judge me when I say this.” Her head is on my shoulder, one arm wrapped around her.

“You got it,” I say before giving a hearty hiccup.

“I have a crush on my wrangler. She’s just so funny and beautiful.”

I pause a moment, trying to keep my loose tongue from blurting out that not thinking about my wrangler is becoming almost impossible.

Especially in the shower.

Or at night.

“You should do something about it,” I tell her, but I feel like I’m talking to myself.

“I can’t,” she says dejectedly. “She has a girlfriend.”

“Ugh, of course she does. Not that I want to add pain to this moment, but you know she will probably watch this footage and know this information, right?” I ask.

She sits up straight, almost cracking her head against my nose.

“Sometimes I actually forget we are being recorded all the time. Does that ever happen to you?” she asks, looking down at me in the dim light.

“Not really, no. It gets exhausting, always being aware, but what can you do?” I shrug.

What I don’t share is I try to think about Alec being the only one watching me. That it’s just me and him.

“I think she’s my soul mate,” Molly continues.

“Your wrangler?” I ask, my mind having drifted to Alec.

“Danielle, yeah.”

“Life is too short. Tell her. At least then you’ll know,” I suggest, yet unable to take my own advice.

Pushing Molly off my arm, I’m thankful she’s only one small step above a corpse when she’s asleep. Calf muscles burning, I walk on tiptoes to the giant dressing room, trying not to stumble as I’m still a little tipsy.

The honey prank worked like a charm earlier this week.

Deep in the middle of a sex dream where Alec had me bent over the arm of the couch in the living room while everyone was asleep, I was woken up by shrieks from an angry Keith.

“What on God’s green Earth!” he hollered, waking up more people.

More squeals echoed through the house as more feet met sticky honey.

“There’s fucking honey on the floor!” Colyn yelled out from the room next to mine.

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