“You got it.”
Two more iced teas later, I was relaxed and could almost forget about that entire party—including Adriana—and the scariest car ride of my life. I left JT in the sand and headed out into the water, lifting the bottom of my dress so it wouldn’t get soaked. It was so surreal to be standing there in the moonlight, in the middle of Malibu, of all places.
I saw JT coming towards me in the water. “Your pants are gonna get soaked.”
“Don’t care.” He came towards me. “You know, Rico had the total wrong idea with that photo shoot.”
The smile froze on my face.
“What do you mean?”
My heart thudded loudly in my ears, and I wasn’t sure I wanted to hear the next words out of his mouth.
“This right here would’ve made the most amazing shot.” He pulled his phone out as if to illustrate the point and snapped a few pics.
I laughed, wedging my dress between my knees before cupping my hands together to throw water at him. “You had me thinking you were on the Adriana side of the fence all of a sudden.”
“Please.” He tucked his phone away before aiming a handful of water at me, which I tried to sidestep and almost ended up toppling over. Before I could fall butt first into the ocean, JT’s hand grabbed mine and hauled me back to my feet.
“Thanks,” I said a little breathlessly.
“Wouldn’t want to see you hurt,” he said softly. “C’mon, I better get you home before sunrise.”
I let him hold my hand as we reluctantly waded out of the water and back towards the house. “You know, for a second date, I’d say it almost topped the first.”
“Second, huh?” He smirked at me.
I nodded, grabbing my shoes and looking back at the water longingly, wishing I could spend the night just stretched out on the sand with JT.
25
I groaned as Trish whirled the blender.
“Sorry,” she apologized. “It’ll just take a couple seconds.”
I glared at the appliance that was waking me up more than the weak cup of coffee beside me.
“I wanna die,” I wailed, burying my face in my arms.
I wanted to crawl back upstairs and hide under the covers until this feeling of doom and gloom passed. It felt like I’d barely gotten any sleep last night, or actually, more like this morning.
JT and I had stopped at an all-night place on the way home for an early breakfast where I found out Sor had been texting me like crazy since we’d left. Apparently, there were already rumors out about our little run-in outside the club. I was lucky I fell asleep at all. My total hours of sleep came in at a whopping three since Trish came in and knocked on my door to wake me up. Obviously, she had no idea how much I needed the extra hour or two.
I wondered if Trish had slept at all. She looked comfy and wide awake in her T-shirt and jeans.
“Isn’t today the weekly phone call?”
“Oh, no…” I rasped.
Did I sound hung over? Probably. But I wasn’t, just majorly sleep-deprived. That run had tired me out. I could sleep for a week if someone would let me. But I already knew I couldn’t. And an afternoon snooze by the pool totally didn’t sound bad to me. I’d even turn off my cell and ignore any calls from Sorche if I had to.
“Have you told her yet?”
I blinked and took a sip of the coffee, hoping it had somehow gotten stronger in the last few minutes. No luck. I pushed it away. “No.”
“Chey!”
“What? I know, I know. It’s time she knows what I’ve been up to out here. But…” I rested my chin on my folded arms and looked at her pouring out the fruit smoothies.
“You’re afraid.”
“Wouldn’t you be?”
I caught her smile before she banished it away as she set the frothy strawberry concoction in front of me. “Much healthier than coffee.”
“You’ve been hanging around Dad too much.” But I took a sip of it, anyway. “She could blow a fuse.”
“She’d have every right, but I don’t think she will. Just tell her the truth.”
“She’s going to wonder why Dad let me do this.”
“Because you’re a seventeen-year-old girl, Chey, weeks away from eighteen. You deserved the chance to see what comes of it. If you were my daughter, I’d be proud of you.”
“Want to adopt me?” I flashed a smile my orthodontist would have been proud of.
“Chey…”
“Fine, fine. Maybe I’ll see if I can catch her online before she has a chance to call.”
“Sounds like a good idea.”
I grabbed my smoothie and headed back upstairs, wishing I could just throw myself back in bed instead of staying on mom-daughter duty.
***
I shut my bedroom door behind me and headed for my cell phone lying on my dresser, charging away. I turned it on and texted Mom a quick message that maybe we could Face Time? I set up my tablet and debated going out on the balcony, but the bright sunlight was a little too much for sleep-deprived me.
I put my smoothie beside me and got comfortable in my desk chair, waiting for her inevitable arrival. Part of me hoped that she wasn’t going to log on, that she’d text back and say she was out running errands and she’d call when she got home.
But my news wasn’t something I really felt like breaking over the phone, either.
The advantage of Face Time was I could see the potential disappointment on her face, not having to try to read her lengthy silences blind like I’d have to over the phone.
Suddenly, there was that familiar noise that she’d logged on.
Too late to chicken out and head downstairs.
In seconds, we were connected.
“Chey!”
At least, she looked happy to see me. Her dark blonde hair looked freshly highlighted and was pulled back with one of those large plastic clips we shared.
“Hi, Mom. How’s things?” I figured start small and work my way up to ‘hey, guess who got their own billboard this week?’
“Good. Quiet around here without you.”
I smiled. Probably a good quiet.
We did the standard small talk—work, weather—and glossed completely over the topic of Dad before finally, I figured it was better to just spit it out and tell her. It would save my already fragile nerves.
“What’s wrong?” she asked after one too many lengthy silences on my part.
“Now why would you think something’s wrong?” I took a break by gulping down some of my strawberry smoothie.
“Because you look worried.”
More anxious, actually. And nauseous.
“And your hair’s changed.”
I smiled, glad she could tell even though it was just an inch here and there and the streaks were meant to be more subtle rather than wham-bam in your face. “There’s something I have to tell you.”
“Oh, great. What’s your father done now?”
“Daddy hasn’t done anything.” I played with my silver ring Mom had given me for my last birthday. “I uh…”
I cleared my throat and watched the cursor blink as it hovered over the share file button.
“I kinda got a job,” I said as I clicked on it before I could back out and change my mind.
Mom was silent for a moment. “Doing what?”
“Modeling.” Okay, so it wasn’t the whole story, but I was working up to my new ‘it girl’ status. Really, I was.
She didn’t move. And the only way I could tell she’d heard me was that little vein on the side of her neck began to twitch like it did when she was trying—unsuccessfully—to control her emotions.
“Chey…” There was a distinct audible sigh from her end. “How long’s this been going on?”
I took another sip of my smoothie. “Not long. I did a charity fashion thing with Sorche a little while after I got here. Rico liked my look, and things sort of went from there, but really Mom, not long. Things sorta sped up the last little bit. It was like a blur b
etween my shoot and my billboard went up this week and…”
So that last little bit ran together, and if she understood a word of it, I’d be stunned.
“Billboard?”
Good thing Mom understood Chey speak, I guess.
“Yeah. Rico was thrilled with how the photo shoot went, and—” I noticed she’d okayed the file transfer. “Sorche took the video. We went to watch it go up.”
I let the we stay ambiguous. She didn’t need to know Dad had missed my big moment. And she didn’t need to know exactly when the billboard had gone up, either. I held my breath as she stayed silent for a few moments, then I heard the clip start to play.
Two minutes and forty-four seconds later, I caught the small smile on her face.
“Well?” I fought the urge to run from the room, not knowing what her reaction was going to be.
“You look beautiful, Chey. I only have one question. Make that two.”
I braced myself. “Ask anything.”
“Did your father have anything to do with you getting this?”
“None. All me. Rico saw me out with Sorche at that charity fashion show and thought I’d be perfect for his new line. The only thing Dad did was look over the contract for me and have his lawyer do the same.”
“Then why didn’t you tell me?”
I met her gaze straight on through the webcam. “Honestly? I was afraid you’d say no.”
And pull the plug on my summer. Which could still happen, I realized as I bit the inside of my lip, waiting for her reaction.
There was another loud, audible sigh that seemed to echo in my room. “Chey, you’re old enough to start making choices on your own.”
Really? Since when? But I knew way better than to ask that. “So it’s okay?”
She gave a slow nod.
“Send me some of the pictures if you have access to them, I’d love to see them.” She looked like she was studying me intently. “I want you to have fun.”
“I am.” Most of the time. “Dad and I took some photos together at his party last night, so…”
“I’ll probably see them somewhere.” She smiled and gave a little head shake. “You’re growing up, Chey. We’ve all got to get used to that.”
I laughed a little. “So really, you’re cool with everything?”
“As long as it’s what you want and you’re still hanging out with your dad, I’m fine.”
I nodded quickly. “Definitely what I want.”
And fingers crossed on the last one.
26
“Brought you something,” Sor announced as I opened the front door to find her standing there, a large white cardboard box in her arms.
“What?”
“Let me in, and you’ll find out.”
I stepped back and waved her inside.
“Aren’t you at least going to give me a hint?” I asked as I followed her back towards the kitchen.
She laughed and looked at me over her shoulder. “You’re worse than a three-year-old.”
Was not.
I was overtired. Exhausted. I’d been hanging out with JT pretty much every day this week since the party. We’d hit Malibu, hung out at his beach house, and played in the surf most of the week. I had a heck of a real California tan going for my efforts.
She set the box on the kitchen table and stepped back.
“Voila,” she said with an exaggerated flourish.
I raised a questioning eyebrow and lifted the lid back to find the cover of a tabloid printed on the icing covering the large sheet cake. I leaned closer, not quite believing my eyes. Front and centre on the tabloid were none other than me and JT. Oh, this was a joke, right? It had to be a joke. Sor had found a pic somewhere and done a little work with Photoshop.
Because there was just no way…
Sorche laughed at the look of awe on my face. “I figured we had to celebrate such a historic event, no?”
“This is real?” My voice came out a rasp, and I stole a glance at her before looking back down at the cake.
“Oh, yeah. It’ll be on every newsstand.”
“Great.” I was so not amused.
Who could blame me? This was just going to prove to Mom that I wasn’t handling this summer out here like I’d promised her I would. She may have okayed me modeling. She’d probably thought the headline of ‘Chey all grown up’ on the ET website with the inset of me as a three-year-old perched on my father’s shoulders at the beach was cute. But this? No way. I could almost picture her making her plane reservations as I stood here staring at the cover of a tabloid. My cover, to be exact. JT and I in full running mode, with a smaller inset picture of Dad and I arriving at the birthday party earlier.
“Relax, it’s an advanced copy.”
Like that helped any. I let out a dejected sigh and felt myself deflate a little.
“Autograph my copy, will you? I think I’ll have it framed.” She pulled an actual edition of the tabloid out of her tote bag, along with a silver marker. “I was thinking personalizing it would be best. After all, a simple Chey doesn’t convey the deep meaning of our friendship.”
I rolled my eyes. “You’re a bitch.”
“Yeah, yeah.” She stuck her tongue out at me. “Small slice please. I’m modeling tomorrow.”
I grabbed the knife from one of the drawers and cut a couple slivers of cake for us and set them on the plates Sorche had grabbed from the plate stand. Dad and Milo could obliterate the rest of the cake whenever they got back later.
“Here, let me read this to you.”
“Oh, no. You mean there’s more?”
Sor just smiled as she took the magazine and flipped it open to a page, probably already having the page number memorized.
“‘All grown up. Where has Chey been hiding? Last we saw Sean’s little girl, she was still in the single digits and taking in Disney movie premieres in full princess regalia’.”
“Tell me there isn’t a picture,” I pleaded, leaning over to see that there wasn’t one of me dressed up like Cinderella or Snow White gracing the glossy pages.
“Shush, I’m reading,” she admonished, pulling the magazine further away from my view. “Where was I? Oh, yeah… ‘but now she’s back with a vengeance’.”
I bit my lip to keep from interrupting her again. A vengeance?
Sor continued on, pausing for only a small nibble of cake. “Between the House of Vanetti billboards and a potential romance with reforming bad boy JT…she’s also been spotted shopping at The Grove with fellow Hollywood daughter, Sorche…” She lowered the magazine. “That’s about it.”
I grabbed the tabloid away from her and flipped through it. Saw a nice photo of JT driving away, the top of my head visible next to the blurb she’d just read.
She pulled it back from me without a word.
“And here I thought he was a half-decent driver.” I took a stab at the icing.
“Amazing what they can catch with the right lens. You know I need details.”
“There are no details. It passed in a flash. Frankly, I was too concerned with my life to remember much of it. We left the club, guys chased us, we circled a block or two, finally got in the car, and sped off. Just like any other high-speed L.A. car chase.”
Yeah, okay, so that was a bit of a fib. See, not a lie. A lie was purposefully misleading someone. A fib, on the other hand… Well, it was less than that. And more about keeping some info to yourself. And that’s what I wanted. Sor didn’t need to know about Malibu or our four a.m. breakfast. I needed to figure out this weird relationship…yikes, did I really just use the R word? Weird. Anyway, whatever JT and I had going—because honestly, I was a bit confused, and having a tabloid call us the latest summer fling on the index page…a hot summer fling…
I was going to take my confusion out on my slice of white chocolate coconut cake.
“You know, maybe I’m just not cut out for all of this,” I mused.
She swiveled back to face me. “If you’re talking about Ric
o putting you on a billboard, deal with it.”
“I can’t.” Look at the fallout it was causing. A nice, neat domino effect. “This was supposed to be a summer-only thing.”
And I knew from Trish that Rico was already talking about extensions, and what would happen if he took the House of Vanetti store to NYC? I’d been sitting there for some of that conversation that night at the restaurant, never figuring it would mean anything to me.
Cruel Summer Page 29