Page 65 of Britta & the Beach Boy
But I dare anyone to look at Dad when he has that face and tell him no. I am reminded in this moment of something I’ve been so aware of but haven’t thought about yet. Dad has lost so much. He lost his wife, partner, and best friend to a slow and miserable disease. He spent his life working toward a future he will never have and watched the toll it took on all of us.
Three years from now, I’m going to get a divorce, and he’ll never know the real reason. I’ve shocked him with this announcement, but he’s not telling me not to do it. He just wants to be there for what he thinks is a beautiful decision I’ve made. I feel like the worst daughter ever, but I can’t tell him that either. Instead, I tell him I’ll see what I can do.
Which is how, the following day, instead of driving fifteen minutes to Santa Monica beach and although I’ve never been on an airplane, Dex, Archie, Stella, and I meet Rhys James at a private jet at the Burbank Airport to fly to Las Vegas—a place I’ve never been—for my fake wedding day.
Chapter twenty-four
Dex
Vegas isn’t the most low-key place for a spur-of-the-moment wedding, especially with Rhys James in tow, but if Britta wants her family at our wedding, I’m not gonna tell her no. Even if I may not make it out of Vegas alive if her brothers get a hold of me.
Aside from Archie, Britta, and me, Rhys and Stella are the only two who know this marriage is a business arrangement. You can’t keep something like that from your best mates. Rhys rolled his eyes, but understood better than I’d expected. Stella twists in her chair, bobbing with the energy of Italo Ferreira nine Red Bulls into the World Finals. I’m not sure if she’s excited about Britta and me or because she’s on a private plane with RhysJames. Probably the second, but she still found time before we boarded to pull me aside for ahurt her and you dietalk.
“I wasn’t keen on this idea in the beginning, but Vegas might actually be better,” Archie says from the leather captain’s chair across from me. Britta is to my side, across the aisle. If I want to look at her, I have to turn my whole body, and it takes every ounce of willpower not to.
“How so?” Rhys asks.
“We can make a bigger deal of it.” Archie’s eyes dart from Britta to me. “Still small and quiet, but it will look more realistic to the press and Immigration if we have Britta’s family there.”
“How will the press know?” Rhys asks, looking ready to jump off the plane even though we’re already in the air. He’s been burned by the media too many times—we all have, really. That’s the reason Frankie’s not here right now.
“Marta will have to alert them after the fact. That is, if we keep all of us being in Vegas—especially Rhys—under wraps long enough that the news doesn’t get leaked before the ceremony,” Archie twists open the cap of his water bottle with a calmness I envy. My hands are shaking so hard I don’t dare try. “We have to treat this wedding as though it’s the real thing,” he finishes, then takes a long sip.
“I don’t even have a dress,” Britta says with a nervousness that makes me feel less self-conscious about my own nerves.
“Did you bring the green one? You could wear that.” I’d love to see her in that again.
“I brought it, but it’s not white.” Britta chews on her thumbnail, her brows drawn together in a tight V.
“You’re too pale to wear white,” Stella offers helpfully, with absolutely no anxiety. In fact, I hope some of her excitement will rub off on me. “The green will be gorgeous. Dex, if you’ll give me access to your social media accounts, as soon as the ceremony is over, I’ll post about it. We’ll control the news from the verybeginning by releasing pictures of the wedding with a caption about marrying the love of your life in an impromptu ceremony.”
She leans forward to look at Rhys, who’s on the other side of me, next to the window. “You’ll need to be in the pictures. Then the focus will shift from Dex and Britta to you officiating. That will ease some questions people might ask over the next few days and also mitigate any suspicion that could arise later when Dex applies to become a national.His mate officiated; that’s good cred.”
This is a Stella I haven’t seen before, and one who’s not fangirling over Rhys anymore. Not that I know her well, but she’s young and usually shows her age. Now she’s all business, and I wonder how Rhys is going to take it.
He tenses, and I wonder if he’s going to tell her no way. He’s not used to being talked to the way Stella just spoke—as though he’s not a certified rockstar who needs to be tiptoed around because of his fragile ego.
I love the guy, but I have suspected over the last few years that he’s surrounded himself with a team of people who are more interested in keeping him happy than they are in giving him sound advice that he might not like. I’ve never said as much, of course, but watching how this has unfolded so far has only confirmed those suspicions.
“You okay with that, mate?” I ask him. Maybe I’m just as bad as his usual entourage. But I also respect that his schedule isn’t his own. It’s packed tight, and it wasn’t simple making time to be by my side today. That took major rearranging and made some people unhappy. I don’t want him to regret his decision to be here.
His mouth twists to the side as he looks past me to Stella. Seconds pass before he speaks. “Yeah. That’ll work.” He sits back and closes his eyes, then says, “Tell me if you want to post stuff on my accounts too.”
Stella pulls back in surprise, but I can tell she’s trying to hide it. “Yeah, that’d be great. Don’t you think, Archie? Makes the wedding even more believable. Is there any way we can get Frankie to come? We could do a wholeSurf City Highreunion and wedding party post.”
Archie, Rhys, and I shake our heads at the same time, and Archie answers firmly, “Frankie won’t be there.” He pauses, and his next words come out less tense. “But I agree on everything else. If we play up the details, we take control of the story from the beginning.”
“I’ll have my manager send over my login info,” Rhys says, his eyes still closed.
“You don’t know your own logins?” Stella blurts. “That explains a lot,” she adds, mostly to herself.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Rhys’s eyes fly open, and he leans across me to see Stella again.
“It means your accounts are boring. They don’t feel personal at all. I suspected you weren’t the one posting. Now I know.” Stella meets Rhys’s gaze, refusing to back down from the truth about the social media personas he counts as one measure of his success.
“Boring? You think you could do better?” He’s offended, but I hear something else too. It sounds like… curiosity. Definitely not the usual boredom that edges his voice so often these days.
“Yeah, I do. I run Georgia Beck’s personal and professional sites, and I’ve increased her engagement by two hundred percent in the past eighteen months.Andyou know what never got out? That she and Zach were in a fake relationship when her show started. When you take control of your own story, you’re the one who gets to tell it, not the media.” Stella taps Britta’s leg and points to Rhys. “Trade Britta places so I can show you what I’m talking about.”
