Page 22 of Backslide
If anyone is going to look down her low-cut top, it should be me!
Since when did the earth become the sky?
And I am nodding along to what Cara is telling all of us about the history of the estate and the incredible biodynamic wineries in the area, listening vaguely to Nell and Damien respond, comparing notes about the places they’ve heard we should visit. But I am absorbing none of it thanks to the rushing in my ears.
On the outside, I might seem calm. But, in my head, there is an ocean in tumult.
“Is that the spa building?” Nell asks. She tries to raise her arm to point and visibly grimaces, grabbing her shoulder in a way that you’d have to be blind to miss.
“Oh no!” Cara says. “Is it your rotator cuff again?”
Nell chances a real glance up at me for the first time since we’ve been standing here and I raise my eyebrows.Shoulder’s not a thing anymore, huh?
“Yeah. I don’t know. It’s no big deal.”
“You need to let Noah look at it,” Damien says.
And Nell half laughs like he’s kidding. Like he’s made a bad joke and she’s playing along.
“No, really,” he says. “You know he works for like the Dodgers and Clippers and shit, right?”
“Right.” She smirks up at me. “What are you? Like the ball boy?”
Damien opens his mouth to answer her, but I put a hand on his forearm to stop him. “If she wants to believe I’m a nothing, let her,” I murmur. What the hell do I care?
There was a time when I believed that, too.
“Yeah,” I nod to Nell. “I’m a ball boy. With the rest of the children and the dogs.”
“Well,” she says. “The dog part tracks.”
I glare at her hatefully and she glares back at me. So much for civility.
“You guys, I’m so sorry I put you in the same suite!” Cara blurts out, her brow furrowed. “If you want to switch,pleasetell me. It’s not too late!”
Damien’s eyes go wide. He lets out a sharp guffaw. “Wait. No way! The same suite? You two?”
“Yup,” I say. “Us two.”
“Damn,” he says, pointing. “It’s on.”
“Nothing is on,” Nell says. “Ever.”
“We have very separate rooms,” I mumble at the same time. “Thank God.”
Damien takes another look at Nell, scanning her from head to toe like he’s a fucking MRI machine I’m about to smash. He shrugs. “I’ll switch with Noah.”
“Really?” Cara says, hopeful.
“Sure,” he says. “I’ll take his room, no problem. I’d happily share a suite with Nellie. We can catch up on old times. Watch movies on the couch. Eat popcorn. Bond.”
Nell’s eyes widen. Despite the tension between us, she casts a panicked look my way. Thank the Lord. She is still in there somewhere. And she has no interest in alone time with Damien.
“No, thanks,” I say. “I already unpacked.”
And I see Nell exhale just as I hear a female voice behind me purr, “Then let me help. I’ll switch with Nellie. Noah and I havealwaysgotten along. Swimmingly.”
Go fish.
