Page 63 of Meant to Be

Berry nodded, then said, “Interesting. So, where’d she go to college?”

I stared at her and shook my head. “Look, Berry. I know what you’re doing here, and I’m not going for it,” I said.

“What?” she said, all wide-eyed innocence.

“Can you stop being a snob for, like, one second?”

“I amnota snob,” she said, truly believing what she was saying. “I’m just askingbasicquestions. It’s pretty standard to ask where someone went to college.”

“Nah. Good try. That’s a coded, elitist question. And you know it. You sound like my mother,” I said, getting worked up. I looked at Peter and said, “Doesn’t she?”

Always the diplomat, Peter shrugged and said, “Oh, I don’t know, Joe. She’s just asking where the girl went to school. It’s not like she asked whatcountry clubshe belongs to—or what her father does for a living.”

“Yeah. For real, Joe,” Berry said. “WhatshouldI be asking you?”

“I don’t know—stuff like…what we like to do together. Whether she’snice.”

“Oh, Iknowwhat you like to do together,” she said, rolling her eyes. “And so does everyone else who reads thePost. But I’ll play along. Is shenice?”

I smiled, shook my head, and said, “Actually? No. Not especially.”

Genevieve laughed and said, “Wait. Seriously?”

“Well, she’s not abitchor anything…but she’s not one ofthose overly nicey-nice girls. She’s not fake.Nothingabout Cate is fake.”

Berry raised her eyebrows and said, “Nothing? A model without a boob job?”

I shook my head and said, “Okay, Ber. Now you’re just being a bitch.”

“Okay, sorry,” Berry said, her expression softening a bit. “When can we meet her?”

“Only when I can trust you to be polite to her,” I said.

“I’m always polite!”

I resisted the urge to remind her about Nicole—and some of the other times she’d been less than pleasant with women I liked—and said, “We also have to get through this initial paparazzi situation.”

“Meaning what?” Peter said.

“Meaning she just got stalked and is now a little skittish…. Cate hates drama.”

“And she’s datingyou?” Peter laughed. “Good luck with that, man.”

“Exactly,” Berry said. “And also, fun fact: women who go around saying they hate drama secretlylovedrama.”

“That’s pretty accurate, actually,” Genevieve said.

“Well, tell me, Ber,” I said. “Doyouhate drama?”

“You know I do,” she said, walking right into my trap, as I knew she would.

“So then—you actuallysecretlylove it?”

“No,” Berry said. “But here’s the difference. I don’t go around dating the world’s most famous bachelor and then complaining when my picture is in the paper. And you’ll forgive me if I don’t entirely buy that a model—or a former model, whatever—hates photographers and attention.”

Peter frowned, then said to Berry, “I have to agree with Joe on this one. You can’t assume she loves drama or attention because of her former profession—or because she’s dating Joe.”

“Exactly! As hard as it might be for you to believe, Berry…Cate is actually dating medespitemy name…and stuff like this, right here, is why she didn’t want to join us.”

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