Commitment (53 page)

“She’s with Chris and Jodi,” Shawn answered the question he hadn’t yet asked.

“Chris and Jodi,” Brendan said.
He gave a short laugh.  “And you left her there?”

“She a’ight,” Shawn said with more confidence than he felt. “
Even though
Cameron was tryin’ to act stupid awhile ago.”

“Act stupid how?”

“
I walked away for a minute and when I come back, he was all up in
Riley’s
grill
, hands all over her . . .
”

“Then w
hy you still here, Shawn?”

“We squashed it,” Shawn said.

“I know Cam, and I know you.”

Brendan didn’t sound convinced.

“And what does that mean?”

“That it ain’t squashed.”

Shawn laughed.
“Where’s the bar around
here?
Let’s get a real drink.”

For the next hour, h
e
purposely avoided going back in and checking on
Riley
.
Instead, he did what he originally came to do –
chit-chatted with
some industry folks and kept his ears open for the buzz
on Glock.
Having them on the trip with him in California had confirmed
that
they were a
lready hot, and getting hotter.
Some
of their
tracks
had been leaked
on the internet, so the
y already had a small following
that was growing
larger
every day
.
Since it looked like he would be spending a lot more time with them,
Shawn was relieved that they hadn’t been invited tonight – he needed a break from
the unrelenting
drama
.
There was no
question though that their one-
year development deal with Chris was going to turn into something a lot more concrete.
And when it did, he would have to consider whether
and how to reposition himself.

Brendan thought the best strategy was for him to give them nothing but praise and cast himself as
being wholly unconcerned about
his own position
.
And there was something to that;
to challenge or criticize them wo
uld only make him look scared.

“Shawn.”

Brendan was nodding in the direction of the pool house, s
o he turned to see what was up.
His eyes wide
ned in disbelief for a second.

“
Oh h
ell no
.
”

Brendan laughed.
“Talk about your past coming back to haunt you.”

It was Stephan
ie and she was headed his way.
But he had
to keep some perspective.
He’d been neither married nor engaged to
Riley
when he and Stephanie had their night together
in Pittsburgh
.
This was a big nothing, and
that was how he
would treat it.
But
then Stephanie was in front of him, and wrapping her arms about his neck,
kissing him square on the lips.
Shawn stepped back and holding her by the wrists, pried her arms loose.

“Now that hurt my feelings,” she said, pouting
prettily
.

“Stephanie
,” Shawn said shaking his head.
“My wife is here.”

“Tell her
I’m an old friend,” she said.
She sounded just past tipsy.
“I
am
an old friend.
Aren’t I?”

“Stephanie, do I
need
to be worried about you?” Shawn asked slowly.

“I don’t know what you mean,” she said breezily.

“Do I have to worry that
if I tell you
that
you need to back off, you won’t listen?”

Stephanie laughed shrilly.
“You mean like, am I a
stalker
?”

“Why are you in New York, Stephanie?”

“I co
me here maybe once a month now.
I’m i
n the music business, remember?
Just like you.”

“Okay.
Well, g
ood to see you.”

“Good to see you too. And please get over yourself,”
she said before she walked off,
just the tiniest bit unsteady on her feet.

Shawn exchanged a look with
Brendan and they both laughed.
He looked up from his laughter to see
Riley
, just across the pool standing next to Jodi.
Chris was gone but now they’d been joined by
the host
.

The smile
dissolved from Shawn’s
face and he watched as Cameron
raised a
hand – it almost
seemed to
be moving in slow motion – and
finally, almost too casually
placed it
low on
Riley
’s
hip
,
his fingers pressing
into
the bare skin exposed
just above the waistband of
her pants
.
For a
nano
second, Shawn was vaguely aware of B
rendan’s hand
on his shoulder in a fruitless gesture urging restraint
.
T
he rest
was
like an out-of-body ex
perience.
He actually saw red.
Not figuratively; everything
literally
seemed to
turn red.
And then all hell broke loose.

g

Dust-up in the Hamptons

Revelers
at the most popular event
in
the
Hamptons
season
report that
it all started when rapper
K
Smooth
showed up with his fetching new bride, New York writer,
Riley
Gardner
.
Apparently, no one told the host – the pugnacious Cameron Cole
– that she was spoken for. Or perhaps he didn’t care.
In any event, there was
reportedly
some unwelcome and inappropriate touching, a brief verbal altercation and ensuing
mêlée
.
What
?
Fighting at a par
ty hosted by a gangsta rapper?!
Yes, we know this is hardly newsworthy, but nonetheless, we couldn’t help
ourselves – the absence of gun-
play makes thi
s an amusing New York vignette.
After all, can you imagine all of those
well
-
heeled
Manhattan soci
alites stampeding for the exit?
Serves them right
.
M
ost have
likely
never
heard Cameron Cole’s music, and would almost certainly object to their children listening to much of it!

“I hope you’re happy,”
Riley
said
.
She balled the paper up,
tossing
it
across the room where it came to rest at Shawn’s feet.

He
was sitting on the bed, throwing the last few things into his bag b
efore heading to the airport for
his flight to
Houston.
It had taken Page Six a couple days to get wind of what happened at Cameron’s but now that they had, Riley
’s
anger had flared once again.
For the entire day following the party, she’d given him the silent treatment, and for another 24 hours after that,
she was decidedly distant.
It was on
l
y last night that she’d
finally
thawed.

Good thing too, since the idea of leaving home again without getting any first was
more than
a little
unsettling
.
And then this morning
when he thought it had blown over
, she’d picked up the paper to find that she had become notorious.

“
I bet he won’t try that shit again
.”

“You don’t think you overreacted just a
little
?
He had to get stitches.
”

“So did I,” Shawn
reminded her
.

He held up his righ
t hand, still wrapped in gauze.
It would be tough to
get a solid
grip
on
the mike without taking it off when he performed.

“W
ell you hit a man in the mouth.
I think you assume that risk voluntarily,” she snapped.

“You don’t know
Cameron
like I do
,
Riley
.”

“I don’t care!
I’ve never been so humiliated in my entire life.”

“What would it look like if I let him gro
pe you in front of all those
people and didn’t
d
o shit about it?”

“
So ultimately
it’s more about you
and some crazy, macho rapper thing
than any of these othe
r sham reasons you come up with.
”

“No, it’s about keeping you away from that bullshit
.
You
think you can go to a party like that in a
little see-through top
and not
have dudes pushin’ up on you?
”

“
Wow
,
”
Riley said.
“So n
ow it’s about what I was wearing.”

He said nothing.

“I am not a child, Shawn.
I’m perfectly capable of telling a man who’s b
eing touchy-feely to get
his hands
off me.
Regardless of what top I’m wearing.
”

“It’s not about you not being
capable; i
t’s about me looking out for mine.”

“
What does that even mean?
Yours
?
Like I belong to you?”

Shawn bit his tongue and continued
throwing things into his bag.
The argument had begun this morning
when she’d first seen the clip
and continued on and off whenever she thought of something else that pisse
d her off about the situation.
Her boss would see it
; h
er co-workers, h
er mother.
She wouldn’t be taken seriously as a writer. 

She stood directly in front of
him;
her feet planted apart, arms folded across her chest. Rather than look up to her, Shawn stood so that the opposite was necessary.

“
It’s a figure of speech, Riley.
”

But she was already off on her rant.
“Is that w
hat this marriage means to you?
That I belong to you?”

Truth be told, that’s
precisely
what it meant to him
.
Shawn walked around her, carrying his bag into the foy
er and dumping it on the floor.
He pulled out his phone and called Brendan, confirming that he was waiting
downstairs
.

“I’m talking to you,” she said when he hung up. 

“
Yes
,” he said
calmly
.

For about ten seconds
Riley
said noth
ing
.
Then she looked up at him
, momentarily dumbstruck
.

“
Yes, what?
” she asked quietly.
“
I’m your partner and your wife.
Not something you own, Shawn.”

He shook his h
ead.
“As usual, y
ou
got this all twisted
. . .”