The Lord of the Plains (58 page)

When Lillia next went to visit Riley she was
actually surprised at the ease with which Riley accepted her
invitation.

She almost looked pleased to see her when
she opened the door.

Lillia had been cautiously prepared for a
fight. Vann had calmly asked her what she’d said to Riley. Lillia
had explained, hoping Vann would move on. The gemeng girl just
wasn’t interested.

He’d listened quietly as she told him,
nodding every now and then.

‘Hm, alright then.’ he’d said
afterwards.

‘Alright then?’ she asked, hoping.

‘Well, I thought you might have upset her. I
guess it wasn’t you though.’

‘Why? What happened?’ dread was settling
in.

‘Oh, she just screamed at me this morning.’
he shrugged.

Lillia couldn’t say a word. He seemed so
calm. So unnaturally calm.

‘Thanks, Lillia. I’ll see you later.’ He
left.

It wasn’t right.
He
wasn’t right. He
just wasn’t letting her see it.

So she’d waited for him to be gone and then
hurried down to the Blocks.

And when Lillia had knocked Riley had opened
the door.

‘Lillia.’ she didn’t smile, but she didn’t
glare either. She stepped outside and closed the door behind her
before Lillia could say anything. ‘Where are we going today?’ she
asked.

‘O-oh, you want to go somewhere?’ Lillia
hurried to catch up to her.

Riley nodded.

‘I thought you didn’t want to explore
Coastside.’

Riley shrugged.

‘W-well, we could go to V
iew
again.’

Riley almost smiled at that.

Riley could tell Lillia was surprised. She
didn’t really care.

She wasn’t going to stay inside and hide
because of the submariners! She needed to stretch her legs and
move
! She wasn’t going to put up with their behaviour
anymore.

‘Riley,’ Lillia began cautiously. ‘Did I say
something to upset you yesterday?’

She was upset to find she’d been gazing at
the eyes of a Peitar clone. That was upsetting.

‘No.’ Riley answered. Her green eyes were
hard and distant.

‘Ok, then, that’s good… so, why did you get
upset with Vann today?’ she asked.

Riley’s eyes sharped. ‘Because he keeps
bothering me.’ she nearly shouted, an edge to her voice.

‘But why today? I mean, he’s been bothering
you since you got here, you’ve never yelled at him before.’

Riley fixed Lillia with a hard stare. She
was silent as she thought. Lillia was Vann’s friend. ‘That he
pursues me is bad enough. That he does it while he already has
other girls… no, it’s enough. I won’t have him following me around
anymore.’

‘Oh, no, oh no.’ Lillia said hurriedly, her
eyes wide. ‘No, I never said that!’

‘You did.’ she said flatly.

‘I said you should ask Vann about that!’

Riley gazed at her, the sharpness was gone
from her eyes. Now they were just flat and hard. Everything about
Lillia had said ‘yes’. It didn’t matter that she said something
else with her words.

‘Ok,’ Lillia said desperately as Riley
didn’t respond. ‘Ok, Vann usually has, yes, lots of… of, casual
relationships. Darling, that’s normal in Coastside, and if he was
going to see other girls he’d
tell
you, please, don’t be
upset.’

Riley said nothing.

‘Ok.’ Lillia grabbed Riley’s arm and stood
up. ‘Ok. I’ll introduce you to the girls. You’ll see. They’ll tell
you. Let’s go.’

Lillia dragged Riley all around Coastside
collecting girls. She was more than a little upset to discover this
was
her
fault! Still, she felt Riley had made a few leaps of
logic but
still.
She’d fix this and Vann… Vann was
impossible!

Riley remained silent as Lillia rushed
around setting up a get-together. Many of her friends had dated
Vann, or knew girls who had, so it was easy to find a nice big
group of his exes and invite them over. On another occasion, having
her friends over for a party would have been a happy event, but
with Vann behaving so oddly, she was too worried to really enjoy
herself.

After that was done she took Riley back to
her home. The girls wouldn’t arrive for a few hours but Lillia
wouldn’t let Riley leave.

Mostly they waited in silence. Lillia did
some distracted painting. She made a few abortive attempts at
conversation. She fixed dinner for them. After that it wasn’t long
til the girls arrived.

Chapter 46

Lillia’s couches and chairs were now filled
with gossiping women.

Riley looked around at Vann’s former lovers.
The fact that they were all so beautiful didn’t really help Riley
much. What on earth was he doing chasing her around when he could
be with these gorgeous women?

One in particular caught her eye. She had
golden hair and the biggest eyes Riley had ever seen. They were
enormous and blue, surrounded by long, fluttering lashes. At the
moment her delicate hands were clasped around a tea cup. She smiled
so brightly whenever anyone talked to her. She seemed so delicate
and sweet. Riley felt small just looking at Teila. What was Vann
doing even
glancing
at her when he could have been with this
woman?

The women were having a wonderful time
gossiping about Vann. Lillia squeezed her hand hard and gave her a
meaningful look at regular intervals.

The fact that they all seemed to be on good
terms with Vann said a lot in and of itself.

Still, Riley didn’t want to be just one
woman in a room full of his lovers. And especially not when they
were all so much better looking than her! She didn’t belong among
this glittering cast. Some wore dresses, some had pants or skirts,
but they were all lovely and colourful. Most had some form of
jewellery, whether it was colourful, knotted string or sea shells.
Teila had a giant red gemstone hanging from her neck. Riley felt
quite out of place in her uniform.

‘Oh, I think you’re quite wise.’

Riley looked up to see Teila looking at her
earnestly and leaning forward. ‘He’ll break your heart. He’ll say
he wants to be with only you and he loves you then he’ll-’ Teila
sniffed. A girl next to her put her arm around her. ‘He’ll say he
wants to see other women!’

‘He never said that!’ Lillia interrupted.
She glanced at Riley and repeated. ‘He never said that to her.’ She
looked back to Teila. ‘Teila, you know he never said that.’

Teila was crying into the other girl’s
shoulder now.

‘Arella, you know he never said that.’
Lillia insisted to the girl holding Teila.

‘I know.’ she said, ‘but you know Teila, she
lives in a romantic daydream. She doesn’t pay a lot of attention to
reality. Just don’t upset her, Lillia.’

‘But now she’ll think he’s a-a lying,
womanizing cheater!’ Lillia said, clearly referring to Riley.

‘Oh, darling,’ Arella was looking at Riley,
‘Vann’s a submariner. Anyone who expects one of
them
to be
tied down is a fool.’ She patted Teila’s shoulder. ‘A very sweet
one though. But at least Vann’s
honest.’

When Vann heard Lillia had been gathering up
girls to have a we-hate-Vann fest he was more than a little
frazzled.

It was the sort of thing that could only
lead to trouble. It was something that he clearly had to put a stop
to. Besides, it took his mind off Riley. He’d spent all day by the
side beach. In less than ten seconds, Riley had gutted him.

The look in her eyes had been so much worse
than her words.

She’d looked at him like she hated him.

But a we-hate-Vann fest sounded like a
wonderful distraction. So when he heard about it from laughing
submariners he headed straight to Lillia’s. He tried not to wonder
what Lillia was thinking!

When he knocked Lillia opened the door.

Whatever he was going to say fell out of his
head. Through the open door he could see Arella, Mireila, Cas,
Leina, oh damn,
Teila
.

‘Vann.’ Lillia smiled. ‘How are you?’

‘Lillia.’ he said in a small voice. ‘What
are you doing?’

‘Oh, just talking about you with some of my
friends.’

He paled. ‘
Why?
’ Why would she want
to do that?! And had he really been with this many of her
friends?!

‘Come in, Vann!’ Arella called, an evil grin
on her face. ‘We’re just comparing you to other men! I’m afraid
it’s not very favourable so far!’

Vann stepped in. Lillia closed the door
behind him and sat down.

He felt weak at the knees. He wondered
suddenly if gemengs had to put up with this. Had Molk ever swum in
on a gathering of his exes all grinning at him like that?

He looked around the room, counting faces.
There had to be at least ten of them here! And then… on a couch
squeezed between Lillia and Belle…

Her eyes were on him. Every eye in the room
was on him.

There were so many things he wanted to say
he couldn’t get them out. To her, he wanted so desperately to
apologise, he couldn’t bear for her to look at him like that again.
And at Lillia, why is she here?! he wanted to scream.

But her eyes. The anger and hate was gone
from them. Her expression was unreadable.