Dex starts to say something and I cut him right off. “Dex, he didn’t want me to do the piece. He told me I couldn’t handle it, and I can’t come home without a story. So, we made a deal; I would tell him about me, and he would in return give me all the sordid details of his life and his band and why they were retiring. No fucking at all.”
“What did you tell him?”
Just say it. Just say it. It’s like ripping off a Band-Aid. “I told him all about how worried I was about you not calling and how I think—” Why is this so hard? Maybe because the last time I thought I was in love with someone, that someone was in love with my best friend. How long did I look for the man I dubbed Mr. Perfect? Only to find out he was already showering Julia with five orgasms a night, and the one kiss we shared was not as earth-shattering to him as it was for me.
“You think what, Nash?”
“Well, I think…” I think I might throw up.
“You’re killing me here, Nash. My heart’s pounding, and I’m feeling all possessive and it’s not a good fucking mindset to be in this far away from you. So spit it out. What did you tell thecock star?”
“I told him I thought I was in love with you.”
The call ended immediately. Three beeps and cellular death. “No, no no no,” I say to the home screen on my phone.
A jarring ring blasts out, a FaceTime call from Dex. My shaking fingers fumble to tap accept. Then his face takes up the entire screen of my phone. “You love me?”
“I’m sorry?” I say, trying desperately to fight back the tears that are threatening to break free.
“No,” he says shaking his head. “I want to see your face when you say it. Say it again.”
I swallow hard. “I think I’m in love with you.”
His lips lift at both corners and his cheeks turn red. “Oh, but Ms. Nash. I’m think I’m in love with you too.”
Chapter 5
We’re in love.In love. Love, thatthingthat millions of songs and poems and books and films have been written about. That’s what we’re in, together, at the same time, with each other. My lady bits are all aflutter, it’s like someone injected my tampon with pure heroin. I’m excited thinking about growing old with him and all the couple’s therapy we’re going to have to go through eventually.
I can’t stop talking about it. I tell the hotel concierge, two bellhops, and of course my bartending besties. All of them smile at me and nod, like it’s not the most incredible news in the universe. They obviously don’t know about my recent history with Karma and falling for a Kiss Cam guy and any horse-head freak incidents.
I even tell Damian Miles two days later as we enter the green room at London’s Wembley Stadium, the magical place where bands hang out before taking the stage. He’s walking in front of me listening to me blab about the phone conversation Dex and I had, and he spins around on me with a curious look on his face. “Heroin in your tampon?”
“It’s not real, I’m just playing with words to be funny.”
He blinks at me and smiles. “Being in love is important to you?”
I toss my belongings down on a long brown couch and wonder how much semen might be embedded into the material of it. “Well, yeah, of course. Isn’t that what everyone eventually wants in life, to feel loved?” I pick my stuff back up and find a nice clean place to leave it on a table.
“No,” he says.
I spin on my heels to face him. “You don’t want to be in love?”
Damian watches me carefully. “You only get one life, Jane Nash. Why waste it chasing after the one thing that will hurt the most when it’s gone? I love sex. It’s impossible to even think about loving just one person.”
“Because you’re a cock star?”
“Cock star?”
“Yeah, it’s just something Dex said that was funny.”
“You talked to him about me?”
“Yeah, of course.”
“Did you tell him I want to fuck you?”
My stomach flips. “Um. No, I—”
