Callum stared at the phone like it had personally offended him. “Why is there a word for that.”
“Because humans are beautiful and efficient,” Marco said. “Anyway. He asked if I knew where you’d gone. I figured, you know, you tell your team principal when you’re fucking off to another country for two weeks?—”
“We did not,” I said.
“—so I said Milos,” Marco plowed on. “Didn’t realize Ivy had already denied disclosing your location.”
My thumb twisted my engagement ring around my finger anxiously. I realized this was the first time since we got engageda week ago that I’d felt uneasy. Pressure from the outside world. I’d completely checked out ofeverything.
“Wait. Back up. There are rumors about us, and Marco confirmed our location to Dom,” I said slowly.
Callum met my eyes, looking skeptical. Yeah, that couldn’t be good.
“In a casual, offhand way,” he said, like that helped. “It wasn’t like I dropped a grenade.”
“There are other words for what you did,” Ivy said sweetly. “It starts withsnitchand ends withing liability.”
“I thought he already knew!” Marco protested. “I thought you guys had, like, a grown-up, responsible calendar you share with management.”
“Have you met Henric?” I quipped. “I would never give him a look at my personal life like that.”
“Wait, who’sthey?” Callum cut in, voice low. “You keep sayingtheyare talking,theyare asking questions.”
“Bored idiots with too much time and Wi-Fi,” Ivy said flippantly, brushing the question off. “We’ll discuss the nitty gritty later. I am not giving the rumor mill more oxygen than it already has, not over speakerphone. It’s complicated, and it’s best if we talk more privately.”
That word hooked under my ribs. “More privately than this?”
“Yes,” she said. “Preferably when I can see your face and slap you if necessary.”
“That’s comforting,” I said dryly. “But what kind of rumors, Ivy?”
There was a pause on her end, just long enough to tell me she’d picked her words five different times already.
“The kind that don’t die quietly once they start,” she said. “And we both know how this sport loves a narrative. Which is why?—”
“Which is why you didn’t tell them where you were,” Marco cut in, clearly repeating something she’d just yelled at him about. “Because plausible deniability, blah blah, privacy while your guard is down, I didn’t listen, I’m the worst, et cetera.”
His voice echoed weirdly. Once from Callum’s phone, a half-second later from mine. I blinked, my gaze flicking between the two screens.
“Why can I hear you in stereo?” I asked slowly. “Marco, why are you coming through both phones?”
There was a scramble on Ivy’s end, fabric rustling, a muted curse.
“Because he’s an invasive species,” she said sharply.
“Because we’re in the same place,” Marco blurted at the same time, and then Callum’s call ended, leaving us just on a call with Ivy’s phone.
I pushed up a little higher on my elbows, staring at the phones like they might produce CCTV footage. “In the same placehow? Why are you together? Who else is with you?”
“Marco,youwere supposed to be in Monaco,” Callum added. “And Ivy, you were in London this morning, since you did a whole Instagram story on your favorite place to get tea near you?—”
“Airports exist, Scottie,” Ivy interrupted coolly. “Don’t get distracted. But side note, since none of these other bitches in our friend group drink tea, did you at least see the one I did last week in Edinburgh? That little hole-in-the-wall with the jasmine pearls and the rose Earl Grey?”
Callum actually brightened, the corner of his mouth kicking up. “Yes! They’re one of my favorites to visit when I go home. Next time you’re there, get the Assam they keep in the big blue tin behind the counter. Best proper black tea in the country; it’ll sort your whole life out, I swear to fuck. Tastes like being punched in the face by caffeine.”
“You two, shut up,” I snapped. “Ivy, you hate being around Marco alone. You said it yourself in Silverstone. So forgive me for asking why I’m suddenly getting surround sound Bianchi.”
“Oh, fuck off, bitch,” Ivy scoffed, no real heat under it. “This is not the point.”
