Her Secret Life

“Of course I was fine. I told you about the after-party. I had one glass of wine and spent half an hour talking with the new girl on the show. I really liked her. She’s sweet. Likes to read. And she made the dress she was wearing.”

He remembered every detail, including the fact that the dress had been made out of some kind of thin yarn and had a silk lining. Kacey had sounded so impressed when she’d described it, as though she’d have liked to have been able to make one for herself.

“Just checking,” he said now, all business, because her tone was a tad surly. And he didn’t feel quite comfortable remembering so much about a dress. “Someone could have slipped something into your drink.”

“Why? How bad is it?”

“You look like you’re nearly passed out, but it could also be that the photographer caught you in midblink. The caption leads the viewer to believe otherwise.”

“Shit.”

“I’m already looking into it.”

“Lace and I have been using the account like you told us to.”

“I know. I’m monitoring it.”

“And you didn’t see anyone else use it?”

“No. But that account had email notification turned off, so using the account to post wouldn’t have sent an alert to the email address.”

“But you’ve been watching the blog account, too, right?”

“Of course. And it wasn’t used until three o’clock this morning.”

“Oh.”

“Can you see where from?”

“I’m working on it.”

“I know. Thank you. I’m sorry I’m crabby, I just...”

“I understand,” he cut her off, not wanting to get all personal at the moment.

“No, it’s more than just the picture. I... Bo was a bit...difficult last night. We worked it out and he was really sweet and all, but he wanted us to be exclusive and...”

“I thought you already were.”

“We are. I don’t date more than one guy at a time. Just not my style. But he wants to make it, you know, official. As in we’re seriously a couple, not just feeling our way...into something committed, you know...”

He was pretty sure he knew what she meant. But asked, “He wants to make some kind of public announcement?”

“Yeah.”

“And you don’t?” He didn’t know why he hoped she’d say no. If it wasn’t Bo, it would be someone else. But...

“I’m not sure,” she said. “I think I do. I just don’t like being pressured. Especially not right now while I’m still working on changing my lifestyle.”

She hadn’t backslid once since she’d made up her mind the previous summer. But if she felt she was on shaky ground, she could be struggling to maintain the status quo more than he realized.

He knew she wasn’t. He just didn’t want to set her free until she wanted to go. And if she needed the changing lifestyle as an excuse to be his friend, he could live with that.

For a while, anyway.

“You said it ended up okay.” He felt like one of his sisters prying the other for information. Was that what he was becoming? A girlfriend to Kacey?

The thought was not pleasant. At all.