I sat up and turned to face her. “Why do you say that?”
“If he wanted to go to dinner, we had to meet there. He’d have a car leave his townhouse ahead of him, so the paparazzi would follow that one. Then he’d leave on his own and meet me wherever it was we’d planned. At first it was fun. Lord, it was fun. Just to be with him. He made me feel so alive. Then it got to be hard. The sneaking around wasn’t a big deal; I could do it. But one day it just kind of bugged me. I didn’t say anything to him at first because I thought it was what I wanted. I wanted our relationship out of the press. But this part deep inside of me kept second-guessing everything. Someone did snap a picture of us together once.”
“No!”
“Yes. They never did find out who I was, but we were more careful after that. I was so stupid, Arabella. I thought I could handle this big secret, but when I started to have to lie to my folks, and I wasn’t telling Willa or any of you guys, it started to weigh heavy. I’d been living in a bubble with Luke. All the private nights together, the meetings in discreet places. It was so romantic, and I honestly couldn’t even think of a single bad thing about being with him. Then reality hit—and hit hard.”
“What happened?” I asked.
“He asked me to go to this private function that a friend of his was throwing. Press would be there, but they were vetted or something like that, and he trusted that they wouldn’t print anything about us. I told him I couldn’t go because I had a huge trial I was working on the next week, and honestly, I was nervous. I just wanted one regular date before we went public, you know? No sneaking-around bullshit, no going to a function one of his actor friends was putting on. So that was one of the reasons I was reluctant to go. But I finally decided to go after staring at the invitation on my desk all day. I knew if I quickly got home and got changed, I would most likely be able to attend. I sent him a text saying I’d meet him there, since I had the invite. He didn’t reply, so I headed on over by myself.”
“What happened?” I asked, feeling like I was on the edge of my seat reading a good book.
“I showed up and saw him with another woman.”
I brought both of my hands up to my mouth. “Was it just a friend?”
She laughed bitterly. “Hardly. It was the woman he was filming a movie with at the time, or they were in the beginning stages of filming it. They’re filming it now, I do know that. He’d told me a bit about the cast of his new movie. I made the mistake of looking it up and found out it was a romantic comedy. And the lead actress was stunning. She lives in Boggy Creek Valley, crazily enough. Her name is Kathleen Daughtry.
“Anyway, I showed up in a taxi, and it had dropped me off a little ways away from the party. When I walked up, Luke was getting out of a limo with Kathleen. He had his arm around her, and she had hers around him. She kept reaching up and whispering into his ear as they walked into the event, making him laugh every so often. Apparently, the press on the outside wasn’t being paid to keep quiet, and the two of them made sure to put on a spectacular show. Except, I couldn’t tell if they were acting or not.”
“Maybe it was just all for press,” I said, trying to play devil’s advocate.
“That’s what I thought, until I made my way in and saw them still arm-in-arm, where supposedly the press was vetted. I stood off to the side for a little bit and watched. Kathleen kept her arm linked with Luke’s as they walked around the room. It was clear at that point they’d come together as a couple. Then they danced and…”
“And what?” I asked, gripping her arm and jerking her lightly. “What happened?”
Bree sat up and crossed her legs as she faced me. Tears built in her eyes, and my heart instantly broke. I had never seen her like this, so distraught.
Biting her lip, she tried to gather her composure before she went on. “I was in love with him, Arabella. So stupidly in love with him, I couldn’t see what life would be like dating someone like that. Was it an act? Maybe, but it was so hard to stand there and watch it. Then that ugly green jealous monster appeared, and I got so stupidly emotional.”