Chapter 23
Jayden moved around the kitchenette with ease, glad that Mark had kept the freezer stocked with pizza. She unwrapped one and quickly threw it in the oven. There was a bottle of wine in the cupboard that she held up for inspection.
Rhian nodded. “Why not?”
“Why not, indeed.” Jayden grabbed two glasses and poured them generous measures. She sat beside Rhian, twisted in the chair so she was facing her, and tucked one leg under the other. “So what am I not going to like?”
Rhian took a deep breath. Then a large gulp of wine. Then put her glass on the table. Then threaded her fingers together and pressed her clasped hands between her knees.
“Is she firing me or something?”
Rhian turned to her quickly. “What? Who?”
“Rachel. Is she firing me? Is that what this is?”
Rhian shook her head. “No. Nothing like that. Though you might quit when you hear, I don’t know. It’s, I mean, I wouldn’t blame you if you did. Want to quit, I mean. It’s just that…I hope you don’t.”
Jayden reached across the couch and touched Rhian’s hand. “Just tell me what’s going on. Then we can figure out the rest.”
Rhian’s face paled further, and Jayden could feel her hands trembling beneath her own. “She—Rachel—needs us to keep being a couple for this to work.”
“Okay,” Jayden said slowly. Jayden had set the wheels of this in motion herself. Why was Rhian so nervous about this request? Had Jayden’s attentions been making her uncomfortable all this time? Was she only tolerating them as a lesser evil compared to Brooke’s? She’d thought that perhaps Rhian was enjoying what they were doing. Maybe even looking at this being more than just pretend. Or was that just wishful thinking? Were those shy glances just in her imagination? She went over that kiss in her mind, as she had done repeatedly since it happened, loving the way Rhian had trembled in her embrace. Had she gotten it wrong? Had she miscalculated so horribly? “I figured that would be the case at least until Brooke was no longer around.”
“You did?”
Jayden affected a casual air that belied her surprising amount of investment in the question. “Of course. Didn’t you?”
Rhian shook her head. “I guess I didn’t really think that far ahead in all this.”
“Ah.” Jayden felt the stab of disappointment. “Then I guess I’m sorry you’re now caught up in my lie and it’s making you uncomfortable.”
“It’s not your fault. You were trying to help me.”
“But all I did was make things worse.” Jayden put her own glass down and took hold of Rhian’s hand. Well, no matter what Rhian thought of her, they were now in this, for better or for worse. “Look, we’re friends, right?”
Rhian nodded, her gaze fixed on their joined hands. She seemed rattled. Jayden needed to fix this.
“So as friends we can spend time together without there being anything awkward about it, right?”
Rhian nodded again, her gaze still fixed.
“What more is there to a relationship that other people actually see anyway? I mean, I’m not in the habit of inviting people into my bedroom to watch me and my girlfriend. Are you?”
“No,” Rhian said with a small smile.
“So we hold hands out there a little bit, maybe kiss on the cheek every now and then. But we just carry on being friends. Nothing too different, really.”
“And you’d be comfortable with that—with being my pretend girlfriend—for the duration of filming?”
“The whole time?”
Rhian nodded yet again. “The whole time”—she finally managed to look Jayden in the eyes—“spend the next four and a half months pretending to care for me.”
Jayden looked at her. Really looked at her, at her grey eyes that changed with her mood and reflected the tumultuous passion and…anxiety…that simmered inside her. Those pink-tinted lips that had tasted so sweet were parted, moist, and inviting. Her blond hair was tucked behind her ears, the short fringe slipping over one eye when she moved. And the truth hit Jayden: She didn’t have to spend the next four and a half months pretending to care for Rhian. She did care for her. The real question was, could she spend the next four and a half months only pretending to care for her?
Clearly Rhian would return to the UK when this show was done. And Jayden would be here—alone—taking care of the business while Fen recovered…or not, as the case might be. Rhian would return to her life, to her mother, her firm, her friends, maybe even a girlfriend.
She broke the silence that had suddenly developed between them. “Do you have a girlfriend back home?”
“Excuse me?”
“I never thought to ask before, I’m sorry. Is that why you don’t want to do this? You don’t want to hurt someone you care about back in England?”
“No.” Rhian’s voice was quiet. “No girlfriend.”
“So it’s just that I’m repulsive, then,” she said with a smirk.
Rhian chuckled. “Yeah, turning women to stone wherever you go.”
“Hey, that’s my signature move.”
“Then you really need to work on those moves, Jay.”
“Don’t need to now.” She reached over and tugged gently on Rhian’s hair. That was allowed with her officially-sanctioned pretend girlfriend, right? “I’ve already bagged me a babe.”
Rhian groaned. “Ew. Bagged a babe. That’s an awful phrase.”
“Okay, I’ll give you that. But—” An alarm sounded from Jayden’s phone. “—shit. Hang on. I need to get the pizza out of the oven.” She stood. “Don’t go anywhere.”
“I won’t.”
Jayden took two minutes to throw the pizza onto a plate, slice it, grab paper towels, and get back to the sofa with their dinner. She pushed the plate under Rhian’s nose. She snatched a slice and took off the tip with her teeth.
“Okay, where was I?” Jayden asked.
Rhian swallowed her pizza and said, “Babe-bagging.”
Jayden chuckled. Things seemed to be easing up between them. “Right. So, ignoring the awful phrase, why do you seem so against this idea?”
Rhian shrugged.
“No, don’t do that.”
“Don’t do what?”
“Try and avoid the question. Clearly you have a reason. So be honest with me.”
“I don’t want to say anything that will be…I don’t know…taken the wrong way or something.”
“You’re worried about offending me?”
“Well, yeah.”
Jayden laughed and swallowed a good mouthful of her pizza slice. “You won’t. Just tell me what’s going on.”
“I’m not sure I can do this.” She tossed her slice back onto the plate and wiped her hands with the napkin.
“Pretend to be attracted to me?”
Rhian nodded, still wiping grease from her fingers.
Jayden chuckled and tried to swallow the bitter taste of hurt that laced the sauce on her slice. “Well, I know I’m not exactly a stunner, but I can’t do a great deal about that. This is what we’ve got to work with—”
“No. That’s not what… That’s not the way I meant it.”
“Then what did you mean?”
“This is why I didn’t want to say anything.” Rhian shook her head. “We’ve got to work together, and we’ve got to pretend to be a couple. I don’t want to make anything any more awkward than it already is.” She covered her face with her hands.
“Rhian, I’m a big girl. I don’t expect every lesbian I meet to find me attractive.” She shrugged and took a tiny bite. “We’re pretending, remember—a couple of friends doing what we have to do for work purposes.”
Rhian cocked her head to the side and looked Jayden in the eyes. Jayden felt she was staring down into her soul when she asked, “Is that what you want?”
Jayden cleared her throat and shrugged. “It’s what we have. And don’t feel bad that you don’t fancy me. It’s not like you’re my cup of tea either. So it’s all good.” Her voice didn’t sound like her own. It was deeper, and seemed to come from somewhere far away. She tossed her own slice of pizza down and finished her glass of wine before reaching to pour another. She tried to pinpoint what had actually changed in the last half hour. She’d walked into the house with her friend and pretend girlfriend, who, granted, she’d acknowledged was hot. She wasn’t blind. But now she was sitting on the sofa with the same friend and pretend girlfriend, and everything felt different. Everything suddenly felt very wrong. She felt like a crevasse had just opened beneath her, and there was nothing but air between her and the ice below.
“You’re not?” Rhian whispered. Her eyes remained downcast, hands clasped between her knees, and her hair skipped forward from behind her ears, shielding her from Jayden’s gaze.
“Sorry, what?”
Rhian peeked out from the curtain of hair obscuring her face. Her grey eyes seemed to whirl with emotion and restrained energy. Like a storm approaching on the horizon. “You’re not attracted to me?”
“No,” she said quickly. The denial was vomited from her lips, hastened by the bitter energy of rejection. She hated lying, but what else could she do? She had a little pride. “Of course not,” she added a little more softly.
“That’s good.” Rhian’s smile looked painful, like she was forcing her skin to move despite resistance from her muscles.
“Yeah.” Part of her wondered at the smile of Rhian’s face. Was she nursing her own bruised ego too?
“That’s okay, then.” Her voice sounded an octave higher than normal.
Why wasn’t she acting relieved? She’d got what she wanted. Jayden hadn’t quit, and she was going along with the charade—had even made it seem like it was no big deal. “Yeah.”
Rhian sighed. “I should probably get going now. Since we’re all good, and we know what’s going on.”
“Probably a good idea.”
“I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”
“Probably.”
Rhian stood and dropped the napkin on the table next to the plate with the unfinished pizza on it. “Okay. Well then, goodnight, Jayden.”
Jayden looked up from the sofa. She couldn’t seem to make her legs move. She knew she should stand and see her out. Walk her home, even. But she couldn’t make herself do it. “Night,” she said.
She listened to the door close and the silence that filled the room. She hadn’t lied when she’d told Rhian that she didn’t expect other women to find her attractive. But she’d hoped Rhian did, even just a little. Her feelings for Rhian ran deeper than she’d realised. As did the hurt. She closed her eyes, then quickly put her hand to her mouth as she ran for the bathroom.
Rebecca’s eyes burned behind her eyelids as Jayden gave up the pizza she’d consumed. Guilt twisted her gut until there was nothing left.
“I didn’t even think about you. Not the whole time.” She wiped her mouth with some tissue and started the tap running. “I’m so sorry, Becks, I forgot. How could I forget?” She leant back against the wall, knees pulled up to her chest, arms wrapped tight around them, and let herself remember.
She replayed that last smile in the mess tent. The cocky, sexy grin, the promise to be careful. She remembered the chill up her spine, the hairs on her neck standing on end as apprehension walked along her soul, offering her the warning she hadn’t listened to. Every minute between that and the moment the avalanche had hit ticked away as she sat on the cold tiles. Every second flayed her until she was staring again at Rebecca’s lifeless corpse, as cold and rigid as the ice and rock she was encased in.
“How could I forget?”
She picked up the phone and dialled Fen’s mobile number.
“Hey, Mogo,” Fen said after the second ring. “What’s up?”
Jayden sniffled and tried to control her emotions enough to speak. She couldn’t.
“It’s okay, hon. I’m here.”
Fen whispered quiet words through the outpouring of grief and guilt. Never asking her to explain, never asking for more than Jayden could give. She was just there. And Jayden felt her presence as clearly as she would have felt her embrace had they been in the same room. For those few minutes, it was enough.