Page 57 of The Write Track
“Oppenheimerwas his comeback vehicle.Trapis better left forgotten.”
“On that we can absolutely agree.”
14
FOURTEEN
Icouldn’t remember the last time I’d had as much fun with someone. Maybe my mother when I was younger. Our walk turned into a two-hour extravaganza where we talked about every horror movie in the world—good and bad.
We didn’t agree on every single one. He was a fan of the originalThe Texas Chainsaw Massacre,while I preferred the Jessica Biel remake, and I couldn’t stand theTerrifiermovies, but he enjoyed them. We agreed on most, though, which was refreshing.
I felt almost drunk from laughter by the time we rounded the final curve and returned to camp. We headed toward our cabin, still laughing, but the sound of my name gave me pause. When I looked over my shoulder, I found Preston standing near a tree—he’d been hiding in the shadows like a creepy stalker—and he was watching me expectantly.
For once, I wasn’t flooded with instant anxiety. “What do you want?” I asked coldly.
“I thought we could talk,” he replied, his “I’m a businessman and I’ve never had a bad moment in public” face firmly in place. “Things didn’t go how I was expecting at dinner, and Ithought we could figure out a way to get along without making it awkward.”
Nathan pulled on my hand and tugged me in front of him, his hands going to my hips as he guided me in the direction of our cabin. “I don’t think that requires a full conversation,” he said. “All you have to do is stop being a douche.”
“Me?” Preston’s fury surfaced with a vengeance, and it had fangs like the vampires in30 Days of Night, another movie Nathan and I had just bonded over. Josh Hartnettwasversatile, after all. “You’re the one who was out of control. You actually had the audacity to lie and say I… that I…”
He was such a turd. What had I ever seen in him? “If you can’t talk about sex, then you’re not mature enough to be having it,” I offered dryly. “As for what I said, I stand by it.”
“It was a lie,” he hissed, taking a step forward. He immediately balked when Nathan made a growling sound. “Mr. Cooper, if you don’t mind, I would like to have a private conversation with your fiancée.” Preston sounded as if he were negotiating a business deal. “It has nothing to do with you, and I promise it will be quick.”
Nathan regarded him as one might a pile of dog crap somebody left to bake in the sun on a public sidewalk rather than pick up. “I’m good,” he replied blandly.
That was not the answer Preston was expecting. “Excuse me?” he sputtered.
“First off, it’s not my place to give permission for Bella to talk to anybody,” Nathan explained. “She is a grown woman. She has her own agency. I am not her king. I am her partner. That means she makes her decisions and it’s my job to support them.”
Bafflement joined rage on Preston’s face as the words sank in. “You have got to be kidding me. You’re one ofthose?”
“I have no idea what ‘one of those’ means, but I can hazard a guess,” Nathan replied. “And yes, I’m one ofthose. Bella is brightand capable and makes her own decisions. Unless I’m very much mistaken, however, she does not want to talk to you right now.”
“I don’t,” I agreed, relieved that Nathan had my back. “I’m tired, Preston. I’ll talk to you…” I was about to say “tomorrow” when I realized that was merely a different way of capitulating. “Actually, you know what?” My tone shifted quickly. “I don’t want to talk to you. I can’t fathom a single thing we have to talk about.”
“You embarrassed me in public.” The vein I hadn’t forgotten but hadn’t seen in eight months popped on his forehead. “We need to talk about that.”
“You forced that situation,” Nathan countered. “You pushed things with her because you’re an idiot. The solution to this problem is to not talk to her.”
“This is my event,” Preston raged. “I will talk to whomever I want to talk to.”
“No, you won’t,” I countered, suddenly hyper aware of the power I had here. “I don’t want to talk to you, so I’m not going to do it.”
Nathan gave me an approving look and nudged me toward the cabin. “You heard her,” he said when Preston opened his mouth to argue. “She doesn’t want to talk to you.”
“That’s not an option.” A sneer appeared on Preston’s face. “I’m an organizer. This is my event. There are logistics to take into account.”
“That’s fine,” Nathan replied, not missing a beat. “How about this, though? Since she’s my fiancée, and we’re sharing a cabin and bed, you can bring your logistics issues to me and I’ll handle answering your questions.” He sent a questioning look toward me, not Preston, to see if I was okay with it.
I felt like the Grinch, and my heart was suddenly three times bigger. Nobody had ever deferred to me this way while alsoremoving a problem—a huge problem, actually—from my lap. “That sounds perfect to me,” I said.
“Well, I have a problem with it,” Preston argued. “You signed a contract.”
“Point me toward anything in that contract that says conversations can’t be filtered through me,” Nathan demanded.
“I—” Preston looked so perplexed I had to hold back a laugh.
