Igniting the Wild Sparks (63 page)

Shortly after I return from my visit with Simone, Morgan returns to my office with my phone and Rod.

“Let’s go,” she announces.

I pick up my purse and ask, “Where are we going anyway?” She hands me my phone and I take it like it’s a loaded gun. I have no idea how to work it. The guy in the phone store showed me, but I wasn’t paying much attention to him. I haven’t been concentrating on anything lately.

She gloriously smiles and I’m instantly suspicious. “You’ll see. Do you have everything?”

“Why?”

“Just asking. Rod, I need to borrow your phone. Mine needs a new battery, so it doesn’t hold a charge.”

“Awesome, Morgue. Now you’ll intercept all my personal calls.”

She holds out her expectant hand. “Yeah, from your mommy and your kite broker. Come on. We need to get going.”

“Where’s the fire, chief?” Rod grouses as he
pulls his phone out of his pocket and hands it to Morgan.

“I just want to get going before it’s too crowded. I’ll be downstairs.” She leaves
the office, while Rod waits for me to lock my cabinet drawers.

“Do you know where we’re going?” I ask him.

“Yeah. You’ll like it.”

“I don’t want to run into anyone.” Cara’s mouth. Ricky’s questions.
Finn’s arms.

He knowingly smirks. “We won’t.”

I sigh and he puts his arm around me, towing me to the door.

We meet Morgan in the lobby, where she’s busy tapping at Rod’s phone. She looks up and says, “We
have to make a quick trip to the gym. I need you and Shane to get a picture together.”

I stop walking as
they move for the door. “What? Why?”

She holds the door open for
Rod and me. “It’s for my scrapbook. I need a few more of you and Shane. I got a lot of Tonya and Derrick, but not of you and Shane. Please? Two.”

As Morgan
stands against the door waiting for us and checking Rod’s phone, he whispers to me, “I’m sure she did get a
lot
of Ton-ya.” I elbow him and feel a smile trying to emerge.

I practically whine,
“Really, Morgan?”

“Yeah. I’ll also need you to change and pull your ponytail out.” She impatiently rolls her hand at us. “Let’s go!”

“Sure. I’ll just take off my clothes and wear nothing,” I reply sourly.

Rod takes his arm o
ff me to enthusiastically clap. “Now that’s the spirit, Hadders!” I smack his stomach and he shoves me forward through the open doorway, out into the sunshine.

Morgan says, “I brought you something to wear. Calm down.”

“You had this all planned,” I complain.

“I did. I just didn’t want you to worry about it. It’s just a couple pictures.”

I pout. “Don’t expect me to smile.”

Walking
to her Mercedes SUV, she argues, “I’ll need some smiles, Hadley. They’re for my book!”

I grumble,
“That’ll cost you extra.”

“That wasn’t so bad, was it?” Morgan asks from the passenger seat of her car
, having refused to take Rod’s truck because of her bad sense of balance now with her growing belly, but also refusing to drive her own car because of emails she needs to return.

“It was horrendous,” I grouchily tease. It wasn’t that bad. I’m just bitter. “Thanks for letting me borrow your dress, though. I think I might keep it now.”
Morgan gave me a knee-length, light pink dress of hers to wear, explaining that she wanted pictures of Shane and me in different clothes for variety or “multiplicity is the seasoning of existing,” as Rod had put it.

She says
down to Rod’s phone. “Shane looked nice, too.”

I roll my eyes at her. “I guess.”

“Well, you got a couple pictures with Dick Rod.” She makes a disparaging noise at him and he flips her off.

He huffs, “Yeah, and I look like fucking trash!” Greg Rodwell looking like trash? Never. Not even when he wears his lamest concert T-shirt, cheapest blue jeans and sneakers. He always looks cool.

Morgan sneers, “You don’t really matter.”

He turns to glower at her. “Thanks a lot, hag.”

“Watch the road, Ass Rod. You’re driving my car.”

“What? Was your hearse in the shop?” Before Morgan can make a snide comment, I hear Rod’s phone buzz and she instantly returns to her messages.

As we merge onto I-95 North, I ask, “Where are we going anyway?”

Morgan distractedly answers, “The jazz festival.”

“Jazz festival? Where?”

Rod jumps in, “Washington D.C., baby!”

“What the hell?”

Morgan twists as much as she can behind a seatbelt and burgeoning stomach. “It actually was Val’s idea. She wants you to get away for the weekend.”

“It’s
Thursday
!”

“Come on, Hadley. You need some time away from…” Her gaze moves from me to the back window. “You’ll have fun with us.”

“But…” I’ll be farther away from…home. I need to be away, yet I don’t… What the fuck is my problem?

She
nearly glares at me. “No. You’re getting away.” As if she can read my mind, she mutters as she turns around, “He’ll still be there when we get back, unfortunately.” I miss him, though. I’m such a loser.

I scoff, “You’re a newlywed! Isn’t Ivan going to be upset?”

“He has to work. He said he’ll meet us there for a day. We’ll be back Sunday. Chill.”

I ask, “Rod, you’re just going to leave your truck in the lot until Sunday?”

He looks at me in the rearview. “No. It’s at Morticia’s. Relax. We have it all figured out.”

“My clothes?”

Morgan answers, “Packed.”

Rod laughs. “And boy did I love going through your undies. I did not know you had so many pairs of handcuffs and vibrators! You go, girl! I especially loved the crotchless underwear. Wow.”

Rolling my eyes, I try to hide my smile as I gaze out my window. “Shut up.”

Morgan assures,
“
I
packed your clothes. I also checked your mail. You had a ton. I put it on your table. There was a car key on your floor.” Oh, right. Ricky.

“You swiped my apartment key, too?”

“I told you we had it covered.”

“Thanks for the B&E. I’m calling the police.”
I’m sure Ricky would still be the first to respond if I called.

“Good luck figuring out how to dial 911 on your new phone,” she mocks me.

“Bitch,” I retort. “Jeez. You guys thought of everything.”

Rod says, “Yep.”

Petulantly, I cross my arms, making my stomach ache. “I’m really not in the mood to go to a festival.” I’m not really in the mood to even wake up in the morning.

“We’ll get you jazzed.” Rod laughs. “Ha ha. Get it?”

Morgan’s laugh escapes before she’s able to conceal it, and even I smile. A little.

After w
e check into the hotel, I sit on the bed in my room, the room Val paid for me. I love that woman. She is forever taking care of me.

The whole two-and-a-half-hour drive here, I stared out the window. Rod tried to make me laugh by changing lyrics to songs and making fun of other cars, but I don’t feel like laughing. Why can’t anyone understand that? I want to stay in bed and be alone with my formerly happy memories. How do I go on without Finn? How do I get through every day knowing we’re not going to have our forever because he
couldn’t wait to be intimate with Cara? Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think I could even look at him naked again without remembering… Though, strange enough, what hurts more is he didn’t have faith in us, like he had accused me of not having. However, he’s the one who truly didn’t. That’s hard to get past.

There’s a knock at my door
and I groan. I just want to be left alone. Honestly. Just. Alone. I sigh and resentfully get up to answer the door. Morgan sweeps by me into my room. I mutter, “Do come in.”

She beams. “Let’s sightsee.”

I scowl as I sit back down on the bed. “Are you serious? We just got here.”

She excitedly claps her hands. “I want to see the Capital!”

Pouting, I grab one of the 30 pillows on my bed and lie down with it. “You’ve been here. A lot. What more is there to see?”

“I’ll never get tired of D.C.!”

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I grumble as she pulls on my arm.

“Isn’t this great?” Morgan picks up her cheeseburger and takes a bite. “Eating near the monuments?”

Rod crumples his wrapper and says, “Yeah. I like eating with a huge erection in my face. Now I know how starving hookers feel.”

“That’s gross,” I say, wrinkling my nose and sliding my unwrapped burger to him. I pick at my fries and massage my bruise. It seems to flare up along with my attitude, like a mood ring.
Like Finn’s hair.

“Dick Rod, that’s the Washington Monument. It’s cool!”

He pushes my burger back to me. “Morgasm, it still looks like a giant co—”

“Got it. Noted
,” Morgan quickly cuts him off as she checks her watch for the umpteenth time. From the corner of my eye, I notice movement and I turn to see Ivan approaching Morgan from behind…with Shane.

Why, oh why?

Ivan buoyantly says, “Well, look here, Shane. These people look awfully familiar, don’t they?” I really want to go back to my room now. Or another planet.

Shane
approaches the bench and Morgan scoots down to let him sit between us. What a pal. I wish I had one of those people like they do at award shows, who fill empty seats when someone is performing, accepting an award or is in the restroom because I could use one of those right now, except that I wouldn’t come back.

Rod puts his arm around me
, clasping my shoulder, and I actually smile because I know he’s in protective Greg mode now, not letting anything happen to me.

W
ith a wide smile, Shane says, “Hey, there. We have to stop running into each other like this.” He’s still wearing the khaki button-up shirt and black pants from our photo op. What did he and Ivan do, hop in the car and drive right behind us? That would be really stalkerish.