Grounded (Up in the Air, #3)(60)

He made an embarrassing show of getting me out of the pool, drying me and putting my cover-up on. My friends cheered him on, and I flushed. He even tried to walk me to the bathroom.

I gave him a level stare. “James, I can go to the bathroom by myself.”

He looked none-too-happy about it, but he handed me a key from the pocket of his swim trunks. “Use the one in our bedroom. It’s locked.”

I just nodded and walked off, keeping the towel wrapped tightly around my chest.

After I finished and came back down to the main floor, I was particularly surprised to find one partygoer that I did recognize, but that I certainly hadn’t expected to come.

“Hi Melissa,” I told her.

Melissa was drinking a martini and looked to be flirting with a bartender in one of the makeshift bars that had been set up around the house.

She sent me a pretty disgusted look for someone partying at my boyfriend’s house.

“Bianca,” she said with a sneer.

I’m not sure if it was her venom, or if it was the nerve of her bad attitude at this particular location, but that sneer just seemed to snap the class right out of me.

I grabbed her arm, pretty much dragging her into the nearest room. It was some sort of entertainment room, with a giant TV mounted on the wall, theatre seating, and a long sofa set up at the back of the room. I’d only seen the room once before and briefly, when I’d finally gotten the full tour of the house.

A couple was making out on the sofa. I ordered them out like I owned the place. They seemed to think I did, because they listened and obeyed without a protest. I shut the door behind them and turned to Melissa.

“Ok, let’s hear it,” I told her in my coldest voice. “What is your problem? Do you dislike me, or is your personality just this horrible in general?” Normally being this rude to someone literally made my skin crawl, but I didn’t seem to be having any problem with it just then.

She folded her arms over her chest and glared at me, the look more pouty than convincing. “It’s you. You are just the type of woman that I absolutely despise.”

I raised my brows at her. I wasn’t surprised that she didn’t like me—that was hardly a shocker, she hadn’t been keeping it a secret, but I rarely found myself described as a type. Unless maybe it was the distant, reserved type. And that type rarely inspired this kind of animosity. I didn’t have to ask her what she meant; she was more than happy to elaborate.

“You act like a prissy bitch, you look down on the girls that want a sugar daddy, but you are just like us! You are playing the same game I am; you’re just less honest about it. That is what I hate! And you landed the biggest rich guy of all! You don’t deserve it. You don’t deserve any of this! I was born rich. Born in to this life, born deserving this life, but then my daddy lost everything, and now I have to throw f*cking peanuts to make ends meet, blowing sixty-year old men just to get the bags I used to get for giving my daddy a kiss on the cheek. And you, with your supposed virtue, land the ultimate rich guy on your first try. You give honest girls like me a bad name.”

I laughed. I couldn’t keep it in. I laughed right in her face. “So that’s your deal,” I told her, my tone scathing. I just couldn’t believe that she was even more worthless than what I’d pegged her for. “You’re a spoiled little brat that never grew up. Your daddy gave you everything, and look what you became. A whore for bags?”

She actually had the nerve to try to slap me. I saw it coming and caught her wrist mid-air.

“I am nothing like you,” I continued as though she hadn’t just taken a swing at me. “The fact that James has money worked against him with me, not for him, and I couldn’t give a flying f*ck about handbags. You need a little dose of the real world, little girl, and I hope you get it.”

The door burst open, and James strode in, his eyes wild, four security guards behind him. He didn’t even look at Melissa as he had her escorted out.

I did, meeting her glare for glare as she stormed off.

Finally, I met his eyes. I knew what I’d find there. Enough concern and fury to make me tense.

“That’s f*cking it. You aren’t going to the bathroom without security ever again.”

I rolled my eyes. “Please. It was Melissa. She’s hostile, but hardly a threat to me.”

“She threw a f*cking drink at your head!”

He was really working himself into a rage, I realized.

I moved to him, burying my face in his chest. He wrapped me in his arms. It was an automatic response, enraged or not. I thought that said a lot.

“I’m perfectly fine. We had an enlightening conversation, actually.”

“Oh?” he asked, his hands running over my back possessively.

“Yeah. I found out what her deal is.”

“I’d love to hear it.”

“She’s a spoiled brat,” I said simply.

“Huh.”

“And a whore for designer bags.”

That got a real laugh out of him. “She must really like handbags,” he said, a smile in his voice.

“I would hope so, since she claims she blew a sixty-year old just to get one.” I don’t know why it struck me funny when I said it, it really was just sad and pathetic, but I couldn’t make the statement without laughing.

It must have been contagious because James started laughing just as hard as I was.