You Had Me at Halo(20)

“Okay, I guess. Considering I’m back from the dead in someone else’s body.”

“Oh yes.” Gemma quickly pulled her hand away and scrutinized them. “By the way, who am I speaking to? Is it Holly-Vince or Vince-Vince?”

“It’s Holly, you idiot.” It was obvious that despite staying on the phone for an extra half hour last night to try and explain the new situation, Gemma was still having problems making sense of it.

“Hey, that’s a bit unfair calling me an idiot when you’re the one that managed to get herself into someone else’s body,” her friend complained.

“My point exactly,” Vince piped in. “And for the record Gemma, I promise I had nothing to do with Holly trying to hit on you at the funeral yesterday.”

Gemma giggled and Holly rolled her eyes. “Please, don’t encourage him. And Vince, don’t you have something else to do while we talk?”

“Sure, I’ll just go over and grab a cup of coffee. Oh no wait. I can’t move.”

“Ignore him,” Holly advised Gemma. “Because we can’t afford to waste any more time and—Oh...there’s Todd...”

Holly sighed as she looked over to where he was striding through the foyer with a paper under one arm and a coffee in his other hand—a decaf skinny cappuccino, not that he ever let on, but Holly knew he was secretly worried about his weight. Probably wanted to look good for their wedding. She sighed again.

“Great, and things just keep getting better and better,” Vince growled but Holly didn’t pay him any attention.

“Look at how gorgeous he is. I love they way his hair goes all tousled...see...like that.”

Vince squinted. “It’s sort of a weird color if you ask me. Does he dye it?”

“Oh, well I guess he gets a few tones and highlights, but there’s nothing wrong with male grooming. In fact some of your colleagues would do very well to take a leaf out of Todd’s book.”

“I’ll be sure to pass that little tip along,” Vince said in a dry voice.

Holly continued to stare in Todd’s direction. “This is so annoying. I mean he’s my boyfriend and I can’t even go over there and tell him how much I love him. And what’s she doing?”

“Who?” Gemma spun around to see what was going on.

“Rochelle Jackson,” Holly said in disdain as she stared at Todd, who was paying an awful lot of attention to the stupid girl. “She is so unbelievable. I feel like going over there and giving that slut a piece of my mind.”

Gemma’s hand shot out and grabbed Holly’s arm. “Don’t be stupid,” she hissed. “You’re only Holly on the inside. On the outside you’re—”

“Vince Murphy,” Holly muttered. “Yeah and don’t I know it. I mean what’s the point of them sending me back here to sort out my issues if I’m stuck in this body? It’s driving me crazy.”

“Ah, finally we have something in common,” Vince retorted.

“You know it’s starting to become quite obvious why you have no friends,” Holly replied. “And is Rochelle Jackson touching Todd’s butt?”

“Okay, Holly, don’t freak out,” Gemma said tentatively, as if she were about to reveal some more information.

“Don’t freak out about what?” she said in a dangerously low voice.

Gemma let out a muffled sigh. “I didn’t want to tell you before but Rochelle’s been making a play for Todd ever since you died.”

“But I’ve only been dead two weeks. What kind of person would go after a dead girl’s boyfriend like that?”

“I know, right,” Gemma immediately agreed. “But the thing is, Todd isn’t remotely interested. Holly, he’s really upset about you dying. It’s totally thrown him.”

“Well, so it should. I mean we were meant to be...oh.” Holly broke off with a start as something occurred to her. “It was Rochelle who gave me the pills! You were so right when you said that it couldn’t have been Tina. Because what would be the point of only knocking me out for one night? But with Rochelle it’s different. She wanted to knock me out so she could have Todd all to herself at the ball.”

For a moment Gemma was quiet before she finally nodded her head. “We both know that Rochelle doesn’t stop at anything to get what she wants, so making you fall asleep for the night certainly wouldn’t be beyond her. Unbelievable.”

“I’ll say. That girl does not know how to take no for an answer. And she definitely has boundary issues. And why is she still touching him?”

“Well, that’s about to change,” Gemma said firmly. “As soon as we get proof, then she’s history. I think we should start with her office.”

“Her and her stupid office,” Holly growled. Rochelle liked to mention it at every opportunity since the rest of last year’s graduates were still stuck in cubicles. Word on the street, though, was that she hadn’t earned that office at all, she’d only gotten it because she was friendly with the CEO. Real friendly.

And now she had stopped Todd from proposing on the night of the ball. Well the pills may have worked, but there was no way Holly was going to stand by and let her get away with stealing her fiancé as well. This was war.