I tensed and jerked her toward the car. “Blaire isn’t interested in cowboys anymore. Got that? No more guys for Blaire. She’s going home with me,” I said angrily.
Bethy stopped and swayed, then looked at me, her eyes round with understanding. “She lives at your house. Do you mean home to her room or home to your room?” she asked, then burped and covered her mouth.
“My room. Go,” I said, making her walk again.
“Oh, shit,” Bethy said in a loud attempt at a whisper. “You —oh, shit, Rush, you can’t f**k her. She ain’t . . . I think she’s a virgin.” Bethy was whispering loudly enough for the entire parking lot to hear her.
“Shut up, Bethy,” I growled, and opened the car door for her. “She wants to go home, with me. But first, she wants to talk to you.” This was not how I wanted to spend the drive back to Rosemary Beach. I’d hoped I could talk to Blaire. Now we had a drunk Bethy talking about Blaire’s virginity. Shit.
“Well, look at you. Making it with the hottest thing in Rosemary Beach in the back of his Range Rover. And here I thought you wanted a blue-collar man,” Bethy said to Blaire.
“Climb on in, Bethy, before you fall on your ass out here,” I ordered, wishing I could shut her the hell up.
“I don’t wanna leave. I liked Earl, or was his name Kevin? No, wait, what happened to Nash? I lost him . . . I think,” Bethy muttered, as she climbed inside clumsily.
“Who are Earl and Kevin?” Blaire asked.
Bethy reached for something to grab, then fell backward onto the seat and almost on top of Blaire. “Earl is married. He said he wasn’t, but he is. I could tell. The married ones always have the smell about ’em.”
I closed Bethy’s door and then walked around to get Blaire out of the backseat. She was going up front with me. I jerked her door open and held out my hand for hers. “Don’t try to make sense of anything she says. I found her at the bar finishing up a round of six tequila shots that married Earl had bought her. She’s trashed.” I wanted to clear up anything Bethy had said or was going to say that could upset Blaire.
Blaire slipped her hand into mine, and I squeezed it to reassure her.
“No need in explaining anything to her tonight. She won’t remember it in the morning,” I told Blaire.
She was worried about clearing the air with Bethy, and Bethy was doing exactly what she always did—just without the trust-funders.
I helped Blaire down, then pulled her against me and closed the door, leaving Bethy inside. “I want a taste of those sweet lips, but I’m going to deny myself. We need to get her home before she gets sick,” I said, not wanting this to spoil what had just happened with us.
Blaire nodded, staring up at me with those trusting eyes. I didn’t want to ever let that face down.
“But what I said earlier. I meant it. I want you in my bed tonight,” I reminded her, in case it was possible she could have forgotten.
She nodded again. I slipped my hand to her lower back and walked her over to the passenger door. I wasn’t going to pretend we were friends anymore. We weren’t friends. We had never been friends. It was more than that. With Blaire, it was always more.
“Fuck the friend thing,” I told her, before taking her waist and picking her up to put her in the seat. It was high, and I wanted a reason to touch her. I closed her door and walked around to climb in, and the grin on her face made me warm inside. “What’s the grin for?” I asked, hoping I had put it there.
She shrugged and bit her bottom lip. “ ‘Fuck the friend thing.’ It made me laugh.”
I laughed. Good, I had put that smile there. I’d also made her laugh. Why did it feel like I’d just solved world hunger?
“I know something you don’t know. Yes, I do. Yes, I do,” Bethy began chanting in a drunken singsong voice.
I didn’t want her distracting us. Messing this up. It was my time with Blaire, and I wanted that. Why couldn’t she just pass out or something?
Blaire shifted in her seat to look back at Bethy.
“I know something,” Bethy whispered loudly like she had been doing outside.
“I heard that,” Blaire said.
“It’s a big secret. A huge one . . . and I know it. I’m not supposed to, but I do. I know something you don’t know. You don’t know. You don’t know.” Bethy started singing again.
She knew a secret. A sick knot formed in my stomach. I had secrets. Did she know my secrets? Did she know what Blaire didn’t know? How could I have Blaire if Bethy told her before I could fix it? “That’s enough, Bethy,” I warned.
Blaire turned back around, and I could tell I had startled her. I just wanted Bethy to shut up. I didn’t want to hear any secrets she knew. I reached over and slipped a hand over Blaire’s. I needed to reassure her, but I couldn’t look at her right now. The panic in my throat was taking over.
Bethy couldn’t know. Could she? No one knew. Had Nan told someone? Fuck. I couldn’t let this get out. I had to make this right. Blaire needed me. I couldn’t lose her.