Dirty: The Complete Series (Secret Baby Romance Love Story) (91 page)

*******

After we danced, we fixed a small plate
for ourselves and found a nice, quiet table in the corner. We could see the
rest of the ballroom from that vantage point and suddenly, I felt like all eyes
were on me. I told myself it was my imagination as I picked at a crab cake and
tried not to make eye-contact with any of them.

“I was impressed with how you stood up for
yourself out there with Sabrina. I’m sorry she put you in a place where you
felt like you had to do that.”

“What’s Catalyst? It’s the same thing
Lance was talking about the other day at the beach.”

Drake sighed. “It’s a brand of clothing.
The make beach clothes and surf equipment. I’m hoping to get them to sponsor me
so that I don’t have to depend on my father’s money any longer.”

“I don’t have much experience – or any –
with fathers. But this man coming towards us looks an awful lot like he could
be yours. And, he doesn’t look happy at all.”

When Drake looked up, I saw a visible
change in everything about him. His facial expression, his posture, and his
demeanor were suddenly guarded and even slightly intimidated. He pushed back
his chair and stood up. Putting out his right hand, he said, “Father.” His
father shook his hand, but his eyes kept going back to me.

“This is Summer French. Summer, this is my
dad, Neil Spencer.”

“I’m pleased to meet you,” I told him. He
gave my hand a quick, but firm handshake.

“Drake, I need to speak with you, alone.”
He was finished with me, and it was obvious that I was supposed to excuse
myself. Drake looked at me with an apology in his eyes. I tried to give him a
smile so he wouldn’t worry.

“Excuse me,” I said, more for his father’s
benefit than Drake’s, “I’m going to use the ladies room.”

Drake squeezed my hand underneath the
table. His father sat down as I stood up, never making eye-contact with me
again. I escaped to the ladies room, or I thought I did, anyways. I went into
the stall and seconds later, I heard two women’s voices. One of them I
recognized as Sabrina’s. The other sounded familiar, maybe Drake’s sister.

“Homeless…as in she lives on the streets?”

“As in a cave. Lance told me about the
cave, but I didn’t believe him. After listening to how proud she was of her
street status, I don’t doubt it now.”

There was stunned silence. “You’re fucking
kidding me!”

“I wish I were. Your brother is setting
himself up.” Damn it! It was Drake’s sister. I drew my legs up so they couldn’t
see I was there. I really wanted to throw up now. “I don’t think he realizes
how competitive this sponsorship is. Being with the wrong person at this stage
in his life can kill it for him. Besides…homeless? Imagine what kind of nasty
diseases she has.”

My blood was boiling as Chrissy laughed
and said, “Maybe my father is paying her to be with him. I’m actually surprised
he hasn’t thought of something like that. He wants Drake to stop surfing and
come to work with him.”

“Right, but that’s not what Drake wants.
That’s why this sponsorship was so important to him.”

“And, why is it so important to you,
Sabrina?” The other woman didn’t answer and Chrissy continued, “You’ve been in
love with my brother since high school. He told everyone you broke up with him,
but that’s not true, is it?”

She snorted. “No, it wasn’t true, but if
you tell anyone…”

“I won’t.”

“He said he needed something ‘different.’
I thought after he went on tour and fucked a few dozen ‘different’ women, he’d
get that out of his system. Apparently, it’s only gotten worse.”

“Sabrina, you have lots of other choices.
I’ve always wanted to see you two together, but I hate to see you suffer over
it. He’s just still so immature, even rebellious. He doesn’t know what he
wants.”

“I don’t want other choices, and I know
what I want. I want Drake. We’re perfect for each other. I understand him and
he understands me. He’s just sowing his oats and I’m okay with that, for the
most part. I just don’t want him ending up with some nasty disease.”

I’d heard enough. I let my feet drop and
my heels slammed into the polished tile. I couldn’t see them, but I was betting
they jumped about a foot high. I unlocked the door and just stood there to let
them take me in for a second before I laid into them.

“What a miserable couple of bitches you
are. You both claim to care about Drake, yet you’re in here plotting and
scheming over his life. What is wrong with you?”

Chrissy at least had the decency to look
embarrassed. Sabrina just looked amused. “What’s wrong with us asks the girl
who is in thousands of dollars of hair, make-up, and clothing that Drake paid
for? Is this what you do? You play the poor little homeless imp and men shower
you with gifts before you move on?”

I took her in slowly from head to toe with
my eyes. By the time I made it back up to her face, she at least looked
slightly nervous. I thought about going street crazy on her for a fraction of a
second, but I wanted to walk out of here with at least a shred of my dignity
intact. “You can tell Drake whatever you like. It doesn’t matter because I’m not
going to hang around and be the reason he doesn’t succeed. At least, when I lay
my head down in my cave at night, I can do it knowing that I did what was best
for someone I care about. I’m not sure what you bitches use when you lay down
on your designer sheets and I have to say, I don’t give a fuck.” I stepped
towards the sink and they both took a giant step back like they thought I was
coming at them with a knife. I just wanted to wash my hands. I didn’t want to
give them another reason to call me nasty.

CHAPTER
SIXTEEN

DRAKE

My father went on for half an hour about
what I would do after the Laguna competition. I realized when he finally left
the table that Summer had never come back. She was probably with my sister.
God, I hoped Chrissy and the rest of the snobs at that table behaved
themselves.

“Have you seen Summer?” I asked Chrissy
when I got to her table. My mother was sitting and talking to Chrissy and
Searcy.

“Not recently,” Chrissy said.

“Surely, she’s here somewhere. She
wouldn’t just leave, would she?” Mother asked.

I looked back at Chrissy. Something in her
face told me she knew more than she was letting on. “Not unless someone said
something to make her feel like she didn’t belong here. You don’t know anything
about that, do you, Sis?”

“Me? No, of course not. Why would you
think that?”

Mother turned those piercing blue eyes on
me and said, “Yes, Drake, why would you think that? Was there something in
particular you were worried about someone using against her?” I’m sure if
Sabrina told Chrissy about Summer, Chrissy had already filled Mother in.

“There is nothing she has to be ashamed
of, Mom. Chrissy was asking her a lot of questions earlier, and she was pretty
uncomfortable.” I gave my sister a look and she tried to give me an innocent
one in return, but there was something there and I was suddenly worried. I kept
my eyes on Chrissy as I said, “I just want to make sure that she’s okay.”

“I was simply asking her about herself.
Why would that make her uncomfortable?” Chrissy asked with an eye roll. “Maybe
she does have something to hide.”

I glared at my sister. It was obvious to
me now that someone told her about Summer. She was taunting me. “No, she
doesn’t. Excuse me.” I felt their eyes on my back as I made my way over to
where Lance was sitting. I hadn’t spoken to him tonight, but it seemed like
he’d done a lot of talking about me and Summer.

“Lance! I need to talk to you.”

“Sure, dude! Have a seat.” He sounded like
he’d had one too many drinks already. He’s kind of an ass when he’s drunk.

“Alone.”

He reached up and touched the side of his
still bruised mouth. “I don’t think so.”

I tried reasoning first, “Come on, Lance.
This is me. We’ve been friends forever. I need you, man.”

“For what, Spence? Did you need me to go
looking for the street urchin? She could be in any dumpster by now.” I reached
down for him, and he pushed his chair back and stood up. The only thing that
kept me from once again knocking him on his ass was my father’s face looking at
me from just slightly behind him.

“What’s this about?” Lance startled at the
sound of my father’s voice. He turned towards him and at the same time we both
said,

“Just a disagreement.” My father somehow
had the ability to restore us to the age of twelve on a whim. Lance is as
intimidated by the old man as I am.

“Not here,” he had a tone of finality in
his voice, asalways. What he says goes. “Where is your girlfriend?”

Confused about why my father was asking
about Summer, I hesitated long enough for Lance to snort and say, “Probably in
the bat cave by now.” Everyone at the table laughed. My father wasn’t amused. I
just turned around and left. I heard my father call my name, but I didn’t stop.
I will definitely hear about it sooner rather than later, but just then, I
didn’t give a fuck.

The car we had arrived in was still
waiting out front. I wasn’t happy to see that, but relieved that I got her the
hotel room or I could just imagine her walking all the way back to La Jolla. I
had the driver take me back to the Indigo. This was not at all how I imagined
this night. I knocked several times on the door of Summer’s room. I couldn’t
hear so much as a sound from inside and if she hadn’t been wearing a dress and
four inch heels I wouldn’t have put it past her to walk all the way back to La
Jolla. As it were, I knew that she was smarter than that.

“Summer, I know you’re in there. I have a
key card, but I’d rather you open up for me so I don’t have to use it.”

She pulled open the door. She was dressed
back in her shorts and tank top and she had her pretty hair braided to one
side. “I’m going home,” she said.

“Okay, I’ll have the car take you. But can
we talk first?”

“There’s nothing to talk about. Thank you
for everything you did for me today. But I think we proved tonight that I don’t
fit into your world, Drake.”

“Fine, then I’ll live in yours. Please
don’t walk away from me, Summer.”

She took my hand and led me over to the
couch. I took that as a good sign. We sat down and I found out quickly that I
was wrong. “Since the day I met you, Drake, I’ve let myself imagine things and want
things that I will probably never have. Being homeless isn’t so bad once you
accept your lot. But when you start pining for what everyone else has-”

“You can have what everyone else has. I
can give it to you,” I interrupted.

She smiled gently at me and continued, “I
don’t want you or anyone else to give it to me. When and if I get it, I want it
to be on my own merits, so when I have to stand up to bitches like the ones I
did tonight, I have a foundation to stand on.”

“What bitches? Who did you have to stand
up to? What happened?”

“It doesn’t matter. The point is that they
weren’t really saying anything that wasn’t true. I am homeless, I do live in a
cave, and I did let you spend way too much money getting me ready for this gala
tonight. I got caught up in the fairytale. Now, we both need to get back to
reality.”

“I don’t want reality. I want you.”

She stood up. “I’m going home, Drake.
Please don’t follow me. I really appreciate everything you’ve done, but I’m
going to take it from here. You go win your tournament and your sponsorship and
have a great life. You deserve it.”

I had never had to do more than give a
girl a smoldering look my entire life to have her eating out of my hand. I
never asked one to stay that wanted to leave. I knew I could replace any girl
in a heartbeat.

Something about Summer was different from
the beginning, however, and I had no idea what it was. What I did know is that
if I thought it would do any good, I’d be willing to beg her to stay. Like I
said before, she’s not into the drama. When she says something, she means it.
Panic was setting in, though, so I said, “Please don’t do this, Summer. We can
figure this out if you want to be with me.”

Without so much as batting an eyelash she
said, “I don’t. Take care, Drake.” And then I watched her walk out of my life.

*******

Two days before Summer’s big contest was
supposed to take place, I was getting ready to paddle out to some killer waves
stirring up around Black’s Beach. I had almost made it out when I looked up and
saw Lance standing above me holding his board. My first instinct was to kick
his ass, but I ignored him instead. I started paddling out as he lay down on
his board and followed me. Before we made it to the swells he said, “I’m sorry.
I’m an asshole.”

“You’re a fucking cunt.”

He winced. “Okay, I’m a cunt.” He knows
how badly I hate that word. It was the only one strong enough to describe how I
was feeling, though. It had been five days since Summer walked out of my life
and I had only seen her once since. She was surfing in the cove and her little
pain in the ass bodyguard was with her. I had tried to talk to her, but she
packed up her stuff while her watchdog growled at me and she left. “Man, I was
drunk…”