Page 34 of Filthy Rich

Dad forced the most awkward smile I’d ever seen. “Well, you can move if you’d like.”

I frowned. “What does that mean?” They’ve never left anything up to me. There’s no way they were asking me if I wanted them to find a new house. With just two years of school left, why would I want to move?

“Your father and I have decided to get a divorce,” Mom said, her smile as forced as Dad’s. “We’re still friends, and we just think we’re going to be better apart than together.”

I blinked. “You—better. . .” I didn’t understand at all. “What? Why?”

“As I said,” Mom said. “Your Dad thinks?—”

“Oh, ho, ho, you can’t just pin this all on me. We talked about that.”

Mom scowled. “You said I could say that ‘we’ decided.”

“You’ve always said and done whatever you wanted, no matter what I said.”

It got worse and worse from there. I didn’t have to say a single word, though. They spun out all on their own. It made me wonder how they’d held things together around me before that, because clearly they detested one another. But within a few moments, Dad said something that made it pretty clear why they were breaking up.

“Isn’t that just like you? Of course you’re keeping the house. You’re keeping the furniture. You’re keeping all of it.” Dad was pacing, and each time he said ‘you’re,’ he jabbed his finger at Mom’s head.

Mom’s eyes were flashing, however. “I’m not the one demanding we get a divorce.”

“I’m only demanding because you were having an affair with Paul!”

Mom closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose. “You know that’s not true.”

“It is now,” Dad said.

“But that only started after you told me you were filing for divorce,” Mom said.

“Which I did after I saw you two kissing behind the building!”

I froze then, waiting for Mom to explain. Hoping it wasn’t true. Hoping there was some way back.

But there wasn’t.

Mom looked as guilty as he said she was.

She’d been kissing Paul—Christian was his real name—on set, and Dad was leaving her for it. I resolved then and there that I would never kiss someone in a play or movie, and that I would never date or marry someone else who was part of that world.

I’d never broken that promise to myself.

Until now.

But as I think about going on a date with Jake later, I can’t regret it. It’s not the same as my parents at all. He didn’t start acting when his marriage got rough, and he didn’t sacrifice anything and everything to live a dream into his forties.

He’s a young, hot movie star, and he kisses people for his job, not as some kind of sick hobby he can’t quit. He picked me to ask out, in spite of being able to have any woman he wanted, really.

So it’s not the same.

I’m not being stupid. I’m not setting myself up for the same misery my dad endured. I’m sure I’m not. I keep telling myself that as I touch up my makeup, grab my shoes, and sling my purse over my shoulder. “You ready?”

Bea’s grimacing while she stares at her phone. These days, that’s never good.

“What now?”

She drops her phone and it clatters against the table. “Nothing.” She stands and snatches it off the table, checking to make sure the screen isn’t cracked.

But I’m not a moron. “Just tell me. I’ll see it eventually.”