Page 14 of Once Upon a Beast

“You can’t date or sleep with anyone else while this is going on. If you are, that needs to stop and you’ll have to deal with how to handle that. It can’t come back on me or us. I won’t have it look like I was being cheated on.”

“There’s no one. It isn’t a problem. The only person I will be dating, fake or otherwise, will be you for the foreseeable future.”

Layla let out a sigh and I could see some tension leaving her body. “Do you think we can do this? Do you think we can really pull this off?”

“I wouldn’t have brought you into this if I didn’t think it could succeed. I’m not saying it is going to be easy but I do think it could lead to a good thing.”

“What is that?” Layla finished her wine and put it down. I leaned over and refilled the glass.

“It will hopefully lead to me getting your friendship back. I’ve missed you. I do want you back in my life and I hope you will give me this chance to prove that to you. Will you?”

Layla took her wine and moved back onto the couch. She didn’t take a drink but looked at me. After a moment she said, “I guess we are going to do this, friend. So, tell me, what have you been up to in the last ten years?”

Chapter 8

Layla

“And you agreed to this like it was nothing?” Ara asked.

“I didn’t agree immediately. We talked about it for a while,” I replied.

As soon as I had left Nic’s apartment, I called Ara and Ella. They were waiting for my call and told me to hurry on over. When I got to Ara’s place, she had opened a bottle of rosé, and had ordered us some pizza. I had quickly filled them in on what had happened.

“Are you sure you should be doing this? Should you be helping him out like this?” Ara asked, popping an olive in her mouth.

“I think it’s sweet and good of her to agree,” Ella countered. “Plus, it gives her a chance to get Nic back into her life.”

Ara shook her head at Ella before looking at me. “Which is exactly why I don’t think you should do it. The man hurt you once, why would you allow him the chance to do it again?”

“He isn’t going to hurt me. I’m not going to let him. It honestly hurt more not having him in my life. I missed him, I want him back in my life. This is a way to do that. Do I like that it took him being in a crisis for him to call me? No.”

“Technically, he didn’t call you. He had your daddy call you,” Ara pointed out, and took a sip of her wine.

She was right and I took a second before I answered. “I don’t know if I would have answered the phone if Nic had called, or even listened to the voicemail. I know you wouldn’t have let me.”

“There is that. I don’t know if I would have even let you go over there if I had known before,” Ara said.

I exchanged a look with Ella who smiled at me. “Nic is smart enough to know Layla. Getting her dad to call her to come over guaranteed that she would come. Once she was there, Nic took over the convincing. He did a good job. Now they’re back to being friends.”

“Are you friends with him again? Is all forgiven like it never happened?” Ara asked suspiciously.

I knew Ara was only being protective of me. She knew how much Nic had hurt me and didn’t want to see my hurt again. I understood where she was coming from and didn’t mind her scrutiny.

“We’re working on being friends again,” I said cautiously. “I haven’t forgotten what he did nor has he. He honestly thought he was doing what was best for me.”

“Best for you? Ignoring you? Pretending you didn’t exist? Not caring a bit about you and your feelings? That isn’t doing what’s right by you, that’s being a coward,” Ella said.

Ella was always calmer and more collective than Ara and even me at times. She could see all sides of an issue and usually didn’t get that upset about anything. She had been supportive of me talking to Nic, to a point, I hadn’t realized she was as annoyed by him as she was.

“Tell me how you really feel!” I teased her.

“Don’t get me wrong. I’m happy you and Nic are reconnecting. I know how much you missed him. But he needs to know what a jerk he was too. He can’t just sweep it under the rug with a half-ass apology,” Ella said.

Ara smiled and pointed at Ella, “Yeah, what she said.”

“If you would let me finish, I was going to say, once I told him what he did to me and how it made me feel, he apologized. He felt very bad about it and admitted he didn’t think about me or my feelings. Considering the man’s world had fallen apart right in front of him, it’s understandable.”

“Maybe, but then why didn’t he ever try to contact you. It’s been ten years. He should have gotten his head out of his ass before then,” Ara said.