Highway Princess - 2

Here's part 2, a little laterthan expected.
But still in time for the weekend.

Emma walked out of Lonegan’s and into Ed’s Lexus like she was walking on a mattress of feathers. She had killed a pair of weird cocktails that Missy had ordered for her, bright blue and apparently innocuous. The girls had cheered her on, and talked bullshit, and commented on the new board of directors.
Tam had offered her a joint, but Emma was not into that sort of stuff. She had accepted a cigarette instead. She realized Ed would not be pleased, but what the hell, it was her party, and this was, what, the first cigarette in eighteen months? Screw it.

She placed the cardboard box on the back seat.
Ed of course caught her straight away.
“You know I hate it when you smoke,” he said, kissing her lips. The girls had clapped and cat-called and wolf-whistled. Ed had given them a wide grin, and then started the car.
“I only had one,” Emma said, slowly.
She leaned her head against the window, and watched the light reflections chase each other.
“Was it a bad day?” he asked.
“I lost my fucking job,” she replied.
Ed frowned. “You know I don’t like it when you talk like that.”
“But it was my fucking job,” Emma said, relishing his annoyance.
He sighed. “Maybe it’s better like this.”
She turned and stared at him. “What?”
He shrugged, his eyes on the road. “We talked about it so often. You could come and stay with me. You’d only have to worry about where we’d dine, and what to wear. Where we would go on vacation—”
She felt suddenly very sober. “I’m thirty years old, Edward,” she said. He knew that she was serious when she called him by his full name. “I have just lost a work in which I put five years of my life, and you want me to become—what, your Barbie doll?”
“You know it’s not like that.”
She snorted. His phone twittered. He tapped it.
“Hey bro, where are you?” a very loud voice.
“I’m on my way home,” Ed said with a grin.
“Fuck it bro, we got seats for tonight’s playoffs. Get to your place in ten.”
“I’m with Emma,” Ed said, glancing at her.
“Dump the bitch. She’s not as nearly fun as a basketball game.”
“I could never compete with ten men in underwear,” Emma said, leaning towards the phone.
“Shit, Em,” the voice said.
“Yes, Mike, I knew it was you,” she said.
“OK, bro, maybe another time.”
The line was closed.
“He was joking,” Ed said.,
“He was being a dick.”
“Please, Emma, I hate it when you talk like that.”
“I guess it’s all right if it comes from your bro.”
He rolled his eyes. “Men are different.”
She just shook her head. “Drop me home, and then go have fun with your bros.”
“No, listen—”
She looked at him hard. “It’s been a rough day. Turn here, drop me by my place, and then get the fuck to the basketball game with your pals.”
“I thought you’d stay at my place tonight.”
“Not tonight, no.”
He took the first right-hand turn. “Are you sure?”
“Never been more sure.”
He left her a block from her house, and drove away. As he left the curbside, she saw he was dialing on the phone.
Screw him and his dick friends.
She realized she had left her box in his car.
She shrugged, and walked home.