Fluffy(39)

“I'm not the groom.” His eyes dim a bit as he says that. “I’m in the wedding party. I’ve got a–” He frowns. “A thing I have to do.”

“You want antibiotic cream?”

He shakes his head. “I'm good.”

“The risk of infection from being hit with a ten-year-old statue is probably small.”

Squinting, he looks at me, hair disheveled, drops of blood on his collar. He’s never been more attractive. Maybe I was a vampire in another life.

Wait. That's not technically possible. Vampires are immortal, so how could I have been one in another life when they get one, eternal life?

Never mind. Will's staring at me staring at his collar. I lick my lips.

“You’re really invested in getting this house under contract. We should talk more about it,” he says, his eyes on me.

On my mouth.

“We should?” Where's this coming from suddenly?

“In a location where you do not have access to weapons.”

I cross my arms over the girls and lift my eyebrows. “Don’t startle women when they’re vulnerable and alone, and–”

“Are you free for dinner tonight?”





11





Words catch in my throat. I just stare and blink, until finally he asks, “Mallory?”

“Dinner?”

“A business dinner,” he says, suddenly looking away. There's a wet spot where I hit him, the hair darker than the rest, slightly matted. Regret kicks in and I feel about two feet tall. “Talk about design trends, real estate, you know.”

I nod. Right. “I can't tonight. I have a date,” I blurt out, remembering David. The app. The asshole who isn't an asshole.

Yet. I haven't met him, so that judgment remains withheld.

“A date?”

“Yes. A date. You know, that thing where you go out with someone who has no intention of really getting to know you and you spend the entire time eating bread that doesn’t taste as good as your date claims and trying to decide whether to initiate rescue-text sequences with your mom.”

“That’s your idea of a date?”

“That is my actual experience of every date I’ve had since college.”

“You’re dating the wrong guys.” He holds my gaze for just a little too long. I look away.

“I have to keep fishing in the pond if I ever want to catch a different one.”

“If that’s the way you talk to your dates, I am beginning to understand why they all turn out so badly.”

“Hey!”

“What?”

“Don’t accuse me of being a bad date. I’m a great date! I Google the guy in advance and read his LinkedIn profile. I make sure I don’t wear super-tall heels in case he lied about his height on his dating profile. I pretend to care about all his hobbies and don’t reveal that I’m secretly tallying all the micro-aggressions he’s sending my way during appetizers and wine. And if he makes it to dessert, well–” I falter.

“You never make it to dessert, do you?” Will asks, eyebrows up. He drops them quickly, wincing.

“I–well–it’s not that I don’t. He doesn’t!”

“He ditches you?”

“No! No! It’s just that he always has a thing.”

“A thing?”

“A work emergency. Or a dog with a twisted bowel. Or a grandma in the ER.”

“How many guys used the twisted-canine-intestine thing?”

“Three.” I sit down and sag against his teenage desk, elbows sliding forward, fingers deep in my hair. “I looked it up. There’s an entire subreddit devoted to inventive ways to get out of a bad date.”

“And yet here you are.” He leans against the edge of his desk. “Trying again.”

“I’m a masochist.”

His eyes gleam. “Maybe you should start your dates with that line. ‘Hi. I’m Mallory Monahan. I’m a masochist.’ You’d definitely make it to dessert.”

“I’d make it into the headlines, too. ‘Woman found in cage, collar attached to washing machine after online date goes wrong. News at eleven.’”

I stand and grab my purse while Will laughs.

“Good luck,” he says, voice a little quiet. “I hope this one works out.”

“Why should it? None of the other ones do.”

“Why not?”

I shrug. “I wish I knew.” Sigh. “Perky thinks it’s because I won’t make myself smaller.”

Appreciative eyes look at my body. “You don’t need to be smaller. You’re... great.”

Did Will Lotham just size me up?

“No, no, not this,” I say, patting my hips. “Not my body. I mean me. My mind. My way of talking.”

“Way of talking?”

“I don’t... hide it.”

“Hide what?”

“The fact that I’m smart.” There. I said it.

“Why would you hide the fact that you’re smart from a guy?”

Laughter, fourteen years of it, all bottled up and fizzy, comes shooting out of me like I’m Diet Coke and his words are Mentos.