Over Her Dead Body(19)

“Are you worried she’s going to poison my tea?” my aunt asked, and I felt relieved on at least one front. OK, not an impostor.

“Don’t lead her on,” I implored her. I don’t know why I felt protective of this woman—I had only known her ten minutes.

“You have a good night, too,” she said. But of course the best part was over.





CHAPTER 14




* * *



JORDAN


“What do you think is more important, size or clarity?” I asked the jeweler as I gazed down at a gazillion dollars’ worth of diamond rings.

“Size,” the jeweler said. “All day and night.” He winked. I felt a flicker of annoyance at the unsubtle sex joke. I knew it was crazy to propose to a woman I had never had sex with, even though it was pretty much the only thing we hadn’t done. We lived together, ate together, traveled together. I was her ride home from the airport and she was mine. That first year in LA, when we were both too broke to go home for Thanksgiving, we even cooked a turkey together, just the two of us. I made the bird, she made the sides—mashed potatoes and green beans and sweet potato poof. Ashley and I were like family. There wasn’t much I didn’t know about my childhood pal and roommate of seven years, with the glaring exception of how she was in bed.

“Do you have a price range in mind?” he asked.

I had just joined a sports medicine practice and had suffocating student loans, so money was tight. But I knew I would be making a lot more in a matter of months, so I decided not to skimp. I wanted the ring to represent the future, because isn’t that what a proposal is? An invitation to a future together? It’s not like you can just upgrade your fiancée’s engagement ring as you make more money—if things went as planned, she would have it forever. An engagement ring is a declaration, a promise, a statement to the world. I wanted it to be bold and optimistic. Because that’s how I felt about Ashley.

“I’d like to buy her the best one you have,” I said. “But I don’t think I can go much higher than five thousand.”

I hadn’t planned to spend my Sunday afternoon shopping for an engagement ring, but now that I knew that Ashley wanted what I wanted, I was emboldened to make my move. I couldn’t believe she remembered the pact. We were blotto when we said we would be each other’s emergency spouse. I’d thought she was kidding. I’d thought I was kidding, too.

“Have you considered a halo setting?” the jeweler asked. I didn’t know what a halo setting was, so I just shrugged.

“This center stone is not overly large, but the setting camouflages its smaller size.” He pulled a ring from the case. It was not round, but not square. I learned later it was called a cushion cut, I guess because it was the shape of a couch cushion—rectangular but with rounded edges. There were what looked like a hundred tiny diamonds around it, plus more diamonds on the band that forked out to hug the stone on either side. It sparkled like crazy. I peeked at the price tag. It was $1,000 more than I’d wanted to spend but looked like it should cost twice that much.

I did a quick calculation in my head. The rent at our Valley bungalow hadn’t gone up for three years, and based on the condition of the place, it was unlikely it would anytime soon. I had paid cash for my pickup, so I didn’t have a car payment. I had student debt, but now that I was done with my residency I could start chipping away at it. I pretty much always wore scrubs to work, so didn’t need fancy clothes or shoes. And I wasn’t a foodie; most days lunch was a turkey sandwich I made at home. It was a little irresponsible to spend six grand on a diamond ring, but so was proposing to a woman who I’d never even seen naked.

“Wow,” I said. “It looks like it fell right out of a fairy tale.”

“Do you know her ring size?” the jeweler asked.

I pulled a twist tie out of my jacket pocket. She had a mood ring she sometimes wore on her left ring finger. I didn’t want to risk taking it, but I’d snuck into her room and measured it when she was at work. The twist tie was a little mangled, but when he put it on the sizer it straightened right out.

“She’s a five,” the jeweler said with a grin.

“Is that good?”

“This ring is a five,” he replied. “I don’t have many this small. I think it may be—”

I finished his sentence for him. “Meant to be.”

I thought about how what I wanted in a partner had changed over the years. In my early twenties I fell for women who made me feel off-balance, like I was teetering on the edge of a cliff. I craved the excitement of the chase, and never knowing when—or if—she was going to call me back. But as I approached my thirtieth birthday, I realized I didn’t want to marry someone who made me feel dizzy. I wanted to marry my best friend—because isn’t that what a wife is?

“I think I have to have it,” I said, imagining Ashley’s expression when she saw it.

“You won’t regret it.”

I got a dopamine hit as he rung it up. I hadn’t felt a rush like that since the swish of my three-pointer that clinched the state championship—and that was a long time ago. It was going to be hard to wait for her birthday—patience was never my strong suit. Of course I didn’t know how much was going to change between now and then, and that the people she had just met were going to ruin everything.