She's Up to No Good(59)

“What are you thinking?” he asked in her ear.

She turned her head up to look at him, her round brown eyes sparkling, wild and beautiful even with the ridiculous wig. “How happy I am.”

“Even if we can’t ever have this for ourselves?”

“What do you mean?”

“If your father says no—”

Evelyn pressed a finger to his lips. “You’re ruining the mood, darling. Let’s be happy now. And if he says no, as long as I have you, I don’t need any of this.”

He pulled her in close again, and they stayed like that even after the tempo of the song changed.





CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX





I should have worn the sundress, I thought, looking down at my jeans and tank top. But then would I look like I was trying too hard? A dress was definitely trying too hard. And I wasn’t trying at all.

Or did a dress say, Hi, I’m confident enough to wear what I want?

The Inn was such a short distance from the cottage. I could go back and change. Especially because I had driven—it was an easy walk, but if I walked, I had no excuse to nurse one drink and stay utterly inhibited, which was obviously the smart decision.

I took three steps back toward the car, then heard my name and froze, cursing silently.

“Hey,” I said, turning.

“Everything okay?”

“Huh? Oh—yeah. I thought I forgot my phone.” I pulled it from my back pocket. “But here it is.” I was a terrible liar, but if he noticed, he didn’t call me out.

He inclined his head toward the door. “Let’s go in.”

We found a table on the patio, which overlooked the water. There were a handful of people, but it seemed to be a quiet night. I glanced down at my watch—I had lost track of the days. It was Sunday.

“I’m guessing this place is packed on Fridays and Saturdays.”

“It is.”

A waitress came and took our drink order. Joe asked if I wanted food too, but I shook my head as it was nearly ten.

“Do you live near here or in town?” I asked, curious.

He turned, pointing across the beach to the far side where the handful of large houses sat on the bluffs, looming over the beach. “On that side.”

“In the big houses?”

He smiled. “No. But it was a guesthouse of one of them.”

“Ah, still East Egg though.” I bit the inside of my cheek. He wasn’t going to get that.

“Is that the old money side or the new money side? I always forget which is which.”

“Old.”

“Then no, that’s your side—the old estate that the cottage was part of. The big houses on my side are the new money summer people.”

“Summer people?”

“The ones who come in for the summer from Boston—the old joke goes that ‘Some’re people, some’re not.’”

“That’s terrible.”

He shrugged. “I didn’t say it was a good joke.”

The waitress brought our drinks, and we each took a sip, then sat in silence for a moment.

“Listen,” he said. “I . . . wanted to apologize. For earlier.” I looked at him, confused, thinking he meant for making me hike when we could have driven. “I didn’t expect Emily to come up.”

“Emily? Oh! I—no—I’m sorry. I didn’t know.” Great. That’s why he asked me for a drink, I berated myself. But that did make the most sense.

“Why would you?”

“Well, my grandma could have told me, considering how much she’s told you.”

“She hasn’t told me that much.”

I took another sip of my drink. “She tells me too much. She told me to use a”—I made air quotes—“‘prophylactic’ when I said I was meeting you.”

Joe choked on his drink, coughing loudly enough for people to look over, and I turned pink, wishing I hadn’t said that.

“That’s both hilarious and so, so gross,” he said when he caught his breath.

“It’s hilarious when it doesn’t happen to you.”

“Like that bad date you wouldn’t tell me about.” He gestured to my drink. “Have some more. I want that story.”

“Not sure this place has enough alcohol for that one. Besides, I drove tonight.”

Something painful crossed his face, and I kicked myself. He had lost his wife to a drunk driver. My grandma was right. I was not good at this on my own. I glanced over my shoulder to see if she was coming to bail me out.

“Guess that saves you tonight, then,” he said lightly. “But I’ll get it out of you.”

“Unlikely.” But I was smiling. I tilted my head. “What do you do for fun when you’re not showing around sad almost-divorcees?”

“Are you sad?”

“Not really,” I said, realizing for the first time that it was true. “Okay, so when you’re not showing around merry almost-divorcees?”

“Merry might be a stretch.”

I shook my head. “Fine, totally boring, middle-of-the-road almost-divorcees. You’re a real buzzkill, you know that?”

“Just honest. You’re not boring either though.”