The Dirty Book Club(49)

Jules’s breath hitched. “Did you hear that?” She cocked her head and froze. A deer after the chik-chik of a hunter’s rifle. “It’s Destiny! She can’t see me like this.” She hurried for the bathroom. “Can you let her in?”

“I’m not sure,” M.J. said to the room service cart that was lodged in the bedroom doorway. Silver trays were stacked high but unevenly. It was a carpet-cleaning fee waiting to happen. M.J. summoned her strength, which was none, and shoved.

The cart didn’t budge, but the tray tower collapsed and toppled. A dirty bomb of syrup-soaked pancakes, french fries, bacon bits, and shrimp tails spilled onto the cream-colored rug. Over was the only way out.

Shielding her eyes from the brain-biting sun, M.J. opened the door to find not Destiny, but Addie, in an ivory dress and pigtails, radiating youth and innocence. The whites of her eyes were actually white and her forehead dewy with hydration.

“Did you ride that here?” M.J. asked, glimpsing the skateboard pinned beneath Addie’s high-top sneaker.

“I’m low on gas.” She handed a grocery bag to M.J.

“What’s this?”

“Hangover helpers.”

M.J. peeked inside and found a glorious assortment of bagels and artisan cream cheeses. “Carbs! How did you know?”

“There were messages.”

“Oh no.”

“Oh yes. You wanted to know if Bungee was in my bathtub, if we were having sex in my bathtub, and if I came in my bathtub. Then you all sang ‘Aqua-come’ to the tune of ‘Aqualung’ and laughed for, like, fifteen minutes. Alcohol was obvious, the hangover implied.”

“Are you sure it was me?” M.J. asked. Not because she was incapable of blowing up someone’s phone with drunk messages and goofy bastardized songs. She had done it hundreds of times in college. But that was college. And this was now.

Nodding a mighty yes, Addie flashed her phone log. There were eight missed voice mails from NYC Ninja.

“NYC Ninja? That’s what you call me?”

“Only behind your back. Skinny New York Chick Who Dresses Like She Works at the Morgue was too wordy. God, it smells like a beer burp in here.” Addie eyed M.J.’s lavender nightie upon which was one very coy looking Minnie Mouse sniffing a bouquet of tulips. “What’s that about?”

M.J. glanced down. “I have no idea.”

“Hey, Sweet Child,” Jules chirped. She dislodged the room service cart and breezed past the spilled food, coral caftan billowing around her calves, floppy hat shading her face.

“Stand down,” M.J. said. “It’s just Addie.”

“Oh.” Jules removed the hat. “Make yourself at home,” she said, then shuffled back into the bedroom.

“What’s up with your hair? Are those cornrows?” Addie asked as she followed Jules with the self-righteous prance of someone who hadn’t pickled her kidneys. “Who did that to you?”

“M.J.”

“Well, can she undo it?”

Jules starfished onto the bed. “Decapitate me. It’s easier.”

Addie cast a sweeping glance around the room. “Where’s Britt?”

“Probably at home,” M.J. said. “Why?”

“She has the deed to the bookstore. Will you call her for me? The speaker on my phone is waterlogged. It got wet during the bathtub challenge.” Addie’s lips curled into a wicked smile. “So did I.”

Jules lifted her head. “Does that mean you . . . ?”

“It means if Easton calls me ‘boss’ one more time my nipples will invert. I need to send that deed back to France and be done with this nightmare. Then we can talk about the bath.”

M.J. found her phone under the bed along with four missed calls from Dan and a chain of texts, none of which she remembered.

DAN: Hospital fire in Boston. If ur near a TV turn it on. Might be terrorism.

DAN: Not terrorism. It was electrical. Oxygen from tanks and incubators made it worse.

DAN: Evacuating. Terrible.

DAN: Answer ur phone.

DAN: U still at the beach club?

DAN: Are u getting these?

DAN: Why aren’t u picking up? Should I be worried?

DAN: OFFICIALLY WORRIED.

M.J.: Hey, s’me. Ha, my font just slurred.

DAN: Where are u?

M.J.: Majestic. In Jules’ room with bro.

M.J.: I mean bro.

M.J.: I mean Britt.

M.J.: Duck I hate auto-correct.

M.J.: DUCK!

M.J.: I mean fuck! This phone keeps iJacking my texts.

M.J.: iJacking instead of hijacking cuz it’s an iPhone. Get it?

DAN: When will u be home? I have to talk to u about something.

M.J.: Minnie mouse is a lesbian.

DAN: U wasted?

M.J.: Wayyyy-stud!

M.J.: Ha! Way-stud. You’re a way-stud. Get it?

DAN: What are u drinking?

M.J.: More.

“Shit,” M.J. said. “I have to go.”

“Not yet!” Addie snatched the phone and called Britt, anxiously twirling a finger around one of her pigtails while she waited for the call to connect. Once it did, they heard the soft strum of a harp. It was coming from under the sheets.

It strummed again.

Then again.

Jules pulled back the duvet to find Britt with half a head of cornrows, a brown M&M stuck to her collarbone, and the phone resting on her cheekbone.