Room-maid(44)

And yes, there was probably some small part of me that thought if she was cheating on him, it would free him up. To, you know, pursue other possible romantic entanglements.

But it was mostly indignation that anybody would want to hurt Tyler.

There was a staticky noise on my phone, like Shay was settling onto her couch as she spoke. “If you’re going to maybe commit a felony and invade someone’s privacy, the very least you could do is have the decency to keep up a running narration.”

“Nothing’s happening.”

“We will solve this mystery! All we need now is a Great Dane, a van, and a stoned hippie friend. Oh! Maybe Delia counts as our hippie friend!”

One of the servers dropped off my water, but I was too busy watching Oksana and her friend to take a drink.

Shay said, “Tell me about the other guy. What does he look like?”

“Older, silver-fox type. Handsome but definite gray in his hair.” Tyler was vastly better looking, but I could admit this guy was a hottie. “Maybe he’s her modeling agent.”

“Or her handler,” Shay offered. “Or her dad.”

Then Oksana climbed into the man’s lap. They started kissing and I said, “Oh! Oh! Not her dad unless she’s a Lannister from Game of Thrones.” I knocked my water glass over in my excitement at this turn of events. It clattered onto the ground, loudly. It didn’t break but everyone around me turned to stare.

I ducked my head and tried to clean up the spilled water with my linen napkin. Oksana stopped kissing the man and started to turn in my direction. Ack! She was going to see me!

Without thinking I slid under the table. One minute I was sitting in my booth, the next I was under a table, praying she hadn’t seen me.

My phone was still glued to my ear and I could hear Shay say, “You know I don’t speak nerd television! What does Lannister mean?”

“It means he’s definitely not her dad as they’re kissing and I’m currently under a table to avoid being caught because I knocked over my glass and it fell on the ground and it was loud and now I don’t know what Oksana’s actually capable of and what she might do if she finds me.”

“This evening in This Is Not Going To End Well . . .”

As if her words were prophetic, a pair of feet came walking toward me. Please don’t let it be Oksana, please don’t let it be Oksana . . .

The universe finally seemed to be on my side as it turned out to be my waitress. She stuck her head under the table. “Is there something I can help you with?”

“Um, yes. There’s a couple across the room. Older gentleman, younger woman with black hair. They were kissing. Are they still kissing?”

She gave me a very concerned look but straightened up. A moment later she was back. “I don’t see anyone kissing and I don’t see the couple you’re describing.”

Had they left? Or was Oksana making her way over here right now to confront me? I debated the merits of staying put and getting out of this restaurant as quickly as possible. Would it be worse for them to see me walking by or worse to be discovered?

“Were you ready to order?” the waitress asked, her face back under the table. “I could tell you about the specials.”

“No, I think I’ll just take off. I wasn’t that hungry anyways. Sorry for being your weirdest customer this week.”

“Oh, you’re not even my weirdest customer today,” she told me with a grin. “Have a good night!”

I nodded and then slid back up into the booth, which was much harder going up than it had been going down. I didn’t look to see where Oksana had been and instead stood quickly, grabbed Tyler’s shoes, and headed for the exit.

“Now what’s happening?” Shay demanded once I was outside.

“I escaped without detection. I’m heading home to check on Pigeon and I’m hoping that she’s not throwing up leather.” I glanced behind me to make sure I wasn’t being followed. As if Oksana really were some kind of assassin. “And now I’m making sure that Her Royal Evilness isn’t following me.”

The light indicated that I couldn’t cross and I came to a stop. “I shouldn’t call her evil just because I don’t like her and am jealous of her. Maybe she’s not evil.”

“Maybe she is. You ever think of that?”

“Why does that cheer me up?”

I heard Shay laugh. “Because I’m your best friend and that’s my job.”

“You’re really good at it.”

“I know. Hey, did you get a picture of Oksana kissing that guy?”

The thought hadn’t even occurred to me. “No.”

“Why not? Wasn’t that the whole point?”

I wasn’t exactly sure what the point was anymore. I tried telling myself again that it was to help protect Tyler because he was one of the few good guys left in the world. That practically made him an endangered species and I should get a humanitarian award.

But none of this was my business, even if I wanted it to be. “I don’t know. I kind of feel like I crossed a line here.”

“Sometimes you have to cross the line to see where it actually is.”

“I don’t think that’s an actual saying.”

She sighed. “Regardless, tell Tyler. And while you’re at it, tell Brad to go away. Tell the men in your lives what is going on so that everybody can make their own decisions and move on to something better.”