The Decoy Girlfriend(9)

As Freya starts to shear off a sheet of the magenta paper dotted with corgis tangled up in streamers and party hats, her skin goose bumps like someone’s got their eye on her.

“You should come back at eight,” Stori tells Taft. “We’re staying open a little later tonight because we have the author flying in from New York to do a reading of her latest book. You can get it signed!”

Taft makes his “Really?” sound interested.

Stori’s voice drops conspiratorially. “She’s friends with my niece, Freya. You remember I told you about her the first time you came here? She’s here to finish writing her book.”

“Right, Freya the author,” says Taft, widened eyes betraying only the tiniest hint of surprise.

Another customer who knows all about her. A very handsome, very famous one who now knows her name, and suddenly, hearing him say it again is all she can think about. Is there anyone left in LA who Stori hasn’t talked her up to?

His eyes search her face. “You know, you look eerily similar to—”

“I know,” says Freya, cutting off his train of thought. “I get that a lot.”

The corners of his eyes crinkle when he smiles. He doesn’t smile like that on camera. At this distance, his eyes are kaleidoscopic with partial heterochromia, both rimmed in a brilliant blue that pops on the big screen but flicker with a glow the exact shade of a Jarritos lime soda.

“I read your book,” he says with the supreme confidence of someone who absolutely has not and doesn’t think they’ll get called on it. “At JFK. And only, like, the really popular ones are sold in airport bookshops, right? My mom’s a big reader, and I’m pretty sure she mentioned you were one of the best debut books?”

Maybe Freya’s being petty, but after her memorable-for-all-the-wrong-reasons day, she’s not in the mood to chat about the success she fears may never happen again.

So maybe she should be flattered he cares enough to lie—and not just lie but lie with a detail about the airport specific enough to give him the benefit of the doubt—but his attitude makes her prickle, and she can’t resist teasing him.

In an offhand tone, Freya asks, “So what did you think about the part with the eleventh-hour plot twist when her lover comes back into the picture?”

Stori and Skye give her flummoxed frowns.

Taft goes still and contemplative, eyebrows scrunched. Then his face smooths back into handsome indifference. “I thought it was outrageous and contrived.”

He’s on to me.

Freya rips and sticks little bits of tape stuck on each finger of her right hand before deftly folding the wrapping paper over Skye’s book tight and neat. “You’re right; it would have been completely ‘outrageous and contrived.’ That’s why my editor had me ax it and rework my entire third act.”

A startled laugh escapes him seemingly before he can stifle it. In other circumstances, she would have quite enjoyed the sound.

Eyes narrowed, he says, “I figured. Things like that don’t happen.”

“Then why is it a beloved romantic gesture in movies?” she counters, sliding the book into Skye’s tote. “The man bursting into the wedding chapel to fight for the woman he loves?”

“Key word: ‘movies.’ Not real life.” He grimaces. “Since I’ve filmed that exact scene three times in different productions and attended over a dozen real-world weddings where it didn’t, I think you can take my word for it.”

“Take your word for it?” she scoffs. “After that bald-faced lie about reading my book?”

The receipt printer cranks out paper long enough that it starts to curl under itself into a scroll. Freya snatches it and hands it to Skye without asking the usual “In the bag or with you?”

Taft winces. “Sorry. I shouldn’t have said— Sorry. I didn’t read it so much as, uh, flip through it. I had a flight to catch, and there were just so many choices that I couldn’t pick. I always get indecisive when I browse.”

Finally, some honesty.

“That happens to me all the time,” Skye says sagely as she heads for the door. “My advice? Buy them all. When it comes to books, you can never be too greedy or go too wrong.”

Freya doubts Skye has the faintest inkling of who Taft is or that he probably could buy them all. But Freya does and is suddenly reminded of the reality of the situation. Of who exactly Taft is. And who he’s dating.

Which is why she studiously avoids eye contact while she rings up his book, almost jumping out of her skin when her fingers graze his as she returns his credit card.

“What if I want mine gift wrapped, too?” he asks.

Freya pauses. “Are you asking? Or was that a hypothetical?”

Stori’s drifted away to straighten an endcap, but even from the back, Freya know she’s still paying attention. Be nice, Stori mouths over her shoulder.

I’m always nice, Freya sends back telepathically.

And to prove it, she squashes down her tart reply that if he’d wanted it gift wrapped, he should have told her before she swiped his credit card. Now it’s a second transaction of $1.50.

“And would you like a bow on it, too?” Freya asks, still looking downward and suppressing an eye roll.

“Naturally. The biggest one you have.”