“Are you not the woman who started a shouting match within an hour of arriving in this country?” he asked, eyebrows raised in amusement. Carly had told them the whole story on the walk to the parking lot, down to the exact shade of pink of that handsome asshole’s face as he’d dressed her down.
“I didnotstart that,” she replied indignantly, or as indignantly as she could manage through a third huge yawn. That milky Australian flat white Heather had brought her had been fine, but what she really needed right now was a vat of industrial-strength bodega iced coffee injected into her veins.
Marcus chuckled, glancing over his shoulder before changing lanes. “Yeah, but I bet you finished it.”
Carly could see why her best friend liked Marcus. He was funny, and kind, and he brought out the best in Heather. A tiny part of her would never forgive him for taking Heather so far away—literally the other side of the world—but she was happy for them. Even if she sometimes struggled tofeelhappy for them. Long-term relationships had never been Carly’s strong suit, and lately it had become difficult to watch so many of her colleagues pair off and settle down, especially when the pickings on the New York dating scene seemed to get slimmer by the day.
Well, that wasn’t her problem anymore, she thought, as she watched Marcus reach across the front seat to squeeze Heather’s hand. She’d made herself a vow after Carter stopped texting back that she was done. No more fuckboys, and no more fuckups. That was her new mantra. No more men who didn’t understand how her body worked. Which meant … no more men. And no more mistakes that endangered the career she’d worked so hard for. She would spend the next three weeks living up to the sign Heather had made—and figuring out how to get promoted, somehow. She’d figure something out. She’d managed to survive on a corps de ballet salary without taking a penny from her parents. She could figure this out on her own, too.
As the car rolled out of the gridlocked center of the city and out toward the suburbs, the streets became narrower and greener, and the traffic lightened up. The sky was pale blue and cloudless, the sun was already high, and the sidewalks were dotted with people out walking their dogs and jogging along the sidewalks. When they stopped at a traffic light, Carly watched a group of uniformed school kids traipse across the road, their giant backpacks sagging on their tiny shoulders.
“That’s Marcus’s old uniform,” Heather said. “Freshwater Primary School. It’s cute, isn’t it? They make all the kids wear them here, even in public schools. The school’s up that way.” She pointed up the hill to their left. “Our place is just down there.”
“Hope you like the flat we found you,” Marcus said, turning the car down the hill. “It’s small, but it’s close to us, not too expensive, and near the beach, which Heather said were your three top priorities.”
“Damn right,” Carly replied. She was going to spend three weeks soaking up the Australian sun and traipsing all over the city doing whatever it was a maid of honor was meant to do. She’d never done this before, but she also had no doubt Heather had already made a detailed, color-coded list of tasks for them to complete between now and the wedding. She was a little surprised Heather hadn’t already pulled it out.
A few minutes later, they arrived at a two-story brick building with a faded yellow front door. “This is it,” Marcus declared. “You’re in one of the top units.” He popped the trunk, and Carly climbed out of the back seat into the salty morning air.
The sidewalk in front of the house was scattered with petals, and Carly looked up to see a large tree arching over the low brick wall of the front yard, its twisted brown trunk sprouting glossy green leaves and velvety white and yellow flowers. Frangipani, she thought, just like the ones in the garden at her parents’ beach house on Maui. She took a deep inhale and smiled at Heather, who had taken her suitcase from Marcus and was watching her with evident satisfaction on her face.
“Not bad, huh?” She smiled. “Let’s get you upstairs so you can shower and get a fresh change of clothes. And maybe a nap?”
“Yes, please,” Carly groaned gratefully. She reached up and pulled a flower off the tree and tucked it behind her ear, the scent wrapping itself around her, filling her with contentment and excitement. Sure, her arrival had been a little bumpy, but she was here now, and the next three weeks were going to be perfect. She would make sure of it.
The rental apartment took up half the top floor, and by New York standards it was positively spacious. There was a kitchen with a breakfast bar and two stools, and the living room had a comfortable looking couch and an upholstered bay window that looked out onto the street. The bedroom was snug, but it had a huge window and a skylight. The owners had leaned hard into the beach house aesthetic, and Carly failed to find a single item of furniture that wasn’t distressed and painted white, or a decorative item that didn’t feature at least one seashell or starfish. But the bathroom looked like it had been recently renovated, and Carly almost whimpered with longing when she saw the rainwater shower head hanging over the tub. She had spent her entire career dancing through clouds of other people’s perspiration and sweating through heavy stage makeup, but she couldn’t remember ever wanting a shower more than she did right now.
Carly wheeled her suitcase into the bedroom and unzipped it, ready to grab her shampoo and bodywash. But when it fell open on the floor, she stopped cold. She stared at its contents, confused. The last thing she’d packed had been the teal halter bridesmaid’s dress she and Heather had picked out together. After a few weeks of scouring the internet, she’d found it on super sale, and it had been the last thing she’d packed before closing her suitcase. But the dress wasn’t here. In fact, none of her things were here. She grabbed the first item she could see, a black suit bag, and found several pairs of men’s shoes tucked underneath it, along with what looked like a camera bag.
“Fuuuuuck,” she breathed. “No, no,no.” She slammed the suitcase shut and examined the outside of it. It was a dark silver gray, just like her suitcase, but it was, she could see now, definitelynother suitcase. And these werenother belongings. In her humiliated rush to get out of the airport, she must have taken the wrong bag. Heart racing, she seized the baggage tag on the handle and frantically flipped it over.
NICKJACOBS, it read.
“Argh,” she groaned to the empty bedroom. “Who thehellis Nick Jacobs?”
“Nick,” Nick said into the phone, as slowly and clearly and patiently as he could.
“And how do you spell that, sir?” asked the bored-sounding man on the other end of the customer service line.
“Euh,” Nick paused as he pinched the bridge of his nose and fought down every smartass reply that came to mind. Instead, in his most polite voice, he managed to say, “The usual way? N-I-C-K?” He paced the narrow length of his hotel room, too irritated with himself to enjoy the view of the beach from the window. “His” suitcase lay open on the bed, brightly coloured women’s clothes frothing out of it. Taunting him for his unusual carelessness.
“Please hold, sir.”
Nick glared at the suitcase. How could he have forgotten to check the name tag on the bag before he grabbed it off the conveyor belt? So many bags looked alike, and he always made a point of checking. Always.
Except this time, because he’d been thrown to the ground by a runaway luggage trolley, and then upbraided by its tiny American driver. Unbidden, the memory of her flashing brown eyes, wide and angry in her freckled face, popped into his mind. She’d barely come up to his shoulder, and she’d looked as exhausted as he’d felt after his long flight from Paris. But he’d watched as she’d pulled herself ramrod straight and seemed to grow by half a metre. Then she’d opened her mouth and unloaded on him, radiating so much rage that her curly orange-red ponytail seemed to vibrate with it. Even thoughshehad hithim.
And then she’d swept from the building, leaving him standing on bruised legs, almost speechless, like he’d been hit by a human hurricane. And he’d been so out of it he hadn’t even noticed that he’d collected the wrong suitcase until he’d showered and changed, then gone to unpack it and found none of his belongings inside.
“Stupid, stupid,” he muttered.
“Excuse me, sir?” The customer service guy was back, and Nick couldn’t blame him for sounding salty.
“Not you, sorry,” he clarified hastily. “I was talking to myself.”
“Mmhmm,” came the unconvinced reply. “Is there anything identifying or unique about the bag you took, sir?”
“Euh,” Nick started, but he couldn’t quite figure out how to answer the question. This bag was unique, all right. He’d found a greenish dress on top of a pile of clothes and strappy sandals, and beneath a pair of denim cutoffs, there, plain as day, was a Ziploc bag full of sex toys. Specifically, dildos. The real owner of this bag, whoever they were, had packed alotof dildos. White plastic ones, half a dozen of them in varying sizes, along with a travel-size bottle of lube. He’d hastily replaced the shorts, feeling as if he had violated this mystery traveller’s privacy, but the shiny plastic of the dildo bag was still visible, catching the sunlight and drawing his eye every time he glanced towards the suitcase. He cleared his throat.
