“Totally. Everyone knows Tuesday was onions, lox and eggs day.”
She gave his arm a little punch. The solid meat of his bicep under that suit jacket reminded her of their dynamic: he was muscle for hire, she was his Client with a capital “c” – the high value asset and nothing more.
You can’t fall for this guy while you are not even supposed to be you, Tzipi’s brain chastised.
But it felt so easy to be around him, talking about…well, just about anything under the moon. And that was the most dangerous part: how natural it felt to slip from borrowed memories into her own – those old Rosie days recalled with fondness. Her real self, hidden in plain sight.
“Kara! Kara! Kara!”
There was a commotion coming from one of the dreidel tables, guys and girls in glitzy attire chanting and fist-pumping to get her attention. One reveler broke from the pack and jogged up to them, his hands clasped.
Jonah couldn’t help it. His shift in gait, from strolling to sentry, was immediate and baked into him from years of rolling with Avi. Stance squared, weight balanced. Just in case.
Turned out they had nothing to worry about; the guy quickly revealed what was in his hands: a small, metal dreidel.
“I’ve won three young champion dreidel competitions with this,” he stuttered, by way of explanation. “Can you help me win a fourth?”
Did he want Kara to bless it? Blow on it like lucky dice? Kiss it?
“Spin it! Spin it! Spin it!” The friends all cheered.
Kara looked up at Jonah for guidance. He lifted a shoulder. “No pressure,” he joked.
“You won’t be disqualified, right?”
“Nope,” the kid assured her, dropping the weighty dreidel in her palm. “We’re still in the practice round.”
She slipped off his jacket without ceremony – just a quick shimmy of her shoulders – handing it back to him so the sleeves wouldn’t get in the way. Then approached the table and leaned over the smooth glass.
“I haven’t done this since I was a kid,” she warned the group, but they all seemed too star-struck to even care.
“No one’s watching,” Jonah murmured in assurance.
It was true, they were all filming.
Kara’s lips twitched, perhaps sending a silent prayer up before giving it her best twirl, putting an extra flick of her left wrist in as she hovered over the sleek table. The thing was no toy; it hopped, spun counter-clockwise and stayed up for an respectable amount of time for someone who hadn’t spun one since childhood.
It didn’t matter how it landed, the whole table went bananas.
And that twitch of hers had turned into an uncontrollable grin – not trained, not photogenic, just full wattage and unapologetic. All for her, like she knew she had fucking earned it. For just a second, before she reeled it back in.
She turned to him, eyes wide. “Max.”
Max.
She was still calling him Max. And now he was certain it wasn’t in service of his stupid James Bond bit an hour ago. That unsettled inkling from the bar resurfaced.
She hadn’t, he realized, called him Jonah, even once tonight.
Maybe it had been silly to think a celebrity as big as Kara Koff would remember his actual name from last year’s drunken disaster on the deck.
Do I correct her now? After hours together? It felt as awkward as fuck, like joining the improv circle a beat too late.
“Can we…not be here?”
He looked in the direction she was staring, and realized he had bigger problems.
Leah was rushing toward the rowdy table – and them. Leah, of all people.
