I stride to my suitcase to grab a pair of swim trunks and slip them on. “Aw, come on. You can’t possibly regret having the best sex of your life.”
She rolls her eyes. “I don’t. But why’d I have to do ittoday? If I wanted to live dangerously for the first time in my life, I should have picked another time, not to mention another guy, but that’s a whole other story.”
“I notice you didn’t deny you just had the best sex of your life. And, sweetheart, trust me, you didn’t come like that because you were living dangerously for the first time—you came like that because you were fuckingme. I’m the secret sauce. No one else could have done that to you.”
She sits on a chair and begins strapping on her heels. “Well, when I have meaningless sex with the next guy, I’ll let you know if you’re right about that.”
My entire body revolts at the thought of her fucking anyone but me, but I clench my teeth and force myself not to wig out. I grab a T-shirt from my suitcase and pull it over my head, taking deep breaths to steady myself. “You didn’t answer my question. Why were you wearing the uniform?”
“Oh, please. You’re trying to makemethe villain of this story? Ha! I told one little white lie in a bar—you’re the one without an ounce of integrity in your stupid, perfect body.”
“I’m losing patience with you, my darling sociopath. I politely request you please tell me the truth about the uniform-bullshit right now, because, if it turns out you’re literally a sociopath, then I’m not gonna be all that thrilled about you working alongside my sister’s husband, especially when I know you’d give your left tit to fuck his brains out at your first opportunity.”
She snarls at me. “You’re disgusting.”
“You’re not answering my question.”
She exhales and crosses her arms over her gorgeous chest. “I find it ironic you’re demanding proof of my integrity when you’re the guy who asked me out when you had a phone number in your pocket from earlier that night and a girlfriend sitting at home.”
“That’s total bullshit. But we’re not talking about me yet—we’re talking about you. Why were you wearing the uniform? And were you planning to meet me the next night or was that just part of the whole shtick—going to bars, giving a guy epic blue-balls, making a date, and laughing about it later?”
She rolls her eyes and shakes her head. “I gave you a fake name and occupation in a bar, Ryan—I didn’t inject you with Ebola. It was a one-time silly lark during a night out with my extremely crazy friend, not a crime against humanity. Certainly, the same thing happens in bars all over the world every night of the week.”
My temper flares. My heart rate spikes. “Bullshit. People don’t have the kind of connection we did in bars every night of the week. Maybe women in bars give fake names and occupations to stupid meatheads they don’t see any potential with, but, unless it’s Halloween, they most certainly don’t wear official flight-attendant uniforms and, unless they’re pretty damned heartless, they don’t stick with their fake stories when the dude they’ve been mind-fucking all night has made it abundantly clear he’s feeling something once-in-a-lifetime—something he’s literally never felt before.” Oh my fuck, my voice is breaking. I can’t even pretend my heart isn’t bursting wide open as I speak. “If you thought I was just gaming you,” I say, the vein in my neck throbbing, “if you thought I was just saying whatever the fuck I had to say in order to get you into bed, then that settles it: you truly are a fucking sociopath.”
She looks pained. “Ryan, no. I...” She swallows hard. “I swear, it truly was a one-time thing. A silly lark. That’s all.”
My chest is tight. I feel like I can’t breathe. “But why didn’t you tell me the truth? Couldn’t you see I was losing my mind over you?”
She closes her eyes briefly and takes a deep breath. “I can’t do this right now. Uncle William and the Faradays will be here any minute and I’ve got a job to do. Honestly, I don’t see how you’re making this about my stupid uniform when you were lying through your teeth the whole time.You weren’t single, Ryan. You acted like you were falling in love with me on the spot and yet you had a fucking girlfriend the whole time. I told you my boyfriend had cheated on me and how much it hurt me and yet you had no qualms about using me to cheat on your girlfriend? How could you do that to me? Fuck you if you think me wearing a uniform came even close to any of that.”
“We’re gonna talk about all of that. But first I need to understand how you didn’t feel the impulse to tell me the truth.”
She looks utterly exasperated. “Oh my God. You’re insane. Fine. Not that I owe you any explanation, but here’s the whole, stupid story, you big cry-baby: I’d just moved up to Seattle and was missing Charlotte, so when she—”
“Wait.You live in Seattle?”
“Yeah, I’d relocated from L.A. a few weeks prior. Josh moved back to Seattle for Climb & Conquer.”
My mind is racing. “But you told me you live in L.A.”
“No, I told you I’mfromL.A., which is true. Born and raised.”
“But you said you flew in from L.A. and came straight from the airport.”
“No.Charlottesaidsheflew in from L.A. and you just assumed she meant both of us. I never said that. In fact, right off the bat, I explicitly told youCharlottewas the flight attendant, not me, and that I was merely dressed like one.”
I feel like my head’s exploding. Holy shit, shedidsay that, didn’t she? How could I have not remembered that detail when I was sending Henn on his wild goose chase?
She continues: “Ever since my break-up, Charlotte had been begging me to come out with her and wear one of her uniforms, so I finally said ‘Fuck it, I’ll do it.’ And then, just my luck, the first time I did it, I met you—the most gorgeous man I’ve ever laid eyes on. The minute I saw you, I regretted wearing that stupid thing, which is why I blurted the truth, right off the bat. I knew you thought I was joking, but, still, it made me feel better to say it out loud. And, then, when we started talking, I got so absorbed in our conversation, I forgot I was wearing the damned uniform—a state of mind helped along by all those martinis and shots you kept feeding me, I’m sure.” She looks wistful. “And then, when we were just about to kiss... when your lips were on my cheek and you were whispering into my ear…” She closes her eyes for a moment, apparently lost in a memory. “You called me ‘Samantha,’ and, all of a sudden, I knew I had to tell you. So I told you I had something I needed to tell you—and that’s precisely when yourgirlfriendcame in and called you a ‘cheater’ and me a ‘cunt’ and screamed about the blonde at dinner and I got the hell out of Dodge.”
“Oh my God,” I say softly, completely bowled over. Everything she’s just told me rings completely true. Holy fuck, I’ve been such an idiot. “Samantha. I mean, T-Rod. Listen to me. I can explain everything.”
“Oh, I’m sure you can. You’re awfully good at ‘explaining everything,’ aren’t you?” Her features harden to steel. “So, fine, be outraged at my purportedly sociopathic tendencies. But I’d look in the mirror before I started slinging ‘sociopath’ around, if I were you. It wasn’t me who was gathering phone numbers and dinner dates and fuck buddies behind my girlfriend’s back.”
“Theresa, you’ve got me all wrong,” I say. “Listen to me, okay? I’d already broken up with my girlfriend earlier that night, way before I got to the bar—and all that shit she said about me was completely untrue.”
Theresa scoffs. “Oh, you’d already broken up with Psycho Barbie? Well, that’s funny because she obviously hadn’t gotten the memo. You do realize you have to say the magic words ‘I want to break up with you’out loudand not just think ’emin order to break-up with someone?”
