“Hey!” Lilah snapped. “I told you I had it! Why did you?—”
She spun around, clearly ready to curse me for doing her a favor, but cut herself off with a soft gasp as we came chest to chest. Her eyes flicked up—so wide and such a bright blue—and her soft pink lips parted in a small ‘o’.
I should have been stepping back—she clearly hadn’t realized how close I was to her or she wouldn’t look so surprised right now. The gentlemanly thing to do would be to give her space and just hand over the box like I’d been meaning to do in the first place. Instead, I stayed rooted on the spot and worked very hard to fight the instinct to tuck a stray piece of her blonde hair behind her ear.
“Which one did you get?” I asked. I dropped my gaze just enough to look at the picture on the box in my left hand. It was a couple’s costume, I realized quickly, with a purple princess dress and an outfit that must have been the prince, though it didn’t look anything like the Prince Charming costumes I’d seen before.
Lilah mumbled something quietly. When I looked at her again, the wild smile she’d been sporting before was gone and she was now looking mildly embarrassed. I couldn’t imagine why she would be embarrassed by this, especially in front of me, and I suddenly wished I’d paid attention when her roommate, Poppy, had given us a PowerPoint presentation on her official ranking of the Disney princesses a few weeks ago so I could at least identify the costume.
“What was that?” I asked, leaning even further in. I rested my free arm on the shelf behind her and held my head practically right next to hers, so close that I could smell her strawberry-scented shampoo.
On an unrelated note, I was suddenly a very big fan of strawberries.
“It’s fromTangled,” she repeated, her voice tickling my ear. “Rapunzel and Flynn Rider.”
I had no clue whatTangledwas, and I’d never heard of Flynn Rider, but I did recognize Rapunzel.
“The princess with the long hair?” I asked. I pulled my head back enough that we were looking at each other again, but we were so close that our noses almost brushed.
Lilah shrugged, which I took as a yes. “She was always my favorite when I was a kid.”
I grinned, imagining a younger version of Lilah running around in a princess dress like this. It was too bad she’d rather die than show me childhood photos, because I would give anything to see them. Maybe I could bribe Luca to “accidentally” sending them to me. Then again, was it possible to bribe a guy who probably had more money at his disposal than he knew what to do with?
“I was thinking,” Lilah said, snatching the box from my grip, “that you and I aren’t famous?—”
I pretend to gasp. “We’re not?”
She rolled her eyes. “So, I thought that maybe if we dressed up in costumes, nobody would recognize us and we could sneak out and go back to school.”
I glanced out the window, which we were almost up against when standing here. The street was still busy, but they weren’t girls pressing themselves against the windows, trying to break in or anything. We’d all come in the back way and the door out there didn’t mark the store, and with my brothers and Luca tucked out of view in the back corner of the store, there wasn’t an easy way to find out. Of course, if they tried to step out, the vultures would descend on them in no time. But Lilah made a good point about us. Except…
“I’m not sure we need the costumes,” I pointed out. “If we’re not recognizable at all, then we should be able to walk out of here no problem, right?”
“Except all those girls totally have photos of us in our current clothes,” Lilah said, gesturing vaguely toward the back alley. “It’ll totally throw them off our trail if we don’t look anything like we did. And we won’t even look weird since everyone is having costume parties this close to Halloween. Besides…” Her grin was back. “It would be fun.”
Our definitions of fun clearly weren’t well-aligned.
I sighed and looked over my shoulder at the bodyguard, who was still standing in the other corner of the store with a frown on his face. He seemed terrifying at first glance, but I knew he was actually a huge softie. I also knew he took safety more seriously than anything else.
“I’m not sure their bodyguard will go for it,” I told her honestly. “He’ll probably say it’s not worth the risk.”
“Oh, but I’m so woozy,” Lilah said, dramatically putting the back of her hand to her forehead and pretending to faint. “I need to get home and lie down as soon as possible.”
I laughed softly, then looked at the box again. How bad could it be?
“Fine,” I said. “I’ll ask. But if he says no…”
Spoiler alert: he didn’t say no. In fact, I got the distinct sense he was kind of happy to be rid of us.
And that was how I ended up walking down the street dressed up as a Disney character that I’d never even heard of.
“Your hair should really go more this way,” Lilah commented, running her hands through my hair to get it to lay just right. I probably would have told her to quit it about two blocks ago, except that this was one of the few times Lilah was actually initiating physical touch with me and I was trying to enjoy it while I could. Heaven knew it didn’t happen much.
“I can’t believe this plan actually worked,” I groaned.
Lilah shrugged, dropping her hands back to her sides. “Honestly, it probably would have worked without the costumes too. I just knew this was the only way I’d ever get to you to wear it.” I glared at her and she laughed. “And good news! This means you’re ready for Halloween. A win-win.”
“If you think I’m wearing this in public again, I?—”
