“This isobscene,” Tom murmured, eyes following their host. “What did the guy do to make this much money? Sell a nuclear weapon to the fur seal cartel?”
“Tom,” Rose preemptively warned him, though he wasn’t too far off the mark. “They’re being really nice to drop us off.”
“They’re always nice in person, aren’t they? Very pleasant. Right before they order the AI war bots to destroy the low-income housing development.”
“No, sometimes they’re assholes from the get-go,” Rose told him, thinking about all the coffee mugs that had been chucked in her general direction over the years. “But I’m sure these are the pleasant kind who support the arts, not the kind who murder people in Benoit Blanc movies.”
“Fine. After the revolution, though, I call dibs on this thing for my turn at fully automated luxury gay communism,” Tom said. Still balancing on his heels, he stuck out one hand and petted the hull with reverent fingertips.
Rose sighed, because handmaiden to the ruling class might not be the kind of job people dreamed about, but it was how she paid the bills. “Promise no more eat-the-rich talk until we get to Martha’s Vineyard? Or at least make it clear you’ll eat Sloane and her boyfriend last?” She squinted at the door Sloane had disappeared through, nervous that someone would overhear.
Tom snorted. “As if the resource that most needs to be redistributed is this guy’s dark meat. I bet he’s gamey.”
Rose finally laughed at Tom’s unrepentant grin, feeling a tightness loosen in her heart. Like she’d told Sloane, there was a reason she’d married him in the first place. “I forgot what a dork you are.”
“What, should I be playing this whole yacht scene cooler?”
“No, I actually liked that you never pretended to be cool,” she said, rolling her eyes to cover her reluctant smile. For someone whose career was predicated on the ability to slip into the skin of a leading man, Tom had never cared at all about his dignity, not if he could make her laugh instead.
“Oh, good. I’m still not cool.”
“Not unexpected,” Rose said, finally crossing onto the boat. “But please be charming until we get to Oak Bluffs?”
“I’ll be charming,” he promised, standing to follow her onto the main deck. There were at least a dozen crew members on the yacht who swarmed the pile of luggage, efficiently draggingit off to somewhere it wouldn’t disturb the bleached perfection of the deck.
When nobody told her where to go, Rose shrugged and headed to a vacant group of lounge chairs with her day bag. Tom trailed after her, watching her stage her laptop, her thermos of iced coffee, and her boat snacks on a low table. He bounced on his heels, energy undimmed in the face of a nine-hour boat ride. “So, ah, how would you like to be charmed?”
Rose paused in the middle of setting up her workstation. She’d assumed he’d want to explore the rest of the yacht and give her a moment to collect herself. His interested, beaming regard was making her squirm with confusion. “No, not me. I already know all about you. Charm Sloane. When she gets down here, you can tell her and her personified daddy issues all your best Boyd Kellagher stories.”
“What, you think she wants to hear more about Boyd?” he asked, sounding a little surprised. He unselfconsciously ran his hand through his thick dark hair in a classic leading-man stretch.
“Of course she does. I mean, anyone would.”
“Anyone? Do you?”
“Yeah, why not?” Rose said lightly.
She had the idea that she could toughen herself up to this. The blisters were part of the process. She wasnotjealous.
Tom lifted his eyebrows. “Okay, I’ve got one. When he first joined the cast, he used Axe Dark Temptation bodywash. So much of it. Also the body spray. And the deodorant. We staged an intervention when it got unbreathable onstage. Even the bedbugs were fleeing the theater. Ximena Tejeda-Souza and Ihad to drag him to the bathroom and scrub him down with hand soap.”
“Oh my God,” Rose said, appalled. “Are you kidding?”
Tom smiled crookedly. “Yeah.”
Rose made a noise halfway between a snort and a giggle in the back of her throat and pushed him right between his fancy new pectoral muscles. He reeled back theatrically, arms waving to make her laugh harder. This was a familiar groove to settle into, as easy as her oldest shoes.
The yacht sounded its horn and drew away from the pier, slipping into the Hudson. The sweet silt smell of the river gave way to a hint of brine as they slowly turned into the bay. Rose had been here for over a decade, but she still loved the sight of the city from the water. Tom stilled too, both of their heads tracking the Midtown landmarks as the yacht began to trace around the edge of Manhattan. The yacht could cross deep ocean, but for this short voyage they’d cling to the coast and navigate into Long Island Sound instead of chancing the Atlantic in winter.
They took their seats on a pair of teak lounge chairs flanking an enameled coffee table and stretched out their legs. The wind caught their hair, rubbing it across their cheeks. Tom had managed to get a tan somewhere, and it looked good on him; maybe he’d gone back to California with Boyd at some point.
With a casualness she was abruptly certain he’d practiced in his head, Tom reached across the table and put his hand on top of hers. Lightly, so she didn’t feel the weight of it, just the warmth.
Rose didn’t yank her hand away, but she stared down at the point of contact. A kiss on the cheek. Deprecating stories about his boyfriend. His hand on hers. Her heart needed to grow those protective calluses, and soon.Shehadn’t gone through a near-death experience.Shehadn’t even adjusted to the idea that Tom still thought of her at all. Her head went swimmy with the unreality of the situation. She used to dream about this: Tom turning to her, seeing her, looking like he cared. She might have believed it ten years ago.
“I missed talking with you, Rosie,” Tom said, his voice very soft.
She ducked her face toward her lap, feeling her lower lip tuck in reflexively. That wasn’t true. It couldn’t be.
