Vicki, somewhere between appalled and amused at herself, went to make some cookies, because there was always refuge in baking.
Zane really did takehis time in the shower, which meant the cookies were ready by the time he emerged in Chris’s floppy clothes and, to Vicki’s surprise, her robe. His wet hair, ruffled from a towel dry, was surprisingly long when loosened from its gelled hold, and the sweatpants actually just scraped the tops of his ankle bones. He was smiling as he came out, stroking the soft fluffy nape of her robe, and the smile turned to a grin as he met her eyes. “Iwasgoing to stay in the shower forever, but I have a terrible weakness for Sherpa fleece, and IthoughtI smelled cookies. Thanks for the clothes.”
Victoria told herself she was imagining the question in the last four words, but since she was already staring at his ankles in surprise, she said, “They’re my brother’s. He’s huge and I thought those would be really big on you. You must have really long legs.”
“I do.” Zane put a foot out like he was seeing it for the first time. “Disproportionately long legs and arms for my height. It’s actually why I started being interested in clothing design. Even when I was a little kid, I’d get a long-sleeved shirt and…” He put his arms straight out in front of him and the sleeves of Vicki’s robe slid up to well above his wrists. “Not quite that bad, because this is a woman’s robe, but you get the idea. So I wanted clothes that fit.” He laughed and put his arms down again. “Fast-forward thirty-some years, and here I am.”
“In my apartment, wearing my robe and eating cookies,” Vicki said a little weakly, having gotten a glimpse of forearm again. “If you eat cookies?”
Zane gave her a positively blazing smile, movie-star mega-watt in power. “I do. Especially homemade ones straight out of the oven. I don’t suppose you have any milk?”
Vicki beamed. “Milk and cookies coming up.” She got a plate and put all the cookies on it, poured two glasses of milk, and nodded in the general direction of seating. “Table or couch? I’m good either way.”
“Couch?” Zane asked hopefully. “My socks are in the wash and my feet get cold easily.”
“Oh no! I’ll see if I’ve got any of Chris’s slippers. You won’t fit in mine. Couch is good, go tuck your feet up.” Vicki put the milk and cookies down, then scurried to the spare bedroom as Zane offered a weak protest. She came back with socks, handing them over. “No slippers, but Chris’s girlfriend says he’s a furnace, so he doesn’t really need them. Socks should help, though.”
Zane had already taken a cookie to nibble, and after a moment’s hesitation, shoved the whole thing in his mouth rather than figure out where to put it down so he could take the socks and put them on. To Vicki’s surprise, he saidthank youin American Sign Language, then swallowed the cookie and mumbled, “Sorry, that means?—”
Thank you,Vicky signed back, bringing her open-palmed hand to her mouth, then lowering her hand in front of her so her palm faced up. Then she turned her hand to the side and closed her fingers as she pulled her hand across her chest, signing ‘and’ before repeating the ‘thank you’ gesture and saying, “And, you’re welcome,” out loud along with the signs.
Zane’s jaw fell open, but then, Vicki was having a hard time keeping hers closed as they both said, “You speak sign?”
“Not very much,” Zane admitted as Vicki drew a breath to answer, too. She took a cookie to encourage him to do the talking for a moment, and he said, “I’ve had a few Deaf clients and Ihated not being able to speak with them directly, at least some of the time, so I picked a little up.”
“I took it in college and actually teach it in my classroom, not formally but I use sign while I’m talking to the kids, and encourage them to use it, too. It’s partly because I’ve had, and expect to have, Deaf students, but it’s also because—” Vicki leaned forward, suddenly impassioned. “People talk with their hands all the time, right? It’s human nature! So why don’t we use themsaysomething? And it’s not just useful for Deaf people, that’s the thing that gets me! It’s great if you want to talk to somebody at a concert, or across a distance! We should all be learning sign from birth, or at least from school-age onward!”
Zane put another whole cookie in his mouth so he could applaud. “Right? I’d feel so much more competent if I’d learned ASL growing up and could justtalkto my Deaf clients! I hadn’t thought about the distance thing, though. That’s a great point. Whydon’twe teach sign from early schooling?”
“Oh, don’t get me started.” Vicki waved a hand expressively. “It has to do with normalization of different abilities and funding and a million things, but I can’t solve all of that tonight so let’s just sit here and eat cookies.”
“A compelling suggestion.” Zane smiled at her again, that high-wattage grin that made her toes curl and heated up her whole self from the core outward. “They’re great cookies, by the way.”
“Oh, thank you. I didn’t know if you had any allergies or food intolerances so they’re gluten-free and vegan.”
Zane’s dark eyebrows rose toward his damp hairline, where the silver-shot black threads were beginning to dry in soft appealing waves. “They’re—are theyreally? My God. I didn’t know gluten-free and vegan could be this good. No allergies or intolerances, but you probably could have looked it up online,”he added wryly. “Some of the strangest stuff I’ve mentioned in passing has ended up on the internet.”
“Oh. I didn’t think of that.” Vicki wrinkled her nose. “And now that I have, it seems weird and invasive.”
“It is, but I suppose I’ve gotten used to it to some degree. I try not to draw attention?—”
Vicki snorted with disbelief, choked on a cookie crumb, and coughed until her eyes watered. Zane sat frozen with uncertainty, clearly not sure whether he should leap up and do a Heimlich maneuver or wait it out. She signed a feebleI’m okayand he relaxed a little, although is eyebrows beetled worriedly until she managed to stop coughing and got a drink of milk that cleared her throat. “Sorry,” she wheezed. “Just somebody as good-looking and well-dressed as you are trying not to draw attention struck me as unlikely.”
Zane gestured at his current outfit like it somehow detracted from either his gorgeous face, body, or general clothing choices, but also said, “Thank you,” as if slightly confused. “I hang out with much more attractive people than I am, so…well, thank you.”
“Please, I know some legit hotties by anybody’s standards and you can hold a candle,” Vicki said with another, more careful snort. “But anyway, I didn’t look it up, so the cookies are as allergy-proof as I could make them.”
“Because you have food intolerances?”
“Because I have classrooms full of kids who often do, so I have dozens of recipes of things I can bring in for them without killing anybody.”
“Oh, yeah, that seems smart. I don’t cook anything. Dion makes sure I stay fed. He never brings me cookies, though.” Zane examined the plate of cookies again as if considering the idea he was being neglected. “I might have to talk to him about that.”
Right. Dion. The man who’d put his arm around Zane’s waist and escorted him out of the gymnasium. Vicki had managed to forget about Dion, and took a brief moment to despise him in a sort of general and impersonal way before deciding she should be the bigger person. “I can give him the recipe.”
Zane laughed. He had a wonderful laugh, warm and inviting. “I genuinely don’t think he’d know what to do with a recipe. He’s the take-out king of Los Angeles. But if you give me the recipe, I’ll give it my best shot. You have my email address, right?”
A blush ran through Vicki at top speed, which was ridiculous. Who blushed at the idea of getting—or not having—an email address? “Um, no. I have Dion’s number, but he didn’t give me any way to contact you directly. I had the impression you were like Tony Stark and didn’t like to be handed things.”
