“I’d have snagged one for you,” he says, “but—”
“I was a hot mess.”
“I was going to say, ‘but I didn’t know how you liked it.’”
His leg on hers when she woke this morning, that perfect indent above his hips.
“The tea, I mean,” he says, as if he can read her mind.
“Frothy and sweet,” she blurts out, which only makes it more awkward.
“Then here.” He offers her the sweating cup. “We like it the same way, despite our age difference.”
Age. Oh,oh, she’d offended him earlier. She hadn’t meant to. She accepts the tea.
He remains before her, his tolerance for awkwardness much higher than hers. She swivels her neck, desperate for Mallory and Ilena to save her.
“Okay, then,” he says.
He’s past her, the whole uncomfortable exchange nearly over when some compulsion makes her say, “Kai?”
He pauses at the entrance to the building and turns to face her.
“I didn’t mean it.” Her nerves almost get the better of her. “About being young. It’s just...”My dead fiancé who’s notreally deadis only the third person I’ve ever slept with, and oh yeah, it turns out he’s not reallydeadbut Grayson Fields is and I’m more than mildly freaking out and...
Kai’s fingers tighten over the folded top of the paper bag, and she feels like a liar because he looks very much like a young twenty-two-year-old (she checked his age in the employee database that morning). And yet, if she’s being honest, his demeanor does seem older, more mature than the Kai she met at the outing in her world.
“Thanks for the drink,” she says.
Instantly, he grins. “You bet. Best team ever, right?” He says it like it’s some private joke she should know.
She holds up the tea in a mock salute as he enters the building and into her head comes “dollar oysters.” She and Ethan had been at a bar in the North End when the server finished his rundown of the specials with: “Dollar oysters.” The waiter had paused, panic crinkling his forehead as heflipped through his spiral notepad. “I’m so sorry, but I’ll have to double-check the price on that.”
Ethan’s hair had been long in the front then, and it bounced as he burst out laughing. Aubrey tried to cover with a “Probably too rich for our blood,” but it only made Ethan laugh harder and the server’s forehead crinkle more.
After the server left, she’d said honestly that it wasn’t very nice, and Ethan had said, “Babe, dollar oysters.Dollaroysters. Check the price. An Aubreyism if I ever heard one.”
And he’d given that teasing smile and laughed, and she’d laughed, and “dollar oysters” had become their private joke. Every time someone said something a bit silly or inane, “Dollar oysters,” one of them would say. It was their code word if either of them was being held hostage. How they’d work it into conversation, a regular pastime for them after one too many craft beers. Somewhere along the way “Aubreyism” transitioned into a nickname for her, Ethan using it each time she debated a Target pillow or scone from Tatte for too long. He thought it was cute.
She sips the tea, carefully holding the tall cup of brown liquid far from her white coat.
When Ilena and Mallory finally arrive, Mallory sidles up beside Aubrey and says, “Missed you,” in a voice soft and oozy like freshly baked cookies.
“I’m not going to like this, am I?” Aubrey says.
Ilena dangles a pair of sneakers. “You’re going to need these. And, the answer is no.”
Mallory counters with: “Before you say anything, you should know that Ilena thinks she may have trapped Felix with this baby.”
Ilena tightens her lips. “And Mallory almost killed Harley.”
“Grayson’s secretary is a busybody,” Mallory says, “which means, we have to move him.”
Aubrey’s heart clogs her throat. “Well, here’s something. Ethan’s alive.”
Mallory shakes her head. “You win.”
Ilena was right. Aubrey doesn’t like this. Aubrey hates this. Aubrey couldn’t hate this more.
