Chapter Thirty-Eight
Without thinking, Lexi lets her steps lead her past Sam’s bookshop on the way home from hers. If pressed, she’d have to admit it’s only really on the way home if you’re willing to make a slight detour. But she wants to stick her tongue out at it (probably just internally, but she isn’t sure). She wants Sam to see how put together and not at all falling apart she is. And also... maybe she just wants to be near him because she misses him? No, it’s definitely not that.
But she pauses, her tongue midway out of her mouth. Because there, in the window, are bright, cheerful, eye-catching covers. Which can only mean one thing. Romance novels.
What. The. Dickens.
This makes no sense. These books make no sense here, in his angular Apple Store of a bookshop, surrounded by Boring But Important Hardbacks. It’s not what his Serious Customers come to him for. He’s doing this to bait her. To irritate her. To threaten her with increased competition.
Well, it’s not going to work. She’s not going to let it rankle her. Except that maybe, first, before she rises above it, she’s going to tell him what she thinks of this little scheme of his. The last of her post-karaoke hangover has dissipated, and she’s got all this adrenaline from her flowing ideas.
Lexi pushes open the door and a buzzer rings out. Not a twinkly, pretty sound like in Pemberley Books– an industrial, joyless one, as is warranted by this shop’s image. Sam looks up from behind the till and immediately rearranges his features into a frown. Lexi would have sworn she saw a smile first, but she’s probably imagining that.
‘Hi,’ she says, and then she stops, because she hasn’t thought through what she’s going to say. Also because she needs a minute to compose herself at his hotness. She somehow forgot how those green eyes make her forget to breathe.
‘Alexandra,’ he says. Curtly– if anything with four syllables can be curt. Her full name in his mouth has no effect whatsoever. It’s purely coincidence that her legs feel a little weaker than they did five minutes ago. ‘To what do I owe the pleasure?’
He’s mocking her. Repeating back to her what she said to him way back before anything happened, that day he brought the boxes to her and she first had the pleasure of seeing his toned abs. Before she knew what his mouth could do. But it’s also a common enough phrase that it would be easy for him to gaslight her if she picked him up on it, so she chooses to let it go. She’s got bigger fish to fry right now.
‘I was wondering if you stocked any romance novels at all?’ she says.
Lexi realises that there might be customers around who might overhear, and discover the collegial bookshop owner thing is all a lie if they hear them fighting. She looks around, but the shop’s empty, as she expected: it’s technically after closing time, after all. He just hadn’t got around to locking the door.
Sam plays the game. ‘Yes,’ he says. ‘We just started stocking them. Can I interest you in enemies-to-lovers, or—’
‘Actually, I was looking for something more in the lovers-to-enemies vein.’
‘Now, now,’ he says, playful, distant. ‘There’s no need for that.’
But Lexi doesn’t feel like playing. ‘I think there is.’ She’s done with nice, with even trying to smile while she talks– that American skill she’s never quite mastered, the one that makes you seem polite even while complaining. She’s not in the mood to be polite, or even to seem it. ‘Romance novels? Really?’
‘They’re a thriving and growing part of the publishing market,’ he says, like she’s new at this. Like she hasn’t told him this herself.
‘I’m aware.’
They stand there, scowling at each other. Then Lexi remembers her argument.
‘It’s not really very on brand for you, though.’
He shrugs. ‘I’m still new around here. Ever evolving. Always looking for ways to bring in more customers.’
‘Customers who usually go elsewhere for their romance novels?’
‘If that’s what it takes, yes.’
She will not cry. She won’t.
‘Come on,’ he says. ‘Do you really think people can’t be interested in politics and also like romance?’
‘Of course not. The intersection of that particular Venn diagram is what produced the most rabidWest Wingfans.’
‘Many of whom live within a one-mile radius of this shop.’
‘I’m aware,’ she repeats. This patronising parroting of her own marketing strategies is beginning to wear a little thin. She doesn’t really have any good arguments. She just hoped that by pointing out facts, by letting him know she’s noticed what he’s doing, he’d be shamed into standing down. But of course he’s not ashamed. He’s shameless.
‘You’re not the only one who can play games, you know,’ he says.
Unbidden and very much unwelcome, tears spring to Lexi’s eyes.
