“I’m just trying to figure out what’s going on with you. There’s something different, and it’s not just the scruff.” She flicked her fingers at his chin.
“Isn’t it obvious?”
Mugsy didn’t answer, probably hoping he’d drop it.
Charlie said the word to himself anyway.Love.With a capital L.At least on his side. “So she was just using me to get the story? You’re positive?”
“Talking about it isn’t going to help. You need to go cold turkey. Starting now. Flip the off switch.” She snapped her fingers, like it should be that easy.
That must be another mechanism that hadn’t been installed when they were making Charlie, because he had no idea how to turn off his feelings.
“If you have to think about her, focus on the part where she did you dirty.”
The blush hit hard and fast.
“Not like that. Yuck.” It was the same tone she’d used to scold him when he tried to turn the pages of a book while eating something sticky.
“What if she had a reason?” Charlie persisted.
“Like what?”
“Someone in her family needed emergency surgery and Jean had to get the money fast? It might have been a matter of life and death.” Although she could have just asked him. He would have given her anything.
Mugsy responded with a skeptical brow lift. She was difficult to impress under the best of circumstances, which this was not.
“It just felt like she knew me. The real me.” He needed Mugsy to understand that much at least. At first, he’d kept his identity under wraps because Jean was a stranger, and he didn’t want anyone to find out where he was. And then he’d gone on not saying anything because it felt so good being plain old Charlie with her. The parts of his history he didn’t mention were the parts he didn’t want to claim. The public things: beer, business, being looked at, running away.
“Does she know your middle name?”
That was a low blow. “I was trying to impress her. Announcing that my middle name is Poncefort wasn’t going to help.” Or maybe she would have pretended to like that too. “I got it all wrong, didn’t I?”
“It’s not your fault she’s awful.”
Except it was his fault for being the kind of person no onegenuinely wanted to get close to. Hard to blame that on anyone else. “It’s Adriana Asebedo all over again.”
“No.” Mugsy spoke too quickly, like she was trying to convince herself. “It’s nothing like that.”
“It’s a little like that.” In the not-really-caring-about-Charlie sense.
“I won’t let it get that bad.” Mugsy held up her hand like she was swearing an oath. “I’m going to help you handle the situation before it gets out of hand.”
Did “the situation” mean being hounded by reporters for months, or Charlie’s less-than-impressive reaction to the rabid tabloid attention? He didn’t have the heart to ask.
“Sorry about the tight squeeze,” Mugsy said, changing the subject with the subtlety of a rockslide.
Charlie would have shrugged, but there wasn’t enough space. “I’ve been sleeping in a hammock for six months. Well, until last week.” Memories tugged at him: fancy sheets, Jean’s skin, the floral scent of her perfume—
Fingers snapped inches from his nose. “Stay with me,” Mugsy hissed. “I wastryingto say that I figured it would be easier to go incognito in coach. No one will be looking for you here.”
A flight attendant bent to address them. “Cookies?”
Charlie tugged the brim of his baseball cap lower. “No thank you. I’m too sad to eat.”
“I know exactly what you mean, hon.” The uniformed attendant patted his arm, and Charlie’s eyes pricked at her kindness. “It’s always hard when the vacation is over.”
Mugsy reached across Charlie, probably sensing he was about to start blubbering about lost love. “I’ll have his cookies.”
When they were alone again, Mugsy chewed with a thoughtful expression.
