“I see.” She didn’t really, but it was important to maintain the illusion that Eve knew everything.
He sat back on his haunches. “It’s not very fancy, I know.”
She thought of the dinners they’d scrounged together, a buffet of leftovers and vending machine snacks eaten on the floor ofhis room. Of course, that was before she found out he was heir to a beer fortune. If she’d known he was loaded, Jean would have made Charlie buy his own Snickers.
“I should let you get changed,” he said, when she didn’t reply. “For tonight.”
“Why? You don’t like what I’m wearing?”
“Oh no, I like it a lot. It’s really—very nice.” He swallowed hard. “The long dangly bits are especially interesting. Almost like, you know…” He danced his fingers up and down as he searched for the right word. “Tentacles.”
“I think it looks like I’m unraveling,” she countered. “If you pull one of the strings, the whole top might come apart. And then I’d hardly be wearing a thing.”
“That’s a different way to look at it.” And look he did, from the tips of her toes to the part in her hair. Charlie shook himself. “I should go.”
“Aren’t you forgetting something?”
“No.” He tried to make serious eye contact. “I haven’t forgottenanything.”
“Your watch,” she reminded him.
“Oh. It’s still tangled up in your—” He nodded at her fringe.
“Then you better get busy.” Jean rolled onto her hip, propping her cheek on one hand. That forced Charlie to crawl halfway onto the bed, bracing his knees on either side of her body as he began disentangling his watch. His movements were so cautious, he could have been defusing a bomb.
“That’s a nice perfume you’re wearing.” His voice was unsteady, like there wasn’t quite enough oxygen in this tent-wagon, even though the flap was half-open.
She shifted onto her stomach, erasing the polite gap he’d left between his legs and her body. “I know.”
“It almost smells familiar.”
“Don’t tell me your mother wears it.”
“No.” He inhaled deeply. “It’s not that.”
“Grandmother?” Jean guessed.
“She smelled like Vicks, mostly. Sinus trouble.”
Jean opened her mouth to tell him thathergrandmother had always smelled like cinnamon gum before remembering she wasn’t giving him any more pieces of the real her.
With a last gentle tug, Charlie finished unknotting his watch. “Got it.”
She waited for him to move, but he stayed where he was.
“You know, your perfume reminds me of a girl I used to know.”
“I doubt that. It’s very uncommon.”
“So was she.”
Alarm bells clanged in Jean’s head. She wasn’t ready to go there. Charlie needed to leave before he unearthed any of her secrets—like the one stashed underneath all those froufrou undies. So what if she still liked to sleep in his T-shirt? Maybe it was softer than anything else she owned.
“I’m tired. I think I’ll take a nap before dinner.” Jean pulled her legs out from under him, curling her knees into her chest. “Close the door on your way out.”
She kept her eyes squeezed shut until she felt the stairs shake under his weight.
I’ll Have What She’s Having
