“Did you find the winner?”
I look in the mirror at the salesgirl near the door. Milo, Dante, and Ollie are all crowded in the room with me, but I don’t feel bad about it. We aren’t doing anything. “Yes, this is the one.”
Chapter 13
“So…” Milo’s tone and the way he drew out the word immediately raises my suspicion. “Ares called while you were getting dressed. He said all of our parents are at the house, they want to go over the plans for next weekend.”
I don’t know if it’s just me or not, but it feels like we keep dancing around the situation. Maybe talking about it with them and their parents is for the best. “Okay,” I agree easily which feels strange, I feel like I should be more nervous, perhaps I will be when it’s closer. I still have a whole week to worry about it.
Dante tucks his card back in his wallet as he walks away from the register. I never even saw a price tag on the dress, I hope it wasn’t too expensive. The salesclerk comes out of the back area with a black garment bag draped over her arm. “Here you go.” She hands me the bag and gives me a wide smile. “It was great working with you, if you need anything else, you know where to find us.”
“Thanks.” I go to fold the bag over my arm, but Dante takes it from me before I can.
Milo holds the door open as we all leave the store. “Where to next?”
“I thought we were going home?”
“You got the dress, but you still need shoes,” Ollie tells me.
I let my head fall back and look up at the sky, “Do we have to?”
He leans his face, so it’s over top of mine and kisses my forehead. “We do. It won’t take long, promise.”
I huff out a breath, but the kiss softened me a bit. We roam around the mall until we find a shoe store that has tons of high heels in the display window. I hope none of them have their hopes up, because I’m not wearing any of those.
The door chimes when Dante pulls it open. A petite brunette with a pixy cut lifts her head up to look in our direction. Lifting her hand in a wave, she calls, “Have a look around, let me know if you want to see anything.” Then she returns to what she was doing.
The shoes are displayed against the wall and range in style from elegant, to what I would call stripper shoes. Most of the heels are impossibly high, they look more like torture devices than shoes.
“What about these?” Ollie picks up a baby pink stiletto. I shake my head and mouth a big “No.” They wouldn’t even match with the dress. I think he’s mostly just teasing me.
Milo mostly stands in the center of the store near a bench seat and looks around. Dante is much more tactile, and I find him wandering around, touching all the shoes, much more interesting than all the displays.
I force myself to look away from them and focus on finding something that will work so we can get home. I make a trip around the store looking up and down the walls. Near the bottom, by the register, I see a display of flats. They almost look like slippers, but they have pink ovals on the bottom for walking, so I’m assuming they’re shoes. Dante approaches me, looking down where I am.
I bite my lip. “Do you think I could get away with something like this? The hem of the dress just grazes the floor.”
He gives one shoulder a lazy shrug. “You don’t even have to wear shoes.”
I pick up a taupe-colored shoe, butmy eyes are drawn to the pair covered in little three-dimensional flowers—they’re white with little splashes of red and green. I turn my attention back to the flat in my hand. The shoe is light, and the leather material is soft. I turn to face the register. “Can I see these in an eight, or eight and a half, please?”
The brunette lifts her head again and nowthatwe’re closer, I can see the tiny ring she has in hernose and her dramatic makeup. She looks down at the shoe and heaves a sigh. “Sure, the beige ones?”
I nod and look down at the display again. Thinking quickly, I reach for the flower shoes too. “And these please.”
She gives me a tight, fake smile and spins around. “What’s her deal?” Ollie asks when she’s out of sight.
“No clue,” Milo adds, coming closer to our group.
“We don’t have the roseones left in an eight and a half, but I have both sizes in this one.” She deposits three little boxes on the bench beside me. Not giving me much else, she turns and goes back to the counter where the register is and ignores us again.
“Here, have a seat.” Dante urges me to the bench. Ollie picks up oneof the boxes and examines it. He lifts the lid and pulls out the shoes, which are all folded together. It’s the flower ones. Before I can Dante reaches for oneof the shoes, he flips it around in his hand one or twice then focus on me. “Are these slippers?”
“I don’t think so, they have a sole on the bottom, see?” I turn the shoe so he can see the bottom. He shakes his head but liftsupmy foot to remove my sneaker. My old shoes are long gone, theywere traded for white slip-on vans not long after the clothes first arrived.
Ollie picks up the other box and takes out thetaupe ones too. “These are the bigger ones, if you need them.”
Dante slides his thumb up my instep and I squirm away from him. “Knock it off. My feet are nasty I’ve been in these shoes for hours.” Ignoring me, he brushes his fingers over my bare toenails.
