Delilah pulls out a notebook, flips to a fresh page, and uncaps a pen like she’s about to draft a legal contract.
“Rule one,” she says, not looking up. “No being late.”
“I wasn’t late,” I point out.
She snaps her eyes up. “You weren’t early. That means you were late.”
“Wow. Harsh.”
“If we have a meeting, I expect you to be there on time. I have a busy schedule and I cannot afford to waste time waiting around for you.” She underlines it twice.
I take a slow sip of my coffee, purely to be obnoxious.
“Sure thing, boss.”
Delilah narrows her eyes, “Rule two, and I cannot believeI have to specify this. No asking any questions about my sex life,”
“You were the one who told me about it the other night!”
“That was before we were partners.”
I pout. “Ok well, just so you know that’s a one-way rule. Anything you want to know about a good sex life, go ahead and ask away. I’m an open book, Mittens.”
She purses her lips and ignores me.
“Rule three,” she continues. “No half-assing this. If you’re not going to pull your weight, tell me now so I can find someone else.”
“Relax, Greer. I’ll pull my weight. And also, you can’t find anyone else. That’s why we’re paired up.”
“Forgive me if I don’t have faith in the guy who said his top skill is winning people over with his ‘movie-star smile.’”
I bark a laugh, she’s referring to day one of camp Pinehaven when we had to all share our top skill. I feel bad that I can’t remember hers, the only reason I even said that was to make this kid, Rae, in my group smile because he was feeling homesick that morning and I told him I’d make him laugh all summer.
“Hey, it’s a documented skill for a reason,” I say, flashing it at her.
She does not look impressed.
Which is kind of a shame. I mean, not that Icare. It’s just that most people—hell, basically everyone—tends to be at least a little susceptible to my charm. But Delilah seems completely immune. It makes me want to explain to her the real reason I said that at camp, not to be a dick but to make Rae laugh.
“Rule four,” she presses on, ignoring me completely. “No disappearing when there’s work to do. I’m not going to chase you down if something needs to get done.”
“Got it,” I say, leaning forward on my elbows. “Now, my turn.”
Delilah frowns. “Your turn?”
“Yeah. I want a rule too.”
She crosses her arms. “Fine. What’s your rule?”
“No stress-monstering.”
Her brows pull together. “What the hell does that mean?”
“It means you’re going to want to spiral over every tiny detail,” I say, waving a hand at her aggressively neat workspace. “You’re going to make a color-coded timeline and stress out when we’re not three days ahead of it. You’re going to assumeIdon’t know what I’m doing, even though I’m gonna be the one holding this team together. And I would like a rule to ban that.”
Delilah lets out an actual laugh. A short, incredulous one.
“You? Holding this team together?”
