I hear a sharp intake of breath coming from Brody. “I don’t believe it,” he mutters, not sounding happy. Does he know this woman?
He makes a beeline for table four, dragging me behind him. I’m not even sure if he realizes we’re still attached by the hand. When he stops short a couple of feet away from the woman, I have to grab on to his arm to keep from pitching forward.
“What are you doing here, Justine?” he demands coldly, and my heart plummets into my stomach at the mention of his ex-wife’s name.
Justine’s always been more of a concept than a person to me. She symbolizes Brody’s past, the bad part of his life that happened before he met me. She’s the woman who wanted to make Brody into something he wasn’t, who didn’t love him enough to stick around, who broke his heart, who left their dog! In my head, she’s a cartoon villainess, not a real, live, breathing human being, with a great pair of legs. Dang it, why didn’t I wear some sexy high heels tonight? Now, I feel all dumpy and boring in my silver flats.
She turns toward us, a beatific smile on her face. She’s lovely, radiant, one might even say “glowing,” which is to be expected since she’s pregnant!
Pause for collective gasp.
That’s right. Brody’s former wife is sporting a baby bump. How far along is she? Her belly’s pretty swollen, but the rest of her is thin. Well, not her boobs, but maybe she’s always had those. I really hope not, because I can’t compete with big breasts on top of a Mensa-worthy brain. Okay, so swollen belly, but the baby’s up high, so that means it’s not coming for a while. I’m guessing she’s six or seven months along. When did she leave Brody? My mind races to do the math. I need Sloane, or a calculator, or Brody to say something. Why isn’t he saying anything? I glance up at him, and the expression on his face tells me everything I need to know. He looks stunned, upset, overwhelmed, and maybe even a little bit pleased.
Brody’s going to be a father, and I feel like I’m going to throw up.
Chapter 28
(Sloane)
Gav and I both eye the last slice of pizza.
“You want it?” he asks.
“I don’t know. I’m pretty stuffed.” Three slices of deep dish pizza piled high with pepperoni, meatball, sausage, and salami, not to mention thick, oozy layers of mozzarella and tomato sauce, will do that to a person. I feel like I won’t need to eat again for a month. That last slice does look good, though. “Maybe just a bite.”
Reaching forward, Gav plucks out the birthday candle that’s fallen over and become one with the cheese and tosses it to the side. I was really impressed with myself for scaring up that nearly-empty box of candles so that our pizza could be turned into a proper birthday meal for Gav. Of course, the candles were pink since they were left over from Willa’s and my last birthday, and I only had four of them instead of the thirty-three I needed to represent Gav’s age, but it was better than nothing. And I think he appreciated me singing an enthusiastic round of “Happy Birthday” to him, even if I was a bit pitchy.
“Here.” Gav holds the pizza up to my lips, and I take a really big bite, managing to get about half the slice in my mouth.
He laughs. “You’re such a pig!”
“You’re getting the crust,” I defend my gluttony as I chew, “and that’s the best part.”
“Fair point,” he concedes.
I watch him fold the slice in half and make quick work of it. I’m amazed that Gav was able to eat all this messy pizza without dripping any sauce on his nice shirt and slacks. I, on the other hand, am now sporting a huge, greasy stain on the front of my Stanford tee thanks to a chunk of meatball that took a dive off the end of my first slice. If my dinner “date” were anybody but Gav, I’d probably go upstairs and put on a clean shirt, but that’s the beauty of hanging out with someone I’ve known forever. I can just relax and be myself; I don’t ever have to worry about impressing Gav.
He washes down his pizza with a slug from the bottle of Pinot Noir we opened after finishing the Cab. When he’s done, he passes the wine to me and I drink straight from the bottle as well. Classy, huh? Lazy’s more like it. I don’t want to have to rinse off glasses (or plates) later, so I told Gav we had to rough it tonight.
“This is better than going to some stuffy, old restaurant, don’t you think?”
“Sure. Who needs award-winning cuisine and a view of the water when I’ve got a Carnivore’s Delight and you in your Daisy Dukes?” He gives me a saucy wink.
“My cut-offs aren’t that short!” I swing my legs up on to the couch to confirm that I’m not showing butt cheek or anything.
“Maybe it’s just that your legs are so long. They create the illusion of your cut-offs being shorter than they actually are.” Scooping up the limbs we’re discussing, Gav places them on his lap so that I can unbend my knees, then he drapes his arms over them.
“Could be.” I make myself comfortable, leaning back against the arm of the couch. Having nowhere else to put it, I sit the wine bottle on my stomach. “According to Willa, one of the reasons Brody wanted to go out with her was her legs. He thinks they look like a supermodel’s.”
“Can’t say I’ve ever noticed Willa’s legs.”
“Since we’re identical twins, doesn’t it follow that we’d have the same legs?” I point to mine, which are right in front of him.
Gav shakes his disheveled blond head. “Willa doesn’t have a birthmark on the side of her right knee.” He gestures toward the three big freckles lined up there. “And . . .,” he slides his hand up my other leg, stopping at the hem of my cut-offs, “. . . she doesn’t have a scar on her thigh.” His thumb brushes across the two-inch white line up high on my leg, a souvenir from a nasty bike accident when I was eleven. (I hit a pothole, flipped over my handlebars, and sliced open my thigh on a piece of broken glass lying in the street. Gav applied pressure to the bleeding wound using a piece of his t-shirt, and kept me calm by telling me stupid knock-knock jokes until Willa could bring help. My hero!)
“So, you’re saying my legs are more flawed than my sister’s?” I tease, trying to ignore that Gav’s hand seems to have taken up permanent residence on my thigh.
Sweeping his eyes from my thighs all the way down to my toes and back up again, he concludes, “Nothing flawed about these legs; they’re perfect. I think Brody was on to something with his supermodel comparison.”
My cheeks suddenly feel warm, and I realize I’m blushing. What the hell? I don’t get embarrassed or flustered by compliments from men. They’ve been saying nice things about my legs since I hit puberty and sprouted up six inches almost overnight, and Gav’s no different than any of those other guys. I mean, he is because I actually care what he thinks, but . . . The blushing probably doesn’t have anything to do with Gav, or him talking about my body’s assets, or the fact that his hand is still resting on my thigh. I bet it’s the wine. The sulfites in wine can cause the face to redden. I know I read that somewhere. So, my blushing is just a biological response to a preservative. That’s all. Nothing to see here. Moving on . . .
“I wonder how Willa and Brody’s date is going.” I change the subject.
“Wow, what’s in this Pinot?” Removing his hand from my leg, Gav takes the bottle away from me and looks down into it, with a comically perplexed expression on his face. Is he wondering about the sulfites, too? “It must have been made from grapes that have mind-altering properties,” he theorizes, “because you’ve never shown an interest in your sister’s love life before.”
“Not true!” I protest. “I show an interest . . . sometimes . . . when I think she’s making a bad romantic choice and needs guidance.”
“That’s not interest; that’s micromanagement.”
I shrug. “Potato, potahto.”
“‘Let’s call the whole thing off,’” Gav completes the lyric, with a chuckle, then tosses back some more wine.
He leans forward to place the bottle on the coffee table instead of handing it back to me, and I don’t object, though I am
loath to lose this pleasantly buzzed feeling I’m currently enjoying. When it wears off, I know my super efficient brain will kick into high gear again and I’ll start fretting about work. And Josh. And how I’m going to have to plaster a smile on my face tomorrow morning and pretend like everything’s copacetic between us when all I really want to do is tell everyone at ATM what a smarmy, narcissistic, power-grubbing sack of shi–
“Maybe it’ll work out,” Gav suggests.
“Huh?” Is he talking about Josh and me? How could things work out? Josh destroyed both our personal and professional relationships in one fell swoop today.
“Willa and Brody. She’s been smitten with him since the day they met, and the feeling appears to be mutual. He’s cooking her meals, buying her thoughtful gifts, taking her on what she considers to be a dream date. Sounds like he could be ‘The One.’”
“You don’t really believe in all that ‘The One’ stuff, do you?” Feeling like I should be closer to hear his answer, I pull my legs off Gav’s lap, scooch up next to him, and tuck my feet under me.
Gav furrows his brow. “This conversation just got deep.”
“Not really. It’s a simple yes-or-no question.”
“All right then, I’ll give you a simple answer, which I’m sure you’ll scoff at since you’ve made a lifelong commitment to cynicism–”
“And we’re very happy together. Cynicism really gets me,” I say, smirking.
“Cynicism does a good job of protecting you. Beyond that, I think your relationship is pretty dysfunctional.”
“We’ve managed to keep it going for over twenty years now, so we must be doing something right.” I playfully stick out my tongue at Gav, and he responds with an exasperated sigh.
“Do you want to hear my answer to your question or not?”
“I already know your answer. You showed your hand when you said I’d scoff at it, which means that you buy into the same romantic nonsense Willa does, that there’s one person out of the more than seven billion populating this planet who’s the perfect match for you, who will complete you and make you happier than anyone else ever could.”
“It’s nice to think that’s true.”
“For something to be true, it must be feasible, and there are too many variables in ‘The One’ construct for it to ever be so. What if your ‘One’ dies before you meet her? What if she gets tired of waiting around for you, so she marries some other guy instead? What if you think someone is your soul mate, but you turn out to be completely and totally wrong? Case in point . . . Thea.” Yep, that’s right. I just invoked the Wicked Witch of the West’s name. I expect a swarm of flying monkeys to descend upon us shortly.
“When did I ever say Thea was ‘The One?’”
“You must have thought it. Why else propose to her?”
“Seemed like a good idea at the time.” Gav grimaces, which is an accurate representation of my feelings about his shrewish ex, but I realize that his grimace is caused by pain, not revulsion, when he turns away from me and rolls his head to the side.
“Your neck?” Gav has ongoing problems with cervical stiffness (that’s what his chiropractor calls it) because he spends so much time crouched over a drafting table every day. Another occupational hazard of being a graphic novelist. I feel bad that he’s been twisting his head around to talk to me all this time.
“Yeah, it was seizing up on me.”
“Would more wine help?” I glance over at the Pinot bottle that’s still half-full and looking very enticing. A few more sips of that delicious vino would probably guarantee me a good night’s sleep. I dread the thought of lying awake for hours, staring at the ceiling, replaying that confrontation with Josh in my head – I’m already starting to regret storming out of his office the way I did. The smart play would have been to stand my ground and come to some sort of agreement with him that would protect my interests moving forward. Now I don’t know where I stand, and things could get dicey if Josh decides to punish me for rejecting him.
“No to the wine. I don’t want a hangover tomorrow.”
“Yeah, me neither. Gotta be sharp in the A.M.” Guess I can use all that time staring at the ceiling to formulate a plan to keep Josh in line.
Gav rubs his neck. “I’ll take some Advil or Tylenol if you’ve got it.”
“No, sorry, I’m out. What a terrible hostess I am! Won’t give you a glass to drink from. Can’t offer you any painkillers.”
“You paid for the pizza.”
“I had a fifty percent off coupon,” I confess in a dramatic whisper. “Here, let me do that.” Pushing Gav’s hand away, I wrap my fingers around his neck and start kneading the tight muscles in the back.
“Feels good,” he compliments my massaging technique. “Your fingers are like icicles, though.”
“Cold hands, cold heart – isn’t that the old saw?” I query, with a quirk of my lips.
“No, it’s ‘Cold hands, warm heart.’”
“I disprove that theory then.”
Gav frowns. “That’s the second time tonight you’ve joked about your lack of a heart. You don’t fool me with this tough girl act, you know. It’s just a mask, like the one Charlatan hides behind.”
I stop massaging Gav’s neck and gaze at him through narrowed eyes. “You think I’m like Charlatan?”
“You’re not like Charlatan. You are Charlatan. Smart, sexy, confident, dynamic, afraid of getting hurt so you keep everyone at arm’s length.”
“I’m not at arm’s length from you right now.” I point out the obvious as my hands are still inside Gav’s shirt collar, and I’ve moved closer so that my chest is brushing up against the front of his shirt and our faces are just a few inches apart.
“I meant emotionally, not physically,” Gav says, in a husky voice. Because he’s a man and men can’t help themselves in situations like these, his eyes drop down to my breasts. The girls are covered by my t-shirt, of course, but I’m not wearing a bra, something I don’t think he was aware of until just now, because his eyes pop back up to mine and he looks simultaneously panicked and turned on. I’m suddenly feeling the latter to a degree that’s quite unsettling since this is Gav, my very close friend, whom I’ve done my best not to think about in any kind of sexual way for decades. Not an easy task, for the record, and I think I deserve major props for my self-control because Gav is incredibly hot; he has those sexy hands that he creates amazing things with, and killer washboard abs, and I bet he’s really, really good in bed . . . What is that damn wine doing to me? First, it made me blush like some silly tween and now it’s causing me to have lascivious thoughts about Gav. Bad wine!
I should pull away from Gav before I get myself into trouble. That’s what Sober Sloane would do. She’d show some restraint. She’d never slide a hand suggestively down Gav’s chest, nor would she play with the buttons on his shirt and fantasize about ripping that shirt open and making the buttons fly all over the room. But, apparently, there’s no stopping Slightly Sloshed Sloane as I just did all of the above. Okay, bail this out, Sloane. Talk, don’t touch. Use your words while you still can.
“Being emotionally distant doesn’t have to be a flaw, does it? It’s more like a necessity when you’re a bad ass, criminal . . . or otherwise.” I gesture at myself, with a smile. “You know, I feel like we should alert the media or something. This is a red letter day, the day you finally admitted you based Charlatan on me. Honestly, I thought you’d take the true identities of the New Frisco twins to your grave, because you’ve had so much fun teasing Willa and me about it all these years. Detective Bliss is such a goody two-shoes. Makes sense that Willa was your inspiration for that character.”
“But she wasn’t.”
“I don’t understand.” Is the wine affecting my mental faculties now?
Gav sighs and drags his fingers through his tousled hair. “Think about it. Britt Bliss fights injustice with her deductive skills and always makes sure that the truth comes to light. That’s not what Willa does as a pet
psychic; that’s what you do as a forensic accountant. The heroines of New Frisco don’t represent twins literally; they represent two different sides of your personality. You’re Britt; you’re Charlatan; you’re everything, Sloane. You always have been . . . to me.”
Okay, wow. I need a second to process this. It’s one thing for Gav to replicate my physical likeness on the pages of his graphic novels (I always figured he did that because he’s been drawing me since we were kids and it’s easy for him.) But to know that he created the characters of Britt and Charlatan as an homage to me and he put so much thought into capturing the nuances of my psyche and personality . . . It’s all a bit overwhelming. I don’t know what to say, or how to react, or–
I grab Gav’s face and kiss him, because why not, right? I’ve been wanting to do it since he traced the outline of the scar on my thigh earlier, and what better way to thank a guy for finding me inspiring?
The moment our lips meet I’m transported back in time to that dark closet at Lucy Richardson’s Sweet Sixteen party. The way Gav kisses, how he smells and tastes, the feel of his long, lean body pressed up against mine – it’s all deliciously familiar and at the same time, as electrifying as a first encounter because it’s been sixteen years since the last time I had the Gavin Shaw Experience. Just like when we were teenagers, Gav’s hands slide smoothly under my t-shirt and go straight for my breasts. Oh, those hands. Now I remember why I like them so much. They don’t grope, or paw, or squeeze too hard; they’re strong, and gentle, and sure of their purpose. My hands are likewise busy unbuttoning Gav’s shirt and pulling it free from the waistband of his pants. Once that’s done, I lift my hands above my head, silently inviting him to relieve me of my tee, which he does in one swift motion, tossing the grease-stained clothing to the floor.
I climb on top of him, and we stare into each other’s eyes for a minute. He reaches up and removes my glasses, which makes me feel more vulnerable than being topless does. Without my glasses, I’m not my guarded, intellect-driven self. The world’s blurry, and I have to trust my other senses. I touch Gav’s face – his cheek, his jaw, his mouth, features I know as well as my own. He kisses the palm of my hand tenderly, and I lean forward to reclaim his lips. Our kisses are hungrier now, hotter, wetter, more impatient. They don’t stop even when he lifts me off his lap and lays me back on the couch. He lowers himself down on to me, his weight pushing me into the sofa cushions, and I moan my appreciation of our bodies being so closely connected.
Twin Piques Page 28
