I steer Barclay out of Marco’s path and hug him. I should not be surprised when I pull away and find bits of white fluff and feathers stuck to my blouse and black skirt. “I’m glad you could make it, Barclay.”
“Me, too, ma cherie. You know what an impossible schedule I have.” He waves his hand in the air. I nod to Gretchen, and we deliver Barclay to a little table for two by the wall.
“Oh non non non, mes amies. I need to be in media res. In the middle of things!” He raises his pointer finger in the air as if he’s the Statue of Liberty holding aloft the torch.
I feel all the eyes of all the diners on the three of us as we move Barclay to a small table in the center of the room. Barclay sits, and over his shoulder I catch Jean-Claude glaring at me through the circular window of the kitchen door.
Barclay tries to grab my arm to keep my attention, but I’m too fast. “We’ll talk later!” I tell him, deciding to let him be Gretchen’s problem.
I dash back to the kitchen, but just as I get through the door, I skid to a stop.
Jim. Standing there. Blocking my way.
“Evie. Can I talk to you for a second?” His mouth is a firm line. Whatever he wants to talk to me about, I’m not going to like.
“I’m really busy.” I try to step around him to check on my next ticket. Since Barclay’s flamboyant entry took so much time, I probably have an order waiting, which is a cardinal sin at Simple Sauce.
“Make the time.” His voice is low, menacing. My heart starts hammering. “You messed up.”
My stomach plummets. What did I do? What new truth does Jim have about Evie? And how on earth can I refute it when it’s most likely to be undeniably true?
“Maybe we should talk alone first.”
“Uh-unh. I’m not falling for any of your tricks.” He grabs my elbow roughly and steers us to where Aiden is observing the outer dining room through the window.
“Aiden.”
Aiden turns at Jim’s somber tone. When he sees my elbow clasped in Jim’s grasp, a cloud passes over his face. “Yes?”
“Let’s do this in private.” Jim’s voice is gruff.
Without a word, Aiden nods and leads us to his office. Jim must really be scaring him to leave his post on this night of nights. He’s been absorbing every nuance of how his kitchen is operating so he can make adjustments before tomorrow’s opening night.
Aiden closes his office door behind us, and I realize the sound of the dining room and kitchen is muted now, far away. Like the problems out there don’t exist. Just the terrifying ones in here do.
“Why aren’t you out there enjoying dinner with Sarah, Jim?” Aiden nods toward the dining room, and I don’t mistake his meaning. He’s saying Jim had better have a damn good reason for pulling him away from the action. And the fact that I’m involved is making his lip twitch.
“Tell him,” Jim says.
Aiden’s eyes shift to grip mine, expectantly.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I say. Really.
Aiden cocks an eyebrow at Jim and strums his fingers on the desk behind him. “You want to get to the point, Jim? I got a job or two hundred to do here.”
Jim glowers—it’s obvious he doesn’t like being caught at a disadvantage. Whatever he thinks Evie has done he feels strongly enough about to march me in here and make Aiden give me hell.
“Do you remember that Paradise job I had five, six months back?”
Aiden nods slowly. “That strip club you were renovating. Yeah.”
Jim swallows. “There was this girl there. Real piece of work. A stripper who’d get high on anything. Drunk off her ass most of the time. Would do anything for a hit.”
As Jim enumerates Evie’s past sins, I start to melt. Oh, this is so not good.
“Gossip is she started turning tricks. Would get customers from the strip club even though you know Wallace wouldn’t put up with any of that shit. Got herself a pimp, a big guy. The one who put Wallace in the hospital.”
Aiden bobs his head in recognition, and I’m not sure I like that he has intimate knowledge about the goings-on of a local strip club. Jim continues.
“Before that, when Wallace threatened her, she cleaned him out. Somebody—probably her—pulled the fire alarm and when they were all dealing with that, she went in and stole the entire week’s take from Wallace’s office.”
Aiden folds his arms. “Fascinating story, Jim. Why are you telling it to me?”
Jim releases my elbow at last. “Because this is her.”
Aiden tilts his head. “Her who?”
“The stripper.”
“The stripper?”
“Yeah. The stripper.” Jim punches emphasis into his words, obviously frustrated that Aiden is failing to get his meaning. “Knew it as soon as I saw her.”
“If you knew it as soon as you saw her, why are you just telling me now?” He strums his fingers on his arm.
“Because I talked to her, and she swore to me that she was on the straight and narrow.” Jim glances at me. I wonder if he really does have a soft spot, if he believes what he’s saying. “Something in her eyes…I believed her.”
Aiden leans against his desk. “So what’s changed?”
Yes, what exactly has changed so that Jim drags me into Aiden’s office tonight to trot out this sordid tale and ruin Aiden’s night?
“Because she has to be lying.” He looks back and forth between us. “Her pimp’s out there tonight.” He points toward the door. “Right in the middle of the dining room. Big guy in the feather coat.”
The room is still. I look at Aiden, and he looks at me. We both look at Jim.
Aiden and I burst into laughter. Jim jumps, startled by our guffaws. He should chill. This is only the first wave. The laughter is rolling over me like a tsunami. I hug my sides with crossed arms and struggle to speak between billows of whooping. “Barclay? Barclay? Really?!”
Aiden is doubled over with his own hysterics. He tries to straighten and pull himself together, but he takes one look at my face and explodes with mirth all over again. He’s clutching my arm. “Can. You. Believe. He. Just. Said. That?” Before dissolving into another fit of gut-busting hooting. “You’re a hooker and Barclay is your pimp.” He gasps for breath between giggles.
“I know! When would he have the time? Before American Idol or after The Voice? Pimping would get in the way of his rigorous viewing schedule.”
I rest on Aiden, and he puts his arms around my waist and supports me, leaning us both against the desk since we can’t hold ourselves upright through our oxygen-depleting howl fest.
“Maybe he operates during commercials.” The rolls of laughter continue, and we cling to each other and try to breathe.
I wipe the tears that are streaming from the corners of my eyes and catch a glimpse of Jim’s face. It’s as red as a stop sign. His scowl says he wants to punch someone—namely me. With a little effort, I manage to put a chokehold on my hilarity.
Aiden’s laughs roll to a stop, and he thumps his hand on the desk that I’m still leaning on. “You had me, Jim.”
“What?” Jim sounds confused, but there’s no mistaking he’s livid. And probably deeply embarrassed to be laughed at by Aiden. I suddenly feel sorry for laughing at him. He could quite possibly be right about Evie. But I’m reasonably sure there’s no way on earth or Mars that he’s right about Barclay being anyone’s giant chicken pimp.
“You had me going, old man.” Aiden punches him in the arm. Jim flinches.
“No, Aiden. It’s not a joke.”
Aiden sobers. Gone from his face is any trace of amusement. Instead he’s tipping into anger. “You’re serious?”
Jim looks at me imploringly. Does he actually think I’d back him up on this? Maligning my host body and accusing Barclay of something I know him to be completely incapable of doing? I shake my head, but I give him the truth.
“I can say with complete honesty, Jim, that you’ve mistaken me for someone else. I swear to you I�
��m not that girl you talked about. And Barclay would probably be downright pleased that you accused him of being a fist-fighting pimp, but he’s not one.”
Jim turns away from me. “You’d say anything to get what you want.” He scratches his chin before raising his eyes to Aiden’s. “Do you believe her?”
“Of course I do.” Aiden doesn’t hesitate.
Jim stammers something incomprehensible then shakes his head and stamps his way out of the room, slamming the door.
Aiden stares after him with crossed arms and a furrowed brow. “I wonder what’s gotten into him.”
A sliver of guilt stabs me for not volunteering that I very well may have been a prostitute in my former life of a few weeks ago and so maybe Jim isn’t completely insane. But admitting that would mean explaining my body-jumping situation, and then Aiden would think I’m insane.
I stare at the door, debating with myself about how guilty I should feel and what I should do about it. Jim did threaten me. Or Evie, at least. Aiden lifts my hand and tugs me toward him. I step closer, and he folds me in his arms and kisses me, claiming my mouth with a restraint that promises more later.
I pull away, my hands resting on his strong biceps I feel even through his button-down shirt and sport jacket. “You’re not worried? About what Jim said?”
“Ha!” He squeezes my waist. “No!” He nuzzles my neck and strokes my hair. I slide my hands around his head. His voice is husky when he says, “Although if you’d like to be a stripper—and a prostitute—just for me, I think I’d be okay with that.” He pulls away so he can grin at me.
“Well, you will have to pay me.”
His left eyebrow shoots up. “Pay you?”
“Yeah.” I trail my fingers down his neck suggestively. “For waitressing. There’s no way I’d do this for free.”
He chuckles and pulls me in for another kiss.
I kiss him back, tangling my fingers in his hair and thinking about how I don’t ever want him to find out I’m not really me.
Chapter Twenty-One
Despite the heat we generated in his office last night, Aiden and I did not spend time together after hours. We went back to work and said goodbye at the restaurant after my shift, both too exhausted to do anything more. And considering that tonight is opening night and one of the most important events in Aiden’s life, it only makes sense to focus our energies on making it the greatest of successes.
Meanwhile Barclay is thrilled to have been mistaken for a pimp. I become enormously sorry I told him. First thing this morning he puts on a purple fedora at a rakish angle. It has a feather.
“A plume,” Barclay corrects. “Maybe I should get a chunky pinkie ring. Wouldn’t that just set off my ensemble?” He pronounces it “on-somb” and moves his hands up and down his suit jacket in front of the mirror in the living room, no doubt visualizing chunky pinkie rings stacked up past his knuckles.
“Mmmhmm. Yeah, that’s exactly what you need.” I sink onto the couch and put my feet up. Barclay swivels from the mirror to see if he can catch the sarcasm on my face, but I present him a bland portrait of innocence and he returns to preening in front of his reflection.
“I don’t think I’ll go to the hospital today,” I say without looking at Barclay or his remarkably pimp-like reflection.
Barclay is distracted with himself. “Hmm?”
“I don’t really think I need to. Nothing has happened. Nothing ever happens. There’s no reason to go.”
He slaps the wall. “Oh, don’t you start that.”
I’m jarred with surprise. “Start what?”
He deigns to turn around and take two steps toward me before wagging his finger in my face. “You’re squatting!”
“I’m what? I’m sitting. Relaxing. You should try it. Away from the mirror. It’s very soothing.”
He puts his hands on his hips and his plume bobs. “Don’t give me that. You know what you’re doing. You’re squatting in that girl’s body, thinking you’ve got squatters’ rights to stay and that possession is nine-tenths of the law!”
A chill runs through me at his use of the word possession, but I feel his rightness like a still-hot coal down deep in my soul. Of course I can’t stay in Evie’s body. Even though things are going so well with Aiden and life in general is working out. No one can have a hot body forever. It’s a rule of physics or entropy or something. And, um, gravity.
“But nothing’s working,” I whine. “And I might run into Laurel again.” I’m sick of running into Laurel. It’s overwhelming and sad and I feel hopeless and ineffectual. No good thing happens when I go to the hospital. And at this point I don’t consider discovering how to leave this body to return to my old one such a good thing, either. “Didn’t you say I was stuck until the ride was over?”
He grasps the arm of the couch and peers down his nose at me. “Yes, but you shouldn’t settle for that. You don’t give up trying. Bad things happen to people who give up trying.”
“Weren’t you the one encouraging me to live it up?”
“That was back when I knew you still had a conscience.” He tilts his head and gives me narrowed eyes. “Lately I’ve been starting to wonder.”
“Why?” I feel deeply criticized.
“Because you’re coming up with too many reasons to stay.”
“There are too many reasons to stay.”
“That’s exactly why you should go.”
∞∞∞
When I get to the hospital, Laurel is there. She jumps and drops her phone at the sound of my footsteps behind her.
“Oh, hi, Evie. Sorry, I was zoning out.”
I nod and take a seat in the chair next to hers. She’s nervous, tapping her fingers, playing inaudible melodies on an invisible piano.
“How did it go with your dad?” I ask.
Laurel stops tapping and shakes her head. A tear squeezes from the corner of her eye.
“Good. Good.” She wipes the tear from her cheek. I nod like I believe her words and not her face.
“It’s just…” She sucks in air like she’s preparing to release a shattering sob, but she holds it back. “I don’t think it did any good.”
I look at her quizzically. “Did you think your dad would wake up Julianne?”
Laurel shakes her head. “No, but I thought he’d…he’d want to become more involved. I thought he’d want to help. Be part of…this. Us.”
For a second I think she’s including me in the “us,” but her eyes are on the used-to-be me, and I realize her only thought is for her sister. The real me. A hot rock drops into my stomach. How can I bear my sister’s love?
“You thought this would bring you all closer together as a family,” I say in an understanding tone.
“Yes. Stupid, wasn’t it?”
“Oh, Laurel.” I put my arms around her and hug her as she gives over to her tears. “It doesn’t work that way.” I pull back and look at her. “Your dad is a lot like my dad.” Exactly the same, really. “And I can tell you, you can’t make them act like they care. You can’t make them do anything.”
Laurel sniffles and wipes her eyes. I hand her a tissue and continue. “I’m sure they care—deep down—but they’ve walled themselves off from the hurt and to break through that—to come here and be involved and care—would hurt too much. It would unbuild that wall. So they don’t do it.”
I tilt my head and try to read her mind through her watery eyes. “Did he ask how you’re doing, though? Show interest in your well-being?”
A shadow crosses Laurel’s face. “He did. Almost like he expected to hear that things weren’t going well with me.”
“Did you tell him what’s going on with your health?”
She shakes her head vigorously. “Absolutely not. I’m fine. And that’s all he needs to know.”
Stubborn Laurel.
“And so he stayed two minutes and got the hell out of here?”
She nods, biting her lip.
“I’m sorry,” I tell her. And I
am. I’m sorry for both of us.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Opening night.
I don’t even try to talk to Aiden. His face is pinched and shadowed and there’s a focus to him that’s so sharp, I’d be afraid of cutting myself. This is his night, and he’s seeing to it that every single thing will go smoothly, even if he has to personally attend to it himself.
For our part, we employees are doing an exemplary job. Whether it’s the excitement of this most important night pulsing through our veins, the desire to present ourselves well, or just straight-up terror at the idea of pissing off Aiden when he’s in killer-robot mode is anyone’s guess.
For me it’s a mixture of all three.
Jill bumps my arm as she goes by, but I immediately steady myself and keep from dropping the two kale salads I’m on my way to deliver. She shoots me a mischievous grin and looks pointedly in Aiden’s direction. I don’t know if she’s trying to goad me into something or if she’s telling me that she knows—or suspects she knows—about things heating up between Aiden and me, but it bothers me. She’s not being professional, and she’s pulling my focus.
Which apparently needs to be on the dining room because as I exit the kitchen door after re-balancing my salads, I almost drop them again.
Natasha and Greg are here.
I freeze, staring at the two people I have most recently been. There’s a strange quality of unreality as I study these two bodies that are looking at each other, talking, relating, without having anything to do with me.
But I remember looking at their faces in the mirror. Looking down at their arms with a freckle here and a small scar there and feeling like they belonged to me. And now they’re out there, existing on their own, like children I never had.
They look happy, I notice. They’ve already gotten their entrées, and Natasha feeds Greg a bite of her chicken. She’s laughing at something he’s saying and wiping his chin. He catches her hand and kisses it.
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