I picked up a cushion and hugged it to my lap. “Isn’t there more to life than being able to hold your head up?”
He thought for a second then shrugged. “I can’t see what.”
“Me either, but … there’s something niggling in my belly … I don’t know … it’s like part of me wants to do something exciting for once.”
Cameron frowned. “Like your mother and Grace.”
“No, not like them.” I picked at the corner of the cushion. “Like a wilder, crazier version of me.”
“Tobi, there is no wilder, crazier version of you. You’re sensible and cautious. And you’ve got anything your mother genetically passed on completely under control. It’s what I like about you.”
Control. There was that word again. It was stalking me. “But what if I don’t want to be that way all the time? Don’t you think I’m just a tad too uptight?”
Cameron gave me his serious science teacher look—which he was especially good at, probably because he was a serious science teacher. “It’s who you are. I am too. It’s a good thing.”
I watched the bow-legged cat jump up on his lap and had a vision of Cameron and me at eighty, sitting in the same room watching sedate movies with twelve cats and a heap of regrets.
Chapter 11
I’d just submitted an article on fluctuating interest rates when a dark head appeared over the partition behind my desk. Matias gave me a flirtatious wink then proceeded to serenade me.
“To gnome, gnome, gnome her, is to love, love, love her, and I do …”
Two other guys behind him joined in with, “And we do,” before Matias sang, “And I do …”
“And we do …”
“And I do, and I do, and I doooooooo.”
They all fell about laughing but before they could leave, I leaned over the partition and grabbed a handful of Matias’ hair.
“Hey! Ow! What are you doing?”
I practically snarled. “You. Me. The supply closet. Now.” I released his hair and marched off down the corridor without a backward glance. I knew he’d follow—his curiosity would get the better of him.
There was a chorus of “Ooooh,” from his back-up singers and I could imagine Matias’ cocky grin. Unless you had your own office, the supply closet was the only place to get any privacy in the building, and so had become the location of choice for major arguments.
Once in the room, I stood with my hands on hips and glared at an intern, who scurried away. Matias came in and closed the door.
“Lock it.” I heard the click as he did, then I slowly turned to face him. “Explain this to me. This smart ass trash you carry on with.”
He gave a casual shrug. “It’s just fooling around, Fletcher. No need to get so worked up about it.”
“Fooling around? At what point have I given you the impression that I’d like to be included in your ‘fooling around’? Why pick on me?”
“Because you react so well.” He smiled and leaned back against the wall, his hands in his jeans pockets. “And because you’re cute.”
“So I should take it as a compliment?”
He winked. “Yeah, you should.”
I quickly examined my options. I could cut him down with an appropriate remark, I could turn and leave, or I could let him down gently.
Or … or I could throw caution to the wind for once in my life.
Before I could think about it twice, I reached out and grabbed his face with both my hands and kissed him for all I was worth. To give him credit, he didn’t hesitate, and instantly had his arms wrapped around me, drawing me flush against him.
It was as if a switch had been flicked and I was suddenly the new, wilder, crazier version of myself—and I liked it.
I wanted more.
Now.
Of Simon—er, of Matias.
I ran a hand along his bicep then down over his hips before he moaned and moved me so I was against the wall and he was running his hands along my hips. The switch gave me access to his butt and I took full advantage before pulling his shirt out from his jeans and luxuriating in the feel of his back. What would Simon’s back feel like? Would Simon do something like this? Kiss a girl in a stationery closet? Maybe it wasn’t a wise move after all …
Focus on being wild and crazy, Fletcher!
This could stop at any moment and I wanted to fully explore my wanton side before it did.
He moved to kiss my neck and I pressed my cheek to the wall to encourage him. I could feel his hands moving up my sides and I—
A knock at the door broke my concentration.
“Matias, someone’s there.”
“Let them wait,” he murmured in my ear. But it was no use—I couldn’t keep fooling myself that I was into this.
I pushed him away and smoothed down my clothes and hair, searching for what I could say to whoever was on the other side of the door. What if they knew what we were doing? Oh my God, what if everyone knew it? What would they think of me?
“Relax, Fletcher.” Matias grinned as he straightened out his own clothes. “We were only making out. It’s not a capital offense.”
Easy for him to say; this little incident would fit right into his reputation, but I’d been cultivating a reputation of being serious and dedicated to the job above all else. It only took one slip-up, one mistake—that’s all—and I’d be a laughing stock. No matter what else I did, for years people would sneer when I walked past and mutter, “There goes Tobi Fletcher. She was caught making out with Matias in the supply closet you know.”
My breathing had become shallow and there was a dizziness lurking on the edges of my awareness. “Maybe you do this sort of thing all the time, but I—”
He grabbed my hands and held them between his as he looked at me. “Fletcher, don’t freak out on me. No one knows what we were doing. As far as they’re concerned, you called me in here to tear strips off me.”
I groaned and closed my eyes. “And instead, I tried to tear your shirt off.”
“It was appreciated.” He grinned again. “And we’ll get back to that later.”
About as likely as my mother becoming a nun. “Are you going to brag about this?” The panic in my belly was growing by the second.
He seemed surprised. “Why would I?”
“I don’t know. You’re right, I’m freaking.” My heart now pounded faster from fear than it had from kissing Matias.
He hugged me to him, but this time there was nothing sexual about it, just a friend comforting another friend.
“Tobi, are you in there?” Sofia’s voice came through the door. “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine, Sofia.” I filled my lungs, trying to get my breathing under control. I was beginning to realize I might not have the nerve to be a wilder, crazier version of me.
*
I’d been back at my desk just long enough for my heart rate to stabilize from the kiss that shouldn’t have happened when my cell rang. Mini-Mom.
“Hi, Grace.”
“Tobi, hon, I’m out the front of your building.” Her voice wobbled slightly. Great, she’d probably missed out on a pair of sparkly shoes she wanted or her alimony check was late. “I thought we could meet on your lunchbreak. What time do you have it?”
I was about to explain that this wasn’t the sort of job that had regular lunchbreaks, but it would have confused the matter. After the Kissing Incident, there was no way I was up to seeing any member of my family. “Grace, I don’t have time today—maybe we could meet up on the weekend or something.”
“But I wanted to talk to you.” She was using her little girl voice. Hadn’t she worked out yet that that voice only worked on our parents and her husbands? It had the opposite effect on me. Besides, I needed time and space to think about me.
“Not today, Grace, I’m swamped. How about I call you on the weekend?”
I could hear her breathing down the line. “I can wait.”
“Sorry, it’s just not possible right now.”
“Oh, okay.” There was the wobble again, and I felt a twinge of guilt, but I pushed it away.
“Bye.” I hung up and walked over to Sofia’s desk. “Are you going out to get lunch?”
“Yes, in about half an hour.”
“Can you get me a green chile bagel while you’re out?”
“Sure.” She stopped typing and turned to me. “Are you all right? You still haven’t told me what was going on in the supply closet.”
There went my heart rate again, escalating like a penthouse elevator. Did she suspect? “Why, what do you think happened?”
“I’m hoping you gave him something to think about. He’s getting too cocky.”
Hmm. I wondered if he was thinking about it. I might desperately regret it, but that didn’t mean I wanted him to regret it—a girl has some pride.
*
It was that afternoon as I was tidying up my desk to go home that Kevin called me into his office.
“Fletcher, you’re covering that gnome event this weekend, right?”
I sank down into a chair across from him. “Yep.”
He leaned back, linking his hands behind his head. “I want you to take your sister with you.”
“What?” Grace? Apparently the gods were no longer content toying with my life, they’d now painted a large red and white target on my back.
“And,” he pointed a hairy finger at me, “I don’t want her to know I told you to do it.”
Oh, of course. “My mother called, right?”
He didn’t seem embarrassed in the slightest. In fact, there might have been a touch of zeal in his eyes. “Grace mentioned to Lillian she wanted to spend time with you.”
I could feel my blood beginning to boil but remained civil. “Kevin, you know you can’t control my relationship with my family.” There was no way I was taking Grace out on assignment.
He stood up, arms crossed, eyes narrowed. All he needed was a cigar to chomp to complete the image of a bully editor. “Look on it as a personal favor to me,” he said slowly.
Goddammit. I scuffed my shoe on his carpet. Then, the implications of the word “favor” registered. “If we’re talking favors, how about we make it a straight swap? One good turn for another.”
Arms still crossed, he raised his chin. “Whaddaya want?”
“The senator’s office scandal. I want the time and resources to investigate it properly.” I held my breath.
“Nope.” He rubbed a hand across his chin. “But I tell you what. Take your sister to this overgrown school fair, and if a credible source for your scandal pops up, you can write the story.”
It wasn’t much more than I had now, but at least it was something. “Deal.” Unfortunately, I’d traded for a high price. Resigned to carrying out the terms of my bargaining, I moved to leave.
“And, Fletcher?”
I sighed. “Yeah?”
“Does your mother like men in leather?”
*
Two days later, Grace and I arrived at the ExtravaGNOMEza at the ten a.m. starting time to see a huge crowd had already gathered. I scanned the scene—market stalls, a Ferris wheel, food vans, a stage area and a crowd of several thousand people—some of whom had strange ideas of what colors were appropriate in hair dye.
“Tobi, this is great.” Grace grabbed my elbow and tugged me toward a jewelry stall. “Ooh, will you look at this stuff!”
It was gaudy and ugly, but who was I to tell her? “Grace, it’s gaudy and ugly.” Yeah, why fight who I was?
“Oh, Tobi.” She laughed. “You never had any taste in jewelry.” She held a bracelet against her wrist.
The large beads in their clashing colors sparkled against her creamy skin. On my pale, freckled skin, it would’ve been an unmitigated disaster but, I grudgingly admitted, Grace could not only pull it off, she’d probably start a trend.
“Come on,” I said, “I want to see the speakers.”
I tramped through the throng—past many placard-carrying gnome rights activists—in the general direction of the stage, scanning the crowd as I went. For some reason, my subconscious seemed to be looking for someone, though who it could be was anyone’s guess—no one I knew would come to an event like this. A picture of a certain father to a certain four-year-old popped into my head and I groaned. I was scanning for him in crowds now? It wasn’t enough that I had dreams and fantasies and had ruined a perfectly good attempt at being wild and crazy by thinking about him, but now I was obsessing about running into him? Maybe I needed a psych assessment.
We reached the stage and I took out my notebook. I restrained myself to one inconspicuous sniff of my pencil and prepared to listen to the man with the microphone. The crowd at the stage was comparatively small, only a couple of hundred, since most people had left for the stalls when the band had made way for the speaker.
Ten mind-numbing minutes later, I heard a child squeal my name. My heart rate trebled but I played it cool and turned to watch Anna drag her father to my side.
“Tobi!” She hugged my legs and I patted her head in a semi-affectionate manner. “Dad, Tobi’s here!”
“Hi, Tobi.”
Lord, his voice was sexy: deep and reverberating. I let my eyes drift up from the short blond to Simon’s midnight-blue gaze. “Hi,” I said. Then that thing happened again—the same thing as when I first met him in his office, where the temperature changed or there wasn’t enough oxygen in the air or something. But we were outdoors this time, so neither could be a plausible explanation.
Anna was still hugging my legs and neither Simon nor I had spoken since the greetings, but our eyes hadn’t moved from the moment they’d connected. It was as if there was an invisible thread drawing me closer—I wanted to put my hands on his body, just to touch. Oh, who was I kidding? I wanted to drag him to the ground.
At the thought, a flame lit down low in my belly. And the way Simon’s gaze drifted from my eyes to my lips and back again only made the flame flicker and grow. I’d never felt lust like this before. Cameron and I’d had a nice steady progression from dating to sleeping together and, before him, my ex-editor finally won me into to his bed with rational, logical arguments as to why it’d be a good thing. In fact, I’d always had a suspicion that Hollywood-style lust didn’t really exist; it was a mass delusion people used to justify their actions. The kissing incident with Matias was a perfect example of that—I’d convinced myself I wanted to kiss him but it was really because I wanted to feel wild and crazy.
Although … during that kiss, there had been one moment of genuine feeling—when I’d seen Simon’s face in my mind. The face that was in front of me now. The face that was still watching me.
“Aren’t you going to introduce me?” Grace’s voice seemed to break through whatever bizarre spell had been cast. Simon and I both looked at her.
“Um, Grace, this is Simon and Anna Hanson. Simon and Anna, this is my sister, Grace.”
Simon and Grace shook hands—Grace’s fingers lingered an annoying moment too long—and then she squatted down to speak to Anna. That was a good idea—why hadn’t I ever thought of it? Anna seemed to appreciate being on eye level. Of course, I couldn’t do it now, it’d seem like I was copying, but I’d do it next time I saw her.
“How have you been, Tobi?”
Simon’s voice ran right through me. He was wearing a white T-shirt and old jeans and I had a vision of myself wrapping my arms around his powerful shoulders and hooking a leg around his waist. I frowned. Maybe the kiss in the supply closet had released the wild and crazy version of me after all. “Um … good. And you?”
“Busy with work, but otherwise good,” he said. “Unfortunately, I haven’t had to rescue any damsels in distress lately.”
Before I could respond, Grace stood and joined in the conversation. “Well, you wouldn’t have to do that around Tobi. She’s the last person who’d ever need rescuing. In fact, Tobi’s more likely to do the res— Ow! … What’d you—”
I removed my heel from the toe of Grace�
�s shoe and grabbed her elbow, leading her away.
“Nice to see you again, Anna, Simon.” I gave them a wave with my spare hand. “Shame we couldn’t stay and chat.”
“Bye, Tobi,” Anna called as she waved. Simon and Grace also called out their farewells as we wove through the people.
After I’d put half the crowd between us, Grace wrenched her arm away and swung around to block my path. “Okay. What was that about?”
“Nothing,” I said, folding my arms.
Her eyebrows rose. “Nothing?”
I nodded, narrowing my gaze and pursing my lips.
“I’m not buying it. You meet an Adonis who can’t take his eyes off you and you drag us away?”
“He could so take his eyes off me.” Couldn’t he? Well, my eyes had been glued to him, and he’d been there with me all the way … but … Oh, I didn’t know what to think.
I turned to look at a woman wearing a T-shirt with the hand-painted words, “Do you know where your gnome is?”
“No, he couldn’t,” Grace’s voice interrupted. “That man has the hots for you, bad. But don’t change the subject—why’d we have to leave?”
Sighing, I turned back to her. I’d known bringing Grace was courting disaster. “Did it occur to you that I might not like my personality dissected by my sister and a stranger?”
Hoping to avoid the disturbing visions she’d spawned, I sidestepped her and moved on, and began to plot Kevin’s imminent execution for foisting Grace on me during this assignment. Rat poison in his coffee? Perhaps Ebola virus in his aftershave? No, wait, anthrax in his—ugh—leathers!
Grace jumped into my path again—a perky, black-haired Great damn Wall of China. “You like him.”
Panic flared in my chest for a moment before I suppressed it. “I do not, I just don’t—”
“You do! You like him!” Her smile was smug and maddening. “You want to make jungle love with him.”
“I do not!” I had to squash a childish desire to shove my fingers in my ears.
“Then why are you blushing?”
I was pretty sure I wasn’t—well, I’d told my face not to, anyway—but I knew from experience there was no way to win this argument with Grace. “Look, I’m working here. Can we just drop it?”
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