Chapter 33
chapter thirty-three
Audrey
Today's vocabulary word: conspire
I made it out of the room and all the way to the restaurant, and it only took me a sluggish hour. Most of that time I'd spent with my hands pressed to my face as my cheeks flamed with shame from last night's antics, but an hour just the same.
Janet had better be prepared to face me. I had no intention of laughing at whichever quippy quote she had on her t-shirt today or grabbing every stray thread of conversation with both hands. She was going to get a tight-lipped smile and a brief hug from me, and that would be it.
I watched as crystals of brown sugar dissolved into my oatmeal and swirled my spoon through to mix it in.
I didn't like oatmeal very much but I could count on it to settle my belly.
That, and the hotel's breakfast menu was made up of digestive fireballs.
It was like they wanted to kill all the girls with bad bellies.
What I really wanted was a basic breakfast sandwich and some coffee.
A flat white or a café au lait would knock out this pest of a headache and it would probably give me a nice energy boost too.
But when the troll was all riled up, grease and caffeine only made matters worse.
I'd have to get by on toast, oatmeal, and tea today.
I went back to stirring the oatmeal and wondering if any of the people seated around me had witnessed my impromptu dance performance in the halls last night.
It was fine. I always did well on stage.
They probably saw my underwear, if I pulled off the turns and jumps correctly, but that was the least of my shame.
Then Jude dropped into the chair across from me, his collar open at his throat and cuffs rolled to his elbows. His color was high from whichever activities had taken more than two hours out of his morning, his hair was still shower damp, and he was wearing his glasses again.
"Glasses in the daytime," I said. "That's new."
That's new? What the hell was wrong with me? God, what I wouldn't give to transform into a little mouse and disappear right now.
"Yeah. A little bleary today. I didn't sleep much last night." He shrugged, adding, "I was worried about you sneaking out or jumping off the balcony."
Heat crawled up my neck. "I'm sorry about—well, everything. And, you know. Attacking you. Repeatedly."
He swiped a piece of toast from my plate. "The only problem was that I didn't know if you actually wanted it."
I stared down at the napkin on my lap. I wasn't prepared for him to grab that matter by the throat just yet. "Still, I…fondled you and I didn't take no for an answer and that wasn't okay."
"You were drugged. By my mother," he said around a bite of toast. "Fuck, I'm the one who should be apologizing here."
"I wasn't paying attention. When she gave me the mints," I added, as if that was important. "I was worried about garlic and offending the wedding dress lady."
He paused, then pointed the toast crust at me. "The…wedding dress lady?"
"Yeah. Janet had me trying on dresses."
Jude stared at me for a beat before swallowing. "Find anything you like?"
"Not really. It was just to give Janet the bridal shop moment she wanted. I've already done the big white dress thing."
"Yeah. I know." He pushed his glasses up his nose. "I was there, Saunders."
I reached for my tea. Sadly, I couldn't climb all the way into the mug and hide there until the sun extinguished itself.
"Not so fearless today, are you?"
I tore myself away from the mug and met his gaze.
I didn't know if it was the headache or the ecstasy hangover or my bridge troll turning me inside out but I asked, "Is that really what you want to discuss right now?
My wedding day? Because I think we need to talk about Janet's suspicions about us if we want the party tonight to go well. "
He leaned back in the chair, an arm banded over his chest as he polished off the last of my toast. "Tell me about these suspicions."
I gave him an overview of her offhanded comments from yesterday, the quick barbs about him not joining me for Emme's wedding next weekend and the trap I fell into when mentioning a summer wedding.
Now that I'd answered some of Janet's questions and offered up a few random details to her, there was more room for our stories to fall apart.
"I think I'm the source of the doubt," I said.
"She's worried I'm going to leave you at the altar or something like that.
" A terrible thought struck as I added more hot water to my cup.
"That's not what you're planning, is it?
I'd really prefer if you killed this bit before the invites hit the mail. "
"Fine. I guess I'll come up with something new." He flagged down a waiter. "Or we stay engaged a little longer."
I waited while he ordered seventy percent of the breakfast menu. Forever a growing boy, it seemed. "How much longer?"
"I don't know." He dumped some sugar into his coffee, stirred it longer than necessary. Didn't meet my gaze. "If we're going to put these suspicions to rest, we should make it believable tonight."
I heard the challenge baked into those words. I knew what he meant. I also knew it was an opening, a side door into a house where the front steps still looked a little too steep to me. "Okay," I said.
"Are you sure you're going to be all right with that?" he asked. Subtext: are we turning this fake engagement into a full-contact sport?
"I've played worse games for fewer prizes," I said, my tiny, mug-dwelling mouse nowhere to be found. "Don't worry about me."
His gaze swept over my loose button-down and limp ponytail to land on my lips. He lingered there a moment then ran a hand over his mouth. "Someday I'd like to hear about those games."
I shook my head. He didn't really want to know about life with my ex and the way I parried and sparred with my family.
The way I still fought them for inches, even when I should've built a brick wall of boundaries and left them to learn how to climb.
But I didn't want to watch the disappointment register in his eyes.
I knew he expected better. Expected more.
Hell, I expected more. I didn't know how I hadn't realized that until now. "I can't give away all my secrets."
"You used to give me everything." He cleared his throat and glanced away. I didn't think he'd meant to say that. Not out loud. "We need to stick together. Tonight," he added. "We're playing for the same side."
"Right. Stay together, keep the stories straight." I gave my oatmeal another halfhearted stir. "They can't catch us with contradictory details if we're never apart."
He stared at his coffee before taking a sip. "You'll tell me if it gets to be too much. I don't want you to…" He jerked a shoulder up, let it fall. Studied me over the rim of his mug. "I don't want it to be like that night at the motel."
So good of him to bring that up. "I don't think it will be."
Jude pointed at the oatmeal. "What are you doing there? Are you ever going to eat that?"
"Shut up," I grumbled. "I've had at least four bites."
It was more like two but he didn't need to know that.
"The fuck you have," he said. "What do you want? Scrambled eggs on a roll? Or in a tortilla? I'll ask them to make it for you."
"No, it's okay. I'm fine with oatmeal."
"You're not fine and you're not eating, you're glaring.
And you don't even like oatmeal so I don't know what the fuck you're doing with this.
" He moved my bowl to his side of the table like it would prove a point.
"Since you look like you're about to fall off that chair, tell me right now: on a roll or in a tortilla? "
"I don't feel well," I said through gritted teeth.
"Hangover? Or is it something else?"
I balled my hands inside the sleeves of my cardigan and gave a pathetic shake of my head like I was a sickly Victorian child.
"I don't use enough recreational drugs to know whether it's from the ecstasy or just something I ate.
My stomach can be really sensitive and flare up over random things, especially—" I flapped my hands near the sides of my head meant to round up all of this.
"Greasy eggs will definitely make it worse. "
"Okay, no grease. Understood. Probably no salsa, right? What about other veggies? And how about cheese? Is that okay?"
For no good reason at all, I wanted to argue with him.
Tell him he couldn't just take my oatmeal and force scrambled eggs upon me.
That I was the one who got me through the worst of it.
That even when I was married, I'd lived on my own, without anyone looking after me, and I didn't need him to start now.
The notion of someone helping me, even in this small way, was so foreign that it felt like an attack. And that made me want to cry.
"If you don't tell me, I'll order both and eat whatever you don't."
I gulped down a fresh blast of emotion. It was ridiculous to have a reaction like this to a breakfast order. I could let him do this for me. I could let him help, even if I had to put myself in a mental straitjacket to do it. It wouldn't hurt me and I wouldn't come out of this owing him anything.
"No cheese. No veggies. Just plain." When he lifted a brow, I added, "In a tortilla."
He pushed to his feet, saying, "You got it, Saunders."
As he skirted the table, he kissed the top of my head and twisted a hand down my ponytail, and I didn't feel so much like a ghost anymore.