Chapter 2 The Size She Never Wore
Audrey looked at the open bedroom door.
Then she crossed to it and closed it.
Nolan watched her hand remain on the knob for one second after the latch settled.
She did not turn the lock.
The omission should not have mattered. The door was closed either way. The hallway remained on the other side. His jacket and keys were still beyond it.
But Nolan noticed.
Audrey turned back toward him.
“Six weeks,” she said.
The same length of time the dress had been waiting behind her coats.
Nolan looked at the garment bag.
“So you knew before you bought it.”
“Yes.”
“You saw something, bought a dress, and spent six weeks deciding when to reveal it.”
Audrey’s mouth tightened.
“When you say it like that, it sounds calculated.”
“Was it spontaneous?”
“No.”
“Then calculated seems accurate.”
She did not disagree.
The silence between them felt different with the door closed. More private. Not safer.
Audrey’s phone vibrated against the dresser.
Neither of them looked away from the other.
It vibrated again.
“The reception,” Nolan said.
“Yes.”
“You’re late.”
“Yes.”
“You should go.”
Audrey glanced toward the phone. “Do you want me to?”
The question irritated him immediately.
“You have eight hundred guests waiting to find out whether anyone verified the numbers on a catering invoice.”
“They aren’t waiting for me personally.”
“You said that as though you believe it.”
“I believe the event will continue if I’m not there.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
“No.” Audrey drew a slow breath. “It isn’t.”
Nolan looked toward the door.
He could not decide whether her willingness to remain made him feel important or trapped.
Audrey appeared to recognize the difference.
“I can leave,” she said.
“This is your apartment.”
“I’m aware.”
“So I’m supposed to stay here with the dress while you go to your reception?”
“No.”
“What are you proposing?”
“I’m saying that if you need space, I can give it to you without asking you to leave first.”
Nolan stared at her.
The offer was so practical that it felt rehearsed, though he doubted she had imagined this exact arrangement: her standing in one earring and an unfinished face while he occupied her bedroom with a dress she had bought in his size.
Audrey continued before he could answer.
“I can also remove the dress.”
His gaze moved toward the closet.
“I can return it tomorrow,” she said. “Or tonight, if the store will accept it after hours.”
“You think returning it changes anything?”
“No.”
“Then why offer?”
“Because the object is mine to remove.”
“For now.”
The words left his mouth before he decided to say them.
Audrey’s eyes shifted briefly toward the garment bag.
Nolan felt heat move into his face.
He had not meant to imply ownership. He had not meant to imply interest. He had meant only that the dress had been purchased for someone who was not Audrey.
Audrey did not seize on the mistake.
“That is part of what we have to establish,” she said.
“We don’t have to establish anything.”
“No.”
“You keep saying no as though it makes you less certain.”
Her expression changed slightly.
“It makes me careful.”
“I don’t want careful.”
“What do you want?”
The question landed too close to the truth.
Nolan looked away.
Audrey waited.
He hated that she could do that. Ask something simple and let the space afterward make avoidance feel louder than an answer.
“I want to know what you did,” he said.
“All right.”
“And why.”
Audrey nodded once.
“And then I’m leaving.”
“All right.”
The ease of her agreement made him angry again.
“You don’t believe me.”
“I believe you intend to leave.”
“That isn’t the same thing.”
“No.”
He almost told her to stop saying it.
Instead, he crossed back toward the closet.
The garment bag remained partly open where the zipper had caught. The wine-colored dress showed through a narrow vertical gap.
Nolan set the cream card on Audrey’s dresser.
He wanted both hands free.
Audrey watched him without moving closer.
Nolan reached for the zipper and lowered it carefully until the dress was visible from shoulder to hem.
He had seen enough before.
This was not about seeing more.
It was about evidence.
The dress hung from a padded black hanger.
The wrap front crossed from left to right, fastened internally with a narrow tie and externally with a longer sash.
The sleeves were full length and slightly gathered at the cuffs.
The skirt fell in a clean line from the waist, neither tight nor dramatically full.
It was elegant.
That annoyed him.
A ridiculous dress would have been easier. Sequins. Ruffles. Something chosen by a woman who understood femininity only as spectacle.
Audrey had selected restraint.
The color did most of the work.
Wine, deep enough to approach burgundy in shadow, warmer where the closet light touched it.
Nolan lifted the paper tag again.
The number had not changed.
He looked over his shoulder at Audrey.
“What size do you wear?”
She told him.
He already knew.
He looked at the tag.
The difference was impossible to explain as preference.
“You could have bought it oversized.”
“I could have.”
“But you didn’t.”
“No.”
“You could have intended to have it altered.”
“I didn’t.”
“You could have bought it for a donor auction.”
“I didn’t.”
Her answers remained irritatingly clean.
Nolan turned back to the dress.
He touched one sleeve between two fingers.
The material was softer than it looked.
His hand released it immediately.
Audrey noticed.
Of course she noticed.
“Did you measure me?” he asked.
“No.”
“You know my sleeve length?”
“No.”
“You know my chest measurement?”
“No.”
“My waist?”
“No.”
He faced her.
“Then how did you choose this?”
Audrey folded her hands loosely in front of her.
“Observation.”
The word sounded clinical.
“You observed me.”
“Yes.”
“Closely enough to buy a dress.”
“I know approximately how tall you are. I know the width of your shoulders. I know how jackets fit you. I know your build.”
“And that translates directly into women’s sizing?”
“No.”
“Then what?”
“I guessed.”
Nolan looked back at the tag.
“You guessed correctly.”
“We don’t know that.”
The sentence unsettled him.
“You bought a dress without knowing whether it would fit.”
“Yes.”
“For someone you had not spoken to.”
“Yes.”
“Who might never wear it.”
Audrey’s voice lowered.
“Yes.”
Nolan studied her.
The possibility that the dress might not fit had not occurred to him.
He had treated its size as proof of certainty. Audrey knew. Audrey had calculated. Audrey had selected him.
But the dress could be wrong.
The shoulders might pull.
The waist might sit incorrectly.
The sleeves might be too short or too long.
Audrey had made a guess and placed it behind her coats like an answer.
He did not know whether that made the situation better.
It made her seem less omniscient, which was something.
“You could have asked me,” he said.
Audrey’s fingers tightened once around each other.
“Yes.”
“You could have shown me the photograph.”
“No.”
The refusal came too quickly.
Nolan’s attention sharpened.
“Why not?”
“Because you deleted it.”
“That doesn’t answer the question.”
“It told me you did not want it in our conversation.”
“You decided what deletion meant.”
“I decided it meant I should not restore something you removed.”
The phrasing made the photograph sound like a broken file rather than the most frightening mistake Nolan had made in years.
“You could have said you saw it.”
“Yes.”
“You could have asked whether it was meant for you.”
“Yes.”
“You could have asked whether I wanted to discuss it.”
“Yes.”
“But you didn’t.”
“No.”
“Why?”
Audrey looked toward the dress.
Her gaze remained there long enough that Nolan wondered whether she had chosen the garment because it was easier to look at than him.
“When the photograph disappeared,” she said, “I assumed you deleted it because you were afraid.”
“You assumed correctly.”
“I didn’t know what you were afraid of.”
“Does the distinction matter?”
“Yes.”
“To whom?”
“To me.”
Nolan laughed once, without humor.
“Of course.”
Audrey’s eyes returned to him.
“That was selfishly phrased.”
“It was honest.”
“Yes.”
“You wanted to know whether I was afraid of you.”
“Yes.”
“And rather than ask, you bought this.”
The dress moved slightly on the hanger when Nolan’s hand touched the garment bag.
Audrey watched the movement.
“I did not buy it immediately.”
“How long did you wait?”
“Four days.”
“An impressive display of restraint.”
Her jaw tightened.
“I deserve that.”
Nolan wished she would argue.
Anger needed resistance. Without it, the feeling had nowhere to go except back into him.
He stepped away from the closet.
“Did you talk to anyone?”
“No.”
“The woman at the store?”
“Yes.”
“That counts as someone.”
“I spoke to her about fit and fabric. I did not give her your name, show her your photograph, or describe anything private.”
“You told her the dress was for a man.”
Audrey hesitated.
Nolan saw the answer before she gave it.
“I told her it was for an adult partner with a different build from mine.”
“That is not an answer.”
“I did not use the word man.”
“But she understood.”
“I don’t know what she understood.”
“You went into a women’s boutique and asked for a dress in my size.”
“Yes.”
“And somehow nobody understood anything.”
“I didn’t say that.”
Nolan moved toward the window this time and stopped beside the chair near it.
The glass reflected part of the room behind him.
Audrey near the dresser.
The open closet.
The dark line of the garment bag.
He turned away from the reflection.
“Did she see the card?”
“No.”
“Did she write the message?”
“No.”
“Did she suggest it?”
“No.”
“Did she tell you to hide the dress?”
“No.”
“Then this was all you.”
“Yes.”
The answer was almost quiet.
Nolan looked at her.
Audrey’s composure had begun to show strain.