Chapter 19
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Dexter
I’d offered to pick Hollie up but, she said she’d meet me outside Gabriel’s place and made me promise not to go inside without her.
I leaned against the car, trying to see if I could spot her.
I didn’t know what I should be looking for, given we were going to a fancy-dress party.
I’d asked her a couple of times about her costume but she’d refused to tell me anything.
When I suggested Kelly McGillis, Hollie had challenged me to remember the character’s name, and when I couldn’t, she told me she wasn’t going to go as my nameless appendage.
Then I made a crude joke about my dick being my best appendage, and she thwacked me with a towel.
I transferred my fighter pilot helmet from one hand to the other.
My assistant had done a good job with the costume.
The red and black striped helmet even had the word Maverick painted on it in white.
My green jumpsuit had all the requisite patches, including the American flag, Top Gun school crest, and Tom Cat.
But I felt a bit of a dick. Costumes weren’t really my thing.
I checked my watch. She’d said she’d be here ten minutes ago, but it was difficult to know whether she was normally late.
Our relationship had been conducted entirely behind closed doors in my apartment.
We’d had that one dinner when we first met, but since then we’d been banished from going outside together.
“Hey, wanna be my wingman?” Hollie called from behind me.
I turned to find her grinning at me. And then her face dropped. “You guys have Dr. Seuss, right?”
I chuckled, taking in her red flannel outfit and the white circular label on her chest that read Thing 1. “You’re adorable. And yes, we do. Where’s Thing 2?”
She pulled out her keys and dangled a miniature version of herself in front of me.
“Autumn bought it for me. She has another.” Then she slipped her red-gloved hands around my waist and put her head on my chest. “I like you as a pilot. Maybe I should have gone for something a little more feminine, Sexy Dexter.”
Her blue felt hat, shaped like an upside-down octopus, smacked me in the face.
“You’re the sexiest I’ve ever seen you,” I replied.
“You’re a terrible liar,” she said.
“I mean it. Are you wearing anything under that—what is that—is it all-in-one? Does this zip work?” I reached for the neck of her costume to see if I could reveal what was underneath.
She batted my hand away. “I’m wearing pajamas,” she said. “I got a bunch of felt online and with hand stitching and glue, this is what I came up with. And yes, I have underwear on, you pervert.”
She looked completely cute. I was relieved she’d gone to some effort and not bunged on a suit and said she was a CIA agent or something. Gabriel would appreciate her commitment. All the boys would.
“You look phenomenal,” I replied, kissing her on her forehead. No one would be dressed like her.
“You’re sure you don’t wish I’d come as Princess Leia in the gold bikini?” she asked, looking up at me.
I’d be lying if I confessed that the image she’d conjured up wasn’t appealing. “Was that an option? Do you have the bikini back at your place?” I asked. “We could have our own private party later if you insist.”
She rolled her eyes. “So predictable. But this,” she said, pulling away and sweeping an arm down her soft, crimson body, “is as sexy as you can handle.”
I grabbed her hand and pulled her toward Gabriel’s drive. “If we stay here in the dark a moment longer, I’ll have you unzipped and naked in the back of the Sentinel.”
“If I’m completely honest, I’m not feeling hugely sexy,” she said, holding on to her hat as we crossed the road.
“My jumpsuit is chafing if it makes you feel any better.”
“It does. It’s good to know it’s not just women who suffer for their fashion choices. I’m a fire hazard most of the time given the materials in my clothes.”
“Well, at least tonight, no one will miss you in a fire.”
I knocked on the door and went in. The hallway led into the open-plan kitchen area where Gabriel and his daughter spent most of their time. The glass doors into the garden had been opened and the party had spilled out onto the patio.
I didn’t see anyone I knew. Probably due to the fact that we were all dressed up and pretending to be someone else. Then Stella, in a gold helmet and blue cloak, came toward us, her gaze pinned on Hollie.
“Hey!” she said, brandishing a spear. “You must be Hollie. I fucking love your outfit. Just my type of girl. I thought you might turn up in a Princess Leia bikini and I’d have had to take off your head,” she said, wiggling her spear.
“What the fuck is with the spear?” I asked, kissing her on both cheeks.
“I’m Boudica, you walking cliché. You know that film is full of homoerotic imagery?” she asked.
“I like fast planes and good-looking guys,” I replied. “Shoot me.”
“You’re ridiculous,” Hollie said, laughing.
“He is,” Stella said, grinning as if she finally had a partner in crime. “I’m so pleased I don’t have to break it to you. Come and get a drink. You have to see what Beck has come as. He’s even more ridiculous. The testosterone is exhausting. Gabriel’s the only normal friend they have.”
Hollie looked at me and smiled, her blue hat wobbling to one side. “Thank you,” she said.
I wasn’t sure what she meant, and I didn’t have time to ask her before we found Tristan, Gabriel and Beck. I couldn’t help but laugh at how predictable Tristan’s outfit was. “Han Solo?” I asked.
“Yeah, I’m hoping there’ll be a few women here dressed as Leia. You know,” he said, making a cupping gesture in front of him. “In the bikini.”
“You know I’m carrying a spear,” Stella said. “And you’re just asking to have me target your balls.”
Tristan just shrugged.
I turned to Gabriel. “Happy birthday.” I looked him up and down. “Did you two come as a couple?” I asked, taking in his Darth Vader costume. The five-year-old in me was dying to know if the mask pushed to the top of his head did the voice.
“No. And I have to say, I think Han Solo is a weak costume. It’s too conventional. Tristan’s basically rummaged at the back of his wardrobe and found what he wore to university and picked up a plastic gun. Unlike me. Or you.” He held his hand out to Hollie. “I’m Darth,” he said.
“Thing 1. Happy birthday,” she said. They shook hands as if this was any old introduction in the pub.
“Very good,” he said. “I read Dr. Seuss to my daughter. She’s three so I’m not sure she appreciates all the nuances, but I do.”
“How’s it going?” I asked. It was his first birthday since his wife had left.
He nodded and took a large swig of wine. I didn’t press him. It was his birthday, and I was sure he didn’t want to get into it.
“Why are you so pissed off at Beck?” I asked Stella, taking in Beck’s Hulk costume.
“I’m just irritated. He’s greener than I ordinarily like a man. I wanted him to come as Batman,” she said. “That’s a manly costume. And much less green.”
“Yeah but too Vader-y,” he said, indicating Gabriel’s billowing cloak.
“It was thoughtful not to upstage the host,” Hollie muttered beside me.
Stella leaned toward us both. “I know. It’s very sweet that he didn’t want to overshadow Gabriel, but I’m hoping he’s going to put on the costume I got him when we get home so I’m pretending to sulk.”
Hollie laughed and her blue hair fell off, revealing her own dark tendrils. “Oh, this thing is so hard to keep on,” she said. “Where’s your restroom? I’ll go reattach it. I have some bobby pins with me.”
Gabriel pointed over to the door by the stairs.
I tried to catch Hollie’s eye to see if she wanted me to go with her, but she’d already turned to go.
She’d been so adamant she didn’t want me going into the party before her, I wasn’t sure if she was okay to be on her own.
“You think I should go?” I asked Stella.
She frowned. “No. She would have asked you to help her with her hat if she hadn’t wanted to go by herself.”
I nodded. “Yeah, hadn’t thought of that.”
“But it’s very sweet that you’re considering her feelings. You’re very . . . touchy with each other,” she said.
“We’re not,” I said. Yes, I was holding her hand when we came in, and perhaps I’d given her a reassuring back stroke. But I wanted Hollie to feel comfortable. And it was rare for there to be so many people surrounding us. I just wanted her to know that I was . . . here. “No more than you and Beck.”
“Yeah, Beck and I are very touchy. It’s not a criticism. It’s nice to see you like that with a woman.”
I was about to defend myself and say how it was no different from any other girlfriend, but there was no point.
I’d never had the same desire to touch a woman every moment the way I did with Hollie, and although I’d not thought about it consciously before, no doubt that was obvious from someone like Stella’s point of view.
“But you know the thing that makes me sure she’s a winner?” Stella asked.
“Go on,” I said, making clear from my tone that I didn’t want to know.
“Her costume.”
I laughed. “You think Hollie is my perfect match because she’s dressed as a Dr. Seuss character?”
“Absolutely. She could have come as Wonder Woman or Catgirl. Or Princess Leia in that bloody gold bikini. But she came in a onesie. I like the lack of vanity. She’d be completely entitled to come as some super-sexy character, but I like that she didn’t.
It proves there’s more to her than the pretty face. She’s quirky.”
“She’s not that quirky,” I said defensively. I didn’t want Stella to think Hollie was some kind of novelty. “She’s just . . .”
I couldn’t find the right word because Hollie deserved more than a throwaway phrase to describe her. She was more interesting than that.
“You like her.”
“Of course I like her or I wouldn’t be hanging out with her.” I could feel myself falling into the same old argument I had with all my friends—how yes, she was a nice girl but how she wasn’t Bridget. Only this time, I stopped myself. “But yes, I really like her.”
Beck interrupted us. “What are you two gossiping about? Hollie? I like her outfit. Thank God she didn’t wear that Princess Leia bikini or you would be competing with Tristan.”
Women who flirted with my friends to get my attention didn’t last long. “No, I don’t think I would,” I said. “Hollie’s not like that.”
I didn’t miss the nudge Stella gave Beck. It was to be expected, I guessed. I liked Hollie a lot, and it was only in the context of the outside world that it was so obvious.
“I like her outfit,” Beck said. “Shows she’s a woman with her own mind.”
“That’s what I said,” Stella replied.
And that was what Hollie was for me—unlike anyone else I’d ever met. She was just . . . Hollie.