CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Leave it to Martin to ruin everything.
With murder o’clock drawing nearer, Grant and I approached him after dinner in hopes he’d invite us to the final stages of his plan.
Maybe a celebratory nightcap and strangulation on the empty patio, or a nice garroting in the bike barn.
But no, he offered us a quick congratulations and excused himself for a dip in the hot tub.
So now we have to go for a dip in the hot tub.
Funny how the prospect of being in close quarters with Grant, significantly less clothed than usual, can turn me right back into a panicky wreck.
While he changes in our bathroom, I’m debating whether he’d think it’s weird if I wore a big T-shirt in the hot tub like a sunburned kid at the beach.
Or a sweater. Maybe I could convince him to do the same.
As if the gods of forced proximity are finally cutting me a break, my phone rings. I jump for it and speed toward the door.
“I have to take this,” I call to Grant. “I’ll go keep eyes on Martin.”
I duck into the hall, giving myself just a moment to exhale before answering the phone.
“Hey,” I say, plodding down the hall.
“Hi, hi, hi,” says Steph. It’s so good to hear her voice. “I only have a minute, but I wanted to announce that Half-Baked is our next Anna Matthews book, because I just found a copy in the Little Free Library outside the hospital.”
Book club. Right. Lately it’s a little hard to believe that I used to just read these things for fun and then go about my business without completely unraveling.
A thought stops me short at the patio door. “Did you see Anna’s Instagram post?”
“Nope,” she says. “You know my rule: no following people I don’t know in real life. Too big a time suck. Why, is she working on something new?”
I suddenly feel overwhelmed with bitterness. It’s bad enough that all this is happening to me. It’s worse that I can’t tell my best friend about it. Not unless I want to be gently lectured on the benefits of antipsychotics, anyway.
“We’ll see,” I say, trying to sound like I’m not gritting my teeth. “Anyway, Half-Baked. Sounds good. I’ll pick it up when I get back.”
“Back? You didn’t tell me about this one! Where are you now, hang gliding in the outback? Drag racing in South Africa?”
“Close,” I say, stepping out into the night.
The air is cool and sprinkled with the singing of crickets and the wind in the trees.
A long walkway winds through dormant rosebushes and boxwood shrubs, and there at the end of it, climbing into a glowing hot tub, is Martin.
He’s out of earshot and facing away, but I duck behind a planter and lower my voice anyway.
“I’m just outside of London,” I say. “For a … work trip.”
“Work trip? Since when do temps travel for work? Unless …” She gasps. “Did you finally take that job at the gym?”
“No,” I say, a thread of irritation bristling in me. “And since when do self-defense instructors travel for work?”
“I don’t know! You’re the expert. I just want to know why the hell you won’t accept a job that’s literally so perfect for you.”
Not this again. “Because!” The word blares out of me like a trumpet blast, and I steal a look at Martin to make sure he didn’t hear. He’s in a trancelike state of relaxation, swaying as if to music only he can hear. “I’m too busy.”
“Mm-hmm,” Steph says.
“And teaching isn’t my thing.”
“Right.”
“And the studio’s really far from my apartment.”
“You’ve gone all the way to London for a job you don’t even like, but okay.”
I huff at her. “I just don’t want to!”
She sighs. “Okay. If you say so. But you want to know what I think?”
“No,” I say, trusting her to know by my tone that what I really mean is Yeah, kind of.
“I think one of these days, you’re going to have to ask yourself if there’s a difference between not wanting something and being afraid of it.”
“Okay, Brené Brown,” I say, in an I’m not mad at you, but we’re done talking about this way. “Anyway, don’t you have a job to be getting to? The children of San Diego are not going to appendectomize themselves, you know. Hopefully.”
She snorts. “Nah, today it’s just a marble in the nose. But it’s, like, really in there.”
We say our goodbyes and our love yous, and I hang up feeling just as winded as before. Just once this week, it’d be marvelous to have a conversation that doesn’t strike at the heart of my deepest insecurities.
The thing is, Steph’s my best friend. Her seeing right through me is par for the course.
But when it was me and Grant in Lesley’s garden, I opened up voluntarily.
I can’t really make sense of that, except to say that some things are just easier to talk about with people who don’t know you as well.
But that’s not how it felt. It felt like he knew me.
And for a minute, it felt like I wanted him to.
And that, right there, is the danger of all of this.
Strike that. The real danger is sitting in that hot tub. That’s what I need to focus on. Nothing else.
And so, minutes later, Grant and I are shivering in swimsuits and white terry-cloth robes, staring down the cobbled path to where the Sweetheart Slayer soaks in wait, lit eerily blue by the hot tub’s glow.
“This has to be it,” I say quietly, my breath clouding in the night air. “The grand finale. The big moment. Time to bring our A game and break this guy.”
“Has anyone ever told you you prepare for attempted murder like a junior varsity basketball coach?” Grant whispers.
“All the time.”
Grant takes a deep breath. “Okay,” he says on the exhale. “Then let’s get out there and give it our one hundred and ten percent.” He holds his hand out, and I take it.
We’re silent as we stalk forward, pausing only to shed our robes.
My plan to not look at Grant south of chin level vanishes the moment his torso is bared to me, shoulders shifting as he sets his robe on a bench.
I’ve never known the finer details of his body under his signature sweaters and pullovers, but now I feel as though I should have.
Everything that’s new to me—his lean stomach, his light dusting of chest hair, the hollows of his neck and collarbone—they’re all a perfect continuation of the parts of him that I know.
I force myself to meet his eyes and realize with a start that he’s been watching me too.
His gaze roams over my body, studying me.
When we finally make eye contact, something unspoken passes between us—something I can’t name but can feel over every inch of my skin.
And then Grant darts a glance at Martin, and I remember: the mission.
The mission comes first. Don’t be turned on; be annoying. I can do that.
Martin jumps when we enter the hot tub and sit on either side of him, much too close for comfort.
“Heyyyy, friend!” I sing at him.
He looks a little startled but offers a polite smile as he glances from me to Grant. “Hello, you two.”
“Hope you don’t mind us joining you,” says Grant. “When we saw you out here all by your lonesome, we just thought, Now, there’s a man who could really use some company.” Grant shakes Martin by the shoulders for emphasis. Martin’s smile is getting weaker by the moment.
“Yes,” he says. “Nothing better than a hot—quiet—soak under the stars.”
“Sure, sure. You know what is better, though?” I lean past Martin to flash a sickeningly sweet gaze at Grant. “The sweet embrace of the one you love.”
“Aw, babe.” He reaches behind Martin to take my hand, bumping Martin’s head forward in the process. Finally, Martin is beginning to look less than enthused. We’re in the window of Murder Time, and it shows.
“Nathan,” I say across Martin, “what is your favorite thing about our love?”
Grant blows out a thinking man’s breath. “So many things to choose from,” he says. “Probably the fact that neither of us will ever have to go on vacation alone ever again.”
“So true,” I say. “I personally really love the fact that if either of us died unexpectedly, we wouldn’t be found weeks later, half-eaten by a cat.”
Grant’s face goes deadpan, silently asking, Seriously? I give him an apologetic shrug.
Meanwhile, Martin’s eyes are fixed on the bubbling water, his mouth pressed in a grim curve that only barely resembles a smile. I wouldn’t say he’s homicidal, but he’s getting there.
“And the sex,” I blurt. Martin startles and gives me a flustered look. “The hot, hot sex we’re always having. Tell him, babe.”
“Oh. Wow,” says Grant, eyes frozen wide. I have to stifle a snort. He bumps Martin’s shoulder, nodding at me. “This one’s a reeeeal bottle rocket in the old … sack.”
Old sack? I mouth at him, barely keeping it together. He shoots me a warning look, his lips pressed tight, but I can see the tremor of repressed laughter in his shoulders.
“Yep,” I say, fighting to keep my voice level. “Once we get started, we sure do … keep going.”
Martin clears his throat. “Well, I … I do admire your candor,” he says.
Something stony has crept into his face, but it’s still not enough. I don’t get it. We’re being the most obnoxious people who ever lived, and he still isn’t trying to kill us. What’s it going to take to push him over the edge?
“Want to know our secret?” Grant asks. Martin’s looking at him like Thanks, I’m good, whereas I’m trying not to look too intrigued. “It’s all in the buildup,” Grant continues. “You have to savor the moment. A slow dance, a massage … Don’t I give a great massage, babe?”
“Mm-hmm,” I say, a little unsteadily. “Magic fingers, this one.”
There’s a pause during which Grant doesn’t take his eyes off me, and the heat from the water seems to have entered my bloodstream.
“Matter of fact,” he says, “those shoulders are looking a little tense now. Why don’t you come here, babe?”
My breath catches. “Really?” He gives me a small nod, then flashes a quick look at Martin. Martin, who is finally beginning to frown. This is going to work. And it means nothing; it’s just the job.