Why did I hand this over to him? Is the culprit here the martini, the recent head injury, or sheer desperation?
“It’s good,” Charlie says finally, pressing my phone into my hand.
“That’s all you have to say?” I demand. “Nothing else you care to comment on?”
“Fine, it’s exceptional,” he says.
“It’s humiliating,” I parry.
He glances toward the bar, then meets my eyes again. “Look, Stephens. This is the end of a particularly shitty day, inside a particularly shitty restaurant. If we’re going to have this conversation, can I at least get a Coors?”
“You don’t strike me as a Coors guy,” I say.
“I’m not,” he says, “but I find the merciless mockery from the bartender here dampens my enjoyment of a Manhattan.”
I look toward the sexy TV bartender. “Another enemy of yours?”
His eyes darken, his mouth doing that grimace-twitch. “Is that what we are? Do you send all your enemies Bigfoot erotica, or just the special ones?”
“Oh no,” I say, feigning pity. “Did I hurt your feelings, Charlie?”
“You seem pretty pleased with yourself,” he says, “for a woman who just found out she was the inspiration for Cruella de Vil.”
I scowl at him. Charlie rolls his eyes. “Come on. I’ll buy you a martini. Or a puppy coat.”
A martini. Exactly what Nadine Winters drinks, whenever she doesn’t have easy access to virgin’s blood.
For some reason, my ex-boyfriend Jakob flits into my mind. I picture him drinking beer from a can on his back porch, his wife curled under his arm, swigging on her own.
Even four kids in, she’s laid-back and absurdly gorgeous, yet somehow “one of the guys.”
The Anti-Nora.
They always are, the women I get dumped for. Pretty hard to learn to be “one of the guys” when your entire experience with men growing up was either 1) them making your mother cry or 2) your mother’s dancer friends teaching you how to step-ball-change. I can be one of the guys, as long as the guys in question have a favorite song from Les Mis. Otherwise I’m hopeless.
“I’ll have a beer,” I say as I pass Charlie, “and you’re buying.”
“Like . . . I said?” he murmurs, following me to the peanut-shell-strewn bar.
As he’s exchanging pleasantries with the bartender (definitely not enemies; there’s a vibe, by which I mean he’s fifteen percent less rude than usual), I glance back toward the bathroom, but Libby still hasn’t emerged.
I don’t even realize I’ve gone back to rereading the chapters until Charlie tugs my phone from my hands. “Stop obsessing.”
“I’m not obsessing.”
He studies me with that black-hole gaze, the one that makes me want to scrabble for purchase. “I’m surprised this is such a problem for you.”
“And I’m shocked your artificial intelligence chip allows you to feel surprise.”
“Well, hello.” I flinch toward Libby’s voice and find her smiling like a cartoon cat whose mouth is stuffed with multiple canaries.
“Libby,” I say. “This is—”
Before I can introduce Charlie, she pipes up, “Just wanted to let you know, I called a cab. I’m not feeling well.”
“What’s wrong?” I start to rise but she pushes my shoulder back down, hard.
“Just exhausted!” She sounds anything but. “You should stay — you’re not even done with your burger.”
“Lib, I’m not going to just let you—”
“Oh!” She looks at her phone. “Hardy’s here — you don’t mind getting the bill, do you, Nora?”
I’m not traditionally a blusher, but my face is on fire because I’ve just realized what’s going on, which means Charlie likely has too, and Libby’s already retreating, leaving me with half a veggie burger, an unpaid bill, and a deep desire for the earth to swallow me whole.
She throws a look over her shoulder and calls loudly, “Good luck checking off number five, Sissy!”
“Number five?” Charlie asks as the door swings shut, vanishing my sister into the night.
I really don’t like the idea of her hiking up those steps alone. I snatch my phone back up and text her, LET ME KNOW THE SECOND YOU MAKE IT UP TO THE COTTAGE OR ELSE!!!!
Libby replies, Let me know the second you make it to third base with Mr. Hottman.
Over my shoulder, Charlie snorts. I turn my phone away, squaring my shoulders. “That was my sister, Libby,” I say. “Ignore everything she says. She’s always horny when she’s pregnant. Which is always.”
His (truly miraculous) eyebrows lift, his heavy-lidded gaze homing in. “There is . . . so much to unpack in that sentence.”
“And so little time.” I bite into my burger just to focus on something other than his face. “I should get back to her.”
“So no time for that beer.” He says it like a challenge, like I knew it. His brow is arched, the tiniest shred of a smirk hiding in one corner of his mouth. Somehow this doesn’t totally extinguish his pout. It just makes it a smout.
The bartender returns with our sweating glass bottles then, and Charlie thanks her. For the first time, I see her staggeringly incandescent smile. “Of course,” she says. “If you need anything, just say the word.”
As she turns away, Charlie faces me, taking a long sip.
“Why do you get a smile?” I demand. “I’m a thirty-percent-minimum tipper.”
“Yeah, well, you should try almost marrying her and see if that helps,” he replies, leaving me so stunned I’m back to gawping.
“Speaking of sentences with a lot to unpack.”
“I know you’re a busy woman,” he says. “I’ll let you get back to sharpening your knives and organizing your poison cabinet, Nadine Winters.”
He says everything so evenly, it’s easy to miss the joke in it. But this time the unmistakably cajoling note in his voice back-combs over me until I feel like a dog with its hackles up.
“First of all,” I say, “it’s a pantry, not a cabinet. And second of all, the beer’s already here, and it’s after work hours, so I might as well drink it.”
Because I am not Nadine Winters. I grab my bottle and chug, feeling Charlie’s owlish eyes heavy on me.
He says, “It’s fucking good, right?” For once, he lets a little excitement into his voice. His eyes flash like lightning just crackled through the inside of his skull.
“If you’re into cat pee and gasoline.”
“The chapter, Nora.”
My jaw tightens as I nod.
As far as I’ve seen, Charlie’s eyebrows have three modes: brooding, scowling, and portraying something that’s either concern or confusion. That’s what they’re up to now. “But you’re still upset about it.”
“Upset?” I cry. “Just because my oldest client thinks I’d fire someone for getting pregnant? Don’t be silly.”
Charlie tucks one foot on the rung of his stool, his knee bumping mine. “She doesn’t think that.” He tips his head back for another swig. A bead of beer sneaks down his neck, and for a moment, I’m hypnotized, watching it cut a trail toward the collar of his shirt.
“And even if she does,” Charlie says, “that doesn’t make it true.”
“If she wrote a whole book about it,” I say, “it might make other people think it’s true.”
“Who cares?”
“This guy.” I point to my chest. “The person who needs people to work with her in order to have a job.”
“How long have you been representing Dusty?” he asks.