I shrugged. “I don’t care. We should go. Will we get in dressed like this?”
He shook his head but the smiled remained. “I think I can get us in. You realise we’re way underdressed though, right?”
I really didn’t care. I hadn’t misheard Kinsey. She’d made a point of telling me it was nothing fancy. If she was playing games in hope of embarrassing me, it wasn’t going to work. I would have felt more out of place in a dress and heels than jeans and boots, regardless of how everyone else was dressed.
True to his word, Adam got us in. All he had to do was sweet-talk the woman bouncer at the door. She unhooked the velvet rope and ushered us in, shamelessly winking at Adam as he passed.
I hated the whole atmosphere of Club Pieza.
The loud music pulsed through me. Overhead strobe lights worked the crowd. The tight grip Adam had on my hand did little to save me. Bodies thumped and jerked into both of us as we manoeuvred our way through the club in search of his purple circle teammates.
Finding them took no time at all. They were upstairs in the VIP section, hidden away at a private table.
“Hey!” greeted Parker as soon as he saw us. Adam dropped my hand to receive the back thumping hug that guys are so fond of. Parker toned it down for me, kissing my cheek as if he knew me. “I’m glad you could make it.”
“Didn’t you think we would?” asked Adam, glancing at Kinsey.
“We weren’t sure,” she said. “Charli was a little non-committal. Still, it’s nice to see you dressed up for us.” She looked me up and down.
“Drinks and pizza, Kins?” asked Adam.
Her expression was the guiltiest I’d ever seen, confirming what I knew. Kinsey had tried setting me up. At least Adam knew it too.
I decided very early in the evening that if I couldn’t beat them, the only option I had was to join them. Kinsey, Sera and Jeremy shuffled along the narrow booth seat making way for me to sit down. Adam remained standing, talking to Parker.
The loud music made it hard to hear each other speak. Snide whispers were impossible to catch, which was probably a godsend. I got the impression there was a lot of it going on.
“Charli, would you like something to drink?” asked Jeremy, pointing to the copious bottles of wine on the table. “Champagne maybe?”
What was it with these people and champagne? Where I came from, champagne was for special occasions. Then again, so was wearing mascara, but I’d found myself doing that a lot lately. Maybe I was turning into one of them. I shuddered at the thought and quickly declined his offer, settling for a beer instead, to Kinsey’s disgust.
Small talk was exactly that – only smaller. Jeremy tried hard, asking me every polite question he could think of. Unfortunately, my answers were as short as his questions, so conversation soon dried up. The lull didn’t last long. Kinsey jumped right in, asking me all sorts of things that I would never have considered answering if not for the two beers I’d consumed.
“Is that everything?” I asked wearily. “Is there anything else you’d like to know?”
“Just one more thing,” said Kinsey, leaning in close. “Adam belongs to one of the wealthiest families in Manhattan. Why are you wearing an eighty dollar wedding ring?”
I glanced down at my hand, wiggling my fingers. “Is that all its worth? He told me he paid a hundred for it.”
Kinsey burst into a fit of patronising giggles. Jeremy tried shushing her to no avail.
Perhaps sensing a drop in the level of good manners, Adam reached for my hand, pulling me to my feet. “Are you done playing?” he asked, leaning down so I’d hear him. “We can go if you want to.”
I felt utter relief. Parker walked over, interrupting by handing us both another drink. “I’ve got to tell you,” he began, “I’m still trying to come to terms with the news that you sneaked off and got married.”
“Don’t take it personally.” Adam grinned at me. “We had to do it quickly, before Charli changed her mind.”
Parker stared at me strangely – like he was trying to see further than my eyes. “Adam, how can you be so sure she’s the one?”
“Look at her. How could she not be the one?”
Parker smiled. “I’m happy for you, man.” He patted Adam on the back.
At that point I wasn’t sure how I felt about Parker. He was charming in his way, but something about him made me distrust him. He pulled me aside a short while later and I used it as an opportunity to figure him out a little more. We stood side by side, leaning against the railing, looking at the crowded dance floor below.
“Do you dance, Charlotte?” Parker asked, leaning in much too close.
“It’s Charli, and no. I definitely don’t dance.”
“Me neither. But I thought it would be polite to ask.”
“Well, you’re nothing if not polite.”
He twisted his body to look at me. I kept my eyes on the floor below, focusing on an extremely drunk girl jiggling around in a tight sequined dress. I couldn’t help smiling. Her butt looked like two pigs fighting in a sparkly sack.
“Do you see this whole marriage thing as a long-term deal, Charli?” he asked.
“Why not?” I asked, faking apathy. “Adam’s a great choice for a first husband.”
He smirked. “Adam and Whitney were together for a long time. It was amazing how quickly he dropped her in favour of you. He never used to be fickle.”
“To be honest, Parker, I could care less about Whitney – or the rest of his friends for that matter.”
“Ouch,” he muttered. “We’re just trying to be friendly.”
“No, you’re not. You’ve been testing me since I got here. Your girlfriend expected me to be embarrassed by the so-called mix up in the venue tonight. But I’m guessing you know that already,”
“Maybe I did.” The dark edge to his voice unnerved me. “Adam is our friend. We like having him around. Luckily, we’re patient.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means we’re happy to bide our time. I think he’ll tire of you.”
“Time will tell, I guess,” I replied, fighting to keep my tone strong.
“Adam told me all about your two-year plan. It’s fascinating.”
“Is that so?”
“Absolutely.” He leaned so close, I could feel his breath on my neck. “But you should know something. Adam is New York through and through. If you knew anything about him, you’d know he’s never going to leave here. And if you can’t adjust to that, you’ll be sent packing with a one-way ticket back to the gutter he found you in.”
I turned around, searching for Adam. He sat in the booth, wedged between Seraphina and Kinsey.
Noticing me, he winked. I forced a smile that must have looked odd. He nodded, excused himself and walked over. “Everything okay?” he asked, draping his arm around my shoulder.
“I’m just tired.”
“Yes. You should take your bride home, Adam. She looks a little weary.” Parker’s fake concern made me want to retch.
I pulled Adam by the hand to get him moving. Getting out of there took another ten minutes. By the time we’d said goodnight to everyone and manoeuvred our way through the crowd, I’d well and truly reached my New York limit for the day.
***
Just before six the next morning, the sound of Adam’s blaring alarm filled the bedroom. I’d been awake for a while so the annoyance was all his. He groaned, reached across and thumped his hand on the alarm to stop it beeping. I rolled to the side, resting my head on his warm chest, hoping to keep him in the cosy bed for a while longer.
“Stay with me today?”
Adam tangled his hand through my hair. “I can’t, Charlotte,” he murmured. “I wish I could.”
“What if I told you I needed you to?”
“Then I would stay.” His free hand moved to my forehead. “Are you sick?”
Sick and tired is what I was. Having to justify my New York existence at every turn was draining me. But it wasn’t a good
enough reason to keep him from attending class.
“No,” I said flatly. “I’m not sick.”
The old adage that a problem shared is a problem halved didn’t seem applicable. I wanted to tell him the reason for my dark mood, but coming clean and admitting that I was on his mother’s hit list wasn’t an option. Even Ryan had asked me not to tell Adam. Obviously he knew that ugly can of worms was pressurised.
Trying to fit in with his friends wasn’t working out so well either. It was not a plan I’d put my heart and soul into. Cheap shots and bitchy comments on my part had shut down any chance of being accepted from the very beginning. Not that being denied membership to the purple circle bothered me, but keeping up the façade that all was well was going to become tiresome.
“I’ll try and get home early. We’ll do something special, just the two of us,” he suggested.
Every second we spent alone together was special. It was the time I spent with other people that was slowing destroying me, from the inside out.
“I don’t need special. I just need you.” Hopefully, he’d realise it was the same thing.
Adam shifted, pressing my body into the mattress as he rolled on top of me. “Okay, we’ll do something un-special,” he teased. “Something ordinary.”
I allowed a slow smile to creep across my face. “Something un-flashy and un-Décarie.”
He dropped his head. “Are you craving the mundane, Charlotte?” He murmured the question against my bare skin, making me shudder.
I fisted my hands through his hair, drawing his face back to mine. “I’m craving low-key and normal.”
“I’ll see what I can do,” he replied, before kissing me in a way that reminded me why everything I endured was not without reason.
“I’m going to write it on the wall, Adam,” I warned, breaking free of his lips. “If it’s on the wall, it becomes a promise.”
“Fine by me,” he murmured.
***
In my estimation, getting home at five o’clock is not early. Too happy to have him home, I didn’t argue the point.
“Are you ready to go?” he asked, the second he was in the door.
“Go where?”
“To find normal.”
“Do you even do normal, Adam?”
He grabbed my coat off the hook and held it out to me, smiling brightly. “I guess you’ll have to wait and see.”
The weather was the only part of the afternoon that was bleak. We ended up at the rink at the Rockefeller Centre. I’d been there a few times before – as a camera-wielding tourist. The Prometheus statue had disappointed me each time. Statues aren’t great subjects for photographers who liked to capture moments in time. The united nation flags circling the rink were a much better muse, especially on windy days.
But there would be no photography today. We were there to ice skate – something that should have rated highly on my never-done list.
As expected, Boy Wonder was much steadier on his feet than I was. He slowly skated backwards, pulling me along.
“You’ve done this before, Adam,” I accused, stating the obvious. His grip on my hands was the only thing stopping me from crashing to the ice in a heap.
“Once or twice. Never with anyone as pretty as you though – or as uncoordinated. For a girl who balances on a plank in the ocean with ease, you’re remarkably clumsy on ice,” he teased.
“Just so you know, when I fall I’m taking you with me.” I wobbled a bit, and he moved quickly to steady me.
“Bend you knees and lean forward, not back,” he instructed, daring to laugh at my near-slip. “I won’t let you fall.”
Ice skating, much like my New York life, was all about finding balance. And I found that both were easier if I focused only on Adam.
If he found it odd that I was staring at him, he didn’t let on.
I was about to claim to be getting the hang of it when an obnoxious boy whizzed past us, far too close to be doing anything other than being a brat.
“Hey!” yelled Adam, grabbing a fistful of my coat to save me from falling. “Slow down, jerk!” The boy turned back, smirking wryly at the reprimand. We got the last laugh when an employee collared him as he went round and ordered him off the ice. Adam turned his attention back to me. “You okay?”
I smiled, but he didn’t loosen his grip. “Almost came a cropper.”
“Came a cropper,” he repeated, badly imitating my accent. “Is that even English, Charlotte?”
Laughing was a mistake. It signalled the end of my skating streak. Not even Adam could save me as my butt thudded down hard on the cold ice.
“Okay,” I whimpered. “Enough now.”
From behind, he hooked his arms under mine, levering me to my feet. He turned me around to face him. “I’ll take you home,” he said regretfully. “Seeing you get your ass kicked wasn’t part of my master plan this morning.”
My arse had been kicked much harder than that lately, and it wasn’t anywhere near as enjoyable as having it happen while ice skating with the boy I loved.
I linked my arms around his neck, mainly for support.
“So what’s your master plan for the rest of the evening?” I asked suggestively.
“I’ll take you out for dinner. Somewhere special.”
“Normal is the theme of the day, remember?”
“Okay, I forgot,” he replied. “A long walk and soup from a plastic cup?”
I shook my head and tightened my grip on his neck. “No, not soup. I want one of those quesa-thingies.”
“Quesadillas?” he guessed.
“Yes. Is that even English, Adam?”
He laughed. “No, Charli. I’m fairly sure that’s Spanish.”
25. Tomorrow, The Louvre
I wasn’t really sure how I’d got roped in to babysitting Fabergé for the day.
It started with a frantic phone call from Ivy. I stood in the kitchen, absently stirring my mug of tea while I listened to her drama-filled explanation of why she urgently needed a sitter. She was due to attend a pageant seminar downtown that morning, but her regular sitter had fallen ill.
“Can you please watch her?”
“Ivy, what’s a pageant seminar?”
“I have no time to explain,” she huffed in her usual curt manner. “Will you take care of Fabergé or not?”
It was impossible to say no. Ivy had made me the most beautiful wedding dress in the history of all brides – for free. I probably owed her a few months of babysitting. “Can you drop her off?”
“Yes, I can.”
I was about to give her our address when there was a loud knock at the door. Cradling the phone between shoulder and ear, I held my mug of tea with one hand and opened the door with the other. I was stunned to see Ivy and Fabergé. “Wow. You’re here now.”
“Of course we’re here now,” said Ivy, bustling past me, Fabergé in tow. She dumped Fabergé’s bag down on the couch and rattled off a list of rules as she made her way back to the door. “No junk food, no TV and don’t let her squeal.”
“Why would she do that?” I asked, a little afraid.
“She likes to squeal.” Ivy slung her handbag over her shoulder and shrugged. “But it ruins her singing voice and we’re hoping to clean up in the talent section of the Pickle Leaf Pageant next week.”
I nodded, utterly terrified. Small children were a mystery to me.
She hugged little Fabergé tightly, telling her she’d return soon. I prayed she was telling the truth. Ivy disappeared out the front door as quickly as she’d breezed in, making the number of minutes she’d spent in the apartment less than three.
I looked down at my little charge, wondering how on earth I was going to keep her entertained all day, when without warning she opened her mouth and squealed – a horrible, high-pitched scream that made me spill my tea down the front of my shirt. By mid-morning I was exhausted and Fabergé’s singing voice was probably cactus.
“Fabergé, what do you like to do?” I asked, at my wit
’s end.
Her mop of brown curls bounced wildly as she jumped around on the couch. “Cartoons.”
I would’ve broken Ivy’s no television rule in a flash – if only we’d had one. A knock at the door a few minutes later made me want to squeal with joy. Convinced it was Ivy, I jumped off the couch and bolted to open it.
“Oh, it’s only you,” I said disappointedly.
“Oh, my feelings are hurt,” mocked Ryan, holding his hand to his heart.
Slamming the door was tempting but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. “What do you want?”
“I need a favour.”
I wasn’t sure I could handle doing any more favours that day. I’d reached my charitable limit. On the plus side, the favour he needed might involve leaving the apartment.
“What do you need?”
“I’m having some artwork delivered to the new restaurant today,” he explained. “I need to choose some prints for the walls. I was hoping to get your opinion.”
My eyes narrowed with suspicion. “Why?”
Ryan sighed heavily, probably regretting ever knocking on the door. “Because you’re arty and fluffy and good at that kind of junk.”
I hissed through my teeth, “You think I’m fluffy?”
“No, of course I don’t think you’re fluffy. I think you’re… whimsical,” he amended, turning on the Décarie charm. “Please, Charli. Just help me out.”
“It’s going to cost you, Ryan.”
He grinned errantly and I couldn’t help smiling back. “Name your price.”
“A TV. No, a huge TV,” I revised, waving my hands around for effect. “And it has to be delivered today.”
The confused frown that swept his face lasted only seconds. “Has the novelty of marriage worn off already?” he asked, barely composing himself.
“Fine,” I grumbled. “Pick your own artwork.”
I pushed on the door, attempting to close it in his face, but he stepped forward, wedging his foot in the way.
“Okay, okay. I’ll buy you a TV.” I glared at him, prompting him to clarify his offer. “A huge television that will be delivered today – at any cost.”
“Love your work, Ryan.” I quipped, spinning around to face the little girl who was sitting on the couch, munching her way through a bag of contraband chips. “Grab your coat Fabergé, we’re getting out of here.”