Chapter Seven
We're almost finished eating when I spot the fortune cookies left scattered by the takeout bag. "Look, they gave us extra fortune cookies!" I squeak, eyeing the pile.
"Well, to be fair, we ordered enough food for half a dozen people so I think they gave us a normal amount," Max comments wryly, but he seems amused by my excitement, his eyes lingering on my face.
"Hush," I tell him as I grab one. I crack it open, eat one corner of the cookie then pull out the fortune and read it aloud. "‘You are capable, competent, creative and careful.’" I nod and place the fortune on the counter. "Now you go," I tell Max.
He pops a piece of broccoli in his mouth as he opens one of the plastic-sealed cookies and cracks it open. "‘You will be invited to a small gathering with spicy conversation,’" he reads with a smirk. "Well, this one has already come true," he comments as he eyes me in his shirt.
"Okay, my turn." I grab another cookie and pop the package.
"You didn't finish the last one." Max points his fork at the abandoned fortune cookie pieces lying on his countertop.
"I know, I just like the fortunes," I tell him, but I eat a piece of the new cookie as I unfurl the paper. "‘Time is the wisest counselor,’" I read off. We both groan and I toss it on the counter. "Boring. Your turn."
Max pops another cookie open and glances at the paper with a grin. "‘The object of your desire comes closer,’" he reads and then suggestively looks me over.
"You keep getting the good ones," I mumble as I grab another, again eating one bite of the new cookie as I flip the paper around so I can read it. "‘You find beauty in ordinary things. Do not lose this ability,’" I read from the paper. "Eh, kinda generic."
"Why do you keep doing that?" Max asks.
"Doing what?"
"Eating part of each cookie. Why don't you just finish one of them?"
"I don't really want the cookie, but I feel like it's bad luck if I don't eat at least part of it before I read the fortune."
"What about my luck? You didn't let me in on this little superstition and now my fortunes are invalid!" He waves at the uneaten cookies in front of him and glares at me.
"Yours aren't!" I insist. "It's my superstition, it doesn't apply to you!"
"But how could you risk it, Lauren?" He looks at me so beseechingly I can't help but laugh. His eyes are so imploring. I think he could get me to do just about anything with those eyes.
"Okay, I'm sorry! I apologize. I was wrong not to tell you about the proper procedure for eating and reading a fortune cookie."
"Apology accepted, but I've got my eye on you."
I roll my eyes and shrug, "Last one's yours," I tell him and slide the remaining cookie across the counter.
He opens the package and makes a big show of stuffing half the cookie in his mouth before reading the fortune. Then his brows draw and he nods to himself before stuffing the rest of the cookie into his mouth and the slip of paper into his pocket.
"You're not going to read it?" I question, confused.
"I read it."
"You're not going to read it to me?" I try again, a little hurt. Why do I feel like things just got weird?
"I'm saving it for later," he says and I wonder what the hell that means.
"Um, okay," I agree without looking at him and sweep up the mess of cookie crumbs onto my plate while wondering if all men are covert or just the ones I'm attracted to. "That's really cagey," I blurt out.
"Cagey? How am I cagey?" He looks so confused I second-guess my gut reaction to question him. Why am I so suspicious? "We're in my apartment and I gave you carte blanche to go through my stuff. You're the one who wouldn't let me walk you home," he points out as he gets up and drops our plates into the dishwasher. Bastard has a dishwasher too.
"Oh, that." Yeah, he has a point. "That's because I share a one-bedroom apartment with three other girls."
"How does that work exactly?" He looks genuinely curious, then grins. "Does it involve snuggling and pillow fights?"
"No, pervert. Bunk beds."
"Bunk beds," he repeats with a nod, but then a moment later he frowns, subtly, the skin on his forehead wrinkling for a fraction of a second, so quick I wonder if I imagined it. "Can I get you anything else to drink? Should I open a bottle?" He's not facing me, sticking leftovers in the fridge as he asks, and I wonder if it's a dismissal. I wasn't expecting to spend the night here. I wasn't expecting to be here at all, but then he showed up for my book club with his dimples and flowers and things got out of hand.
"Do you want me to leave? It's getting late." I should probably go before I fall for this guy. This has gone too far—time to shield myself.
"No, I definitely don't want you to leave." He pops his head around the fridge door and stares at me. "What's this talk of leaving?”
"Um, I don't know."
"You promised me a dirty bedtime story," he reminds me. "You're staying."
"Okay." I grin, the weirdness from before forgotten.
"I think I've got something you'll like," he says as he pulls a bottle from an under-counter wine fridge and sets it on the counter before peeling the seal off and grabbing a corkscrew. He's really adept with a corkscrew and I'm intoxicated watching the muscles in his arms flex as he grips the bottle and pops the cork. Adeptness is a turn-on, even for a simple task. "Where'd you say you were from, Lauren?"
"I didn't say."
He tilts his head as if to ask the question now.
"You don't think I'm a New Yorker born and raised?" I ask with a laugh.
"Not quite." He shakes his head as he pours the first glass.
"Iowa," I tell him.
"Iowa." He repeats it slowly for such a short word. "What brought you to New York?"
"A guy." I take the offered glass and bring it to my lips. "The stupid finance guy."
"The cheater," he says, focused on tilting the bottle, pouring a glass for himself.
"Yeah." I nod. "That he was." I pause for a moment, thinking. "Wait, when did I mention that he cheated on me?" I don't remember mentioning it. I find it sort of embarrassing so I'm usually careful about who I mention it to.
"This afternoon. When you tried to get out of having dinner with me." He flashes a smile at me while stowing the half-full bottle in the fridge.
"I did? Oh, that's weird. I try not to mention it. But yeah, he was a cheater. Is still a cheater, I assume. He's just cheating on someone else now, I suppose."
"He's an idiot," Max snaps. "You shouldn't blame yourself."
"That's true," I agree. "But it's hard not to. For a long time I felt stupid for not seeing it, you know? But hell, I was in Iowa most of the time it was going on." I shrug. "So now I blame his friends."
"Why's that?" Max asks, pausing.
"So I don't have to blame myself?" I joke. "Because he was a pretty nice guy in college. Then he came to New York and got a fancy job and a nice apartment and I don't know what happened to him. He changed. Started hanging out with a bunch of Wall Street types. No offense," I add when he raises a brow at that comment.
"I'll let it pass."
"His friends are clearly a bunch of degenerate douchebags though. You'd think just one of them might have pointed out to him that he already had a girlfriend."
"Maybe they didn't know."
"Possibly." I nod. "Except he actually told me it wasn't a big deal. Said he was just blowing off steam and that I got to be his girlfriend. Like I should be honored I got top billing in a polygamous relationship I wasn't aware I was in." I snort.
"Huh," he murmurs.
"You don't hang out with guys like that, right?" I question.
"Not on purpose, no," he says, then adds, "Fuck him," as he pulls me off the stool I'm on and leads me back to the couch we had sex on before dinner. Then we talk and kiss and it's the best night of my life. He asks questions about my job and my roommates and what I miss about home and what I like most about the city.
He agrees my boss is a troll and listens to all of the ideas I would have liked to have implemented for Budget Bridal instead of walking around Times Square in a wedding dress today.
We just really hit it off, like we've known each other forever.
Later we go upstairs and Max gets that bedtime story.
"Once upon a time there was a girl named Lauren and her mouth was so, so wet," I purr into his ear as I slide my hand lower.
"Fuck," Max groans in response. He doesn't say much after that. After all, it's my story.