He made a good point. But I was still 90% sure he was the same person as Tanner. I just had to prove it. Which meant I had to get him into a pair of glasses and take his hair out of the man bun. “Do you have a hair tie? I feel like this dress would look so much cuter if my hair was up.”
“I have one,” said Frankie. She took one off her wrist and handed it to me.
Damn you!I wanted Ryder’s hair tie!I shot it over a rack of clothes and tried to play it off like an accident. “Oops.” I turned to Ryder. “Could I use yours?”
“Sure.” He pulled back his colorful sleeve and took a hair tie off his wrist. “Here you go.”
I fumbled with it for a second and then shot it across the room. “I’m so clumsy. Do you have another?”
“It really seems like you’re trying to get the one out of my hair. Which kind of freaks me out. Are you trying to steal a strand of my hair so you can make a Polyjuice potion?”
“You’re a Harry Potter fan?” I asked.He really is my soulmate.
“Uh, of course.” He looked genuinely offended that I thought he mightnotbe a Potterhead.
“What house are you?” I asked.
“What house do you think I am?” he shot back.
“Hufflepuff.”
“Excuse me?!” Now hereallylooked offended.
“Hufflepuff are the humble ones. And since you’re pretending to be a fashionista…”
“Personal fashion consultant,” he corrected me.
“Whatever. Pretending to be that when you’re secretly a billionaire is quite humble.”
“Billionaire? I wish. And anyway, such a charade seems more like something a Slytherin would do.”
I stared at him. I could never tell when he was lying. “What house do you think I am?”
“Definitely Ravenclaw,” he said.
“And why is that?”
“They’re the creative ones. And this fantasy that you’ve created about me being a billionaire is certainly creative. Also, they’re the hot ones.” His eyes scanned my body.
He thinks I’m hot?!My face started to blush. I ran back into the changing room before he could see. I was supposed to be playing hard to get, not melting the second he gave me a compliment. I got into the strappy blue dress and walked back out. “What do you think my date this weekend will think of this one?” I asked, fighting the urge to adjust the straps to make sure I wasn’t showing any underboob.
“He’ll love it,” said Frankie.
Ryder stared at me. Was that a look of jealousy? Or was it a look of skepticism?
“It looks amazing,” he said. “Because I picked it, so of course it does. But whether he likes it really depends on his level of taste. And the date. Where’s he taking you?”
Shit! He’s onto me!“I…he…Chuck E. Cheese.”What?I could have literally said any other place and it would have been more believable.
Ryder raised an eyebrow. “Is your date a small child?”
“Jealousy doesn’t suit you.”
“I’m not jealous. I’m genuinely curious about what kind of man child would take you to Chuck E. Cheese.”
“A really hot one,” said Frankie.
“Yeah,” I agreed. “The hottest. Ten feet of pure muscle.”
