“It has a secret name. But it’s still not for sale. But thank you.”
“For what?”
“For wanting it.”
His gaze briefly turns from my painting to my face, scans my body, and then he turns his attention back to my painting. “That was definitely the weirdest and least successful negotiation I’ve ever engaged in. Don’t tell anyone about this.”
And with that, he heads for the front door, picking up Daisy to take her with him. When he tries to open the door, of course, it sticks. “You really need to get this fixed.”
Like it’s my fault. Like I made the hinges uneven on purpose. “I know that. I’ve told Marco five times. Just lift up the doorknob while you turn it and pull.”
He shakes his head, pulls the door open, and leaves without saying goodbye.
Before I’ve finished licking the last of the cream cheese frosting from the fork I used to attack the carrot cake, there’s another knock at my front door.
“It’s not Daisy,” Matt says from the hallway.
I go to open the door and Matt stands to the side, revealing Marco the super.
“Look who I found.”
Marco is only slightly out of breath as he carries his toolbox in, shrugging and waving his hand at his knee. “I’m sorry—I’m sorry I didn’t get around to it yet, okay? My knee, it’s hard to do the stairs with this knee, okay? I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine. Thank you for coming now. Would you like something to drink?”
“No thanks, I’ll get to work here. Should be done in no time. No big deal. I’ll take care of it, okay?” He’s looking at Matt, not at me.
“Good idea,” he says.
“That’d be great, thank you,” I say in a sing-song voice, overcompensating for Matt’s gruffness, but also trying to hide how terribly turned-on I am right now. After being the girl who gets things done for a man all day long, I feel like a princess right now. An appreciative, secretly horny princess in sweatpants.
I have never felt so many different things for one person in such a short period of time.
I probably have big red pulsating hearts for pupils right now, because Matt gives me a look that says: “Calm down, kid, I got a guy to come upstairs and do his job for you. This isn’t a marriage proposal.”
He goes back to inspecting my artwork, crossing his arms over his chest and planting himself in front of the mixed media piece I did in my last year of school.
“You go to art school?”
“Visual Arts at Bennington.”
“Bennington?” He spits out the word. This doesn’t surprise me.
It’s a relief that he’s being a jerk again. It’s easier to want to slap him than kiss him. “Let me guess where you went…Harvard.”
“Incorrect. Didn’t even apply there.”
I hate being wrong. I narrow my eyes at him, like I’m turning on my psychic laser beams. He seems like a west coast guy. I’m feeling Southern California, but he also seems like the kind of guy who doesn’t want to be what you expect him to be. “Stanford.” I know nothing about law schools, but I repeat it again, very self-assured. “Stanford Law.”
For one second his face betrays him. He seems impressed. “Yeah. I went to SLS. Care to guess where I got my Bachelors?”
“USC.”
He blinks once, then nods.
I mentally high-five myself, because I’m awesome.
Marco is mumbling to himself, over by the front door, talking to his cordless screwdriver. I silently will him to take his time fixing things, because I want to continue blowing the esquire’s mind over here.
