“Either way, my knot skills aren’t transferable to hair and bike chains. I don’t know how to approach this but if I say scissors?—”
“I’ll cry,” she confirms. “You’re going to have to yank. Itried but I kept tangling myself up even more. Just grab it and pull. I don’t have a tender scalp, so don’t worry about it.”
I lean close to study the entanglement. “I need immunity if I accidentally hurt you. You make me nervous.”
“It’s fine, Jay. I’m only going to be grateful when you get me out of here. Oh, but also I’ll never speak to you again out of embarrassment.”
I touch her hair near the chain again, sliding my finger beneath a small hank of it to separate it and pull.
Phoebe reaches up to touch my hand. “Pro tip: if you hold it in two places, you can create some slack so it won’t pull at my scalp when you tug.”
Her hand is soft and warm. She keeps it on mine as I follow her directions.
“Like this?”
“Yep, like that.”
“Here we go.” I tug, and the piece comes free of the bike way more easily than I feared. “One down, no idea how many to go. You okay?”
“Yeah. Just kind of hurting from being in this position so long.”
I look around for anything that might help, but I don’t see anything I can use. All I can do is work fast. I untangle several more dark strands fairly easily, but she hisses and readjusts her position.
“Did I pull your hair?”
“No. My wrists and shoulders are hurting.”
That’s it. “You can be mad if you want, but I’m going to reposition us. I’ll stretch my legs out beneath you, and I’ve got enough slack in your hair that you can rest your head on me like a pillow.”
“You want me to put myself in an even more awkward position?”
“Are you talking literally or figuratively?”
“Socially.”
“Then yes. But even moving fast, this will take a while, and you’re going to start getting hot spots or muscle cramps or something.” I free strands of her hair as I talk, but it still seems to be just as much tangled in the chain as ever.
“I have to take you up on that.”
I immediately stretch out my legs, and with careful hand placement on my part and pained puffs of breath from Phoebe, she’s soon lying on her stomach, her head resting on my thighs, facing toward my shoes. I’m glad I slid on sneakers instead of flip-flops so she doesn’t have to stare at my hairy feet. They’re a normal amount of hairy, but still. No one’s ever commented on my sexy toe tufts.
The change in position makes the process go faster, and soon I can see more and more of the chain. As a man—a not-so-good one at this moment—I toy with the idea of going slower because I like the warm, solid weight of Phoebe’s head almost in my lap.
As someone who knows Phoebe will put up with exactly zero nonsense, I continue to work quickly. I don’t want to give her more fuel for her flirting accusations. Her true accusations.
As if reading my mind, she says, “I googled you.”
My hands slow. “Did you discover I’m a certified historian?”
“More like certified loverboy,” she says with something close to a laugh in her tone.
I groan. “Let me guess: you read the comments.”
“I can’t tell you how much I enjoyed that.”
“You couldn’t just stick with LinkedIn, huh?”
Now she does laugh, and her warm breath skims over my knee. “ThatwasLinkedIn. The top comment says if I ever get a chance to hear a lecture from the Hot Prof, I should run not walk. But don’t worry, I saw your history bona fides too. PhDfrom Harvard, and yet I saw you in a Stanford shirt first. Now, that’s impressive.”
