“Today after the meeting when I talked to him alone he got a little... not stammery, per se, but kind of... when we were talking. I think... I think he was flirting.”
She lowered her voice on the wordflirting. She felt raw and patently ridiculous. She’d always been the loftily wise older sister, the one who made sound decisions and thoroughly studied for every test andneveroverdid anything, rather unlike Avalon, who was legendary for overshooting marks.
Then of course, Eden, the wild card, had gotten mysteriously knocked up ten years ago. Which trumped even that time Avalon had tried to jump her bike over Whiskey Creek.
“Are you sure he didn’t get stammery because your second shirt button came undone again, like that one time you accidentally flashed Jeffrey the UPS guy when he came into your shop? I mean, your boobs aren’t very big, but a boob is a boob as far as men are concerned.”
Eden sighed. “Why do I even talk to you?”
“Because I’m your best option for adult conversation at the moment.”
“I guess it all depends on how you define ‘adult,’” Eden returned placidly. “But I was wearing this.” She gestured at her pale pink cardigan. “Polo, cardigan, jeans.”
“Hardly a Nicki Minaj–caliber outfit, but who knows what floats his boat. But that’s a great color on you. Makes you look kind of ethereal and Nicole Kidman-y.”
“Wow. Thanks. Gosh.” Eden was genuinely touched.
“Which is alotto ask of a color. So.”
Eden snorted.
But Avalon was staring at her as if she was piecing a puzzle together. “But I think you know it’s a great color on you...” Avalon said slowly. “Which iswhyyou wore it. I bet you subconsciouslywantedto make Principal Gabe stammery,” she pronounced with the triumph of Columbo announcing the killer. “Or you hoped you would.”
That right there was why she talked to Avalon, who knew her better than she knew herself.
Damned if she was going to admit it, though. Not even to herself.
Itmightnot even be true.
She was too tired to stop to think about the nuances of those kinds of things, anyway.
“Pshaw,” was what she said.
“Did you just saypshaw,Grandma?”
“I thought it was due for a revival.”
Like her libido.
“I’m saying youlikehim, like him, too.”
Eden shrugged. “I don’t know him well enough tolikehim, like him. I never thought of him at all beyond the fact that he’s the principal of Annelise’s school. I don’t havetimeto have subconscious thoughts about anyone.”
Even as she said that, though, something about it felt like a lie. Which forced her to acknowledge that, thanks to that hallway rescue she kept revisiting like a favorite song, awareness of Gabe Caldera had been a constant low hum in her life for a while now.
“He’s just... easy on the eyes, that’s all,” she concluded with insincere offhandedness.
“Wereyouflirting?”
“I’m not sure. It kind of felt like that scene inThe Wizard of Ozwhere the Tin Man has lockjaw and Dorothy has to oil him. You could practically hear the creaking sounds as I attempted it.”
“Did you flick your hair?”
“Why?”
“You always flick your hair when you’re flirting.”
Huh. She hadn’t known this.