Some Like It Perfect (A Temporary Engagement) (10 page)

Well. He might know her a little better than she’d expected.

She said, “You think I’m going to be her babysitter?”

“Just an older, wiser female figure.” He saw her expression and said, “Like an older sister. Like a hip, older sister.”

“Just stop.”

He nodded and sat back in his chair.

Delia said, “What if I like him?”

“If you meet him, I
would
like a report.”

“You haven’t met him?”

He shook his head and she said, “Then how do you know he’s a bad influence?”

“Because she comes home drunk and high and–” He waved his hand around his face. “Mussed.”

“She’s eighteen. I think that’s the uniform.”

“And he rides a motorcycle.”

“Mmm. The siren song of a hog, luring innocent young women to their pleasurable destruction.”

Jack closed his eyes in pain and Delia took the opportunity to just look her fill. Maybe if she could freeze him for ten minutes a day, it would be enough. She could get over it and stop getting blindsided every time she looked at him.

He opened his eyes; googly time was over. She said, “Reporting on him instead of her feels like it’s splitting hairs, but I can see the distinction. I can tattle on him.”

He took a deep breath and the pinched look disappeared. She hadn’t realized it was there until it was gone.

“Thank you, Delia. I just couldn’t stand it if she moved in with him.”

“You’ve got a real prejudice against motorcyclists. And I didn’t say I’d live with her, just if I did I’d be willing to nark on him.”

“I’ve got a real prejudice about wild boys dating my younger sister.”

Delia crossed her arms and looked out the window behind him, trying to decide if this violated any of her principles.

She thought of Justine and what she’d say when she heard about this development and flicked her eyes back to Jack. “This isn’t some weird scheme to get in my pants, is it? You’re not going to be popping in unannounced to ‘get your money’s worth’, right?”

He blinked, then laughed. “No. There will be no dubious strings attached.” He laughed again, closing his eyes and shaking his head. “I’m not expecting anything from you except to live with my sister and help her become an adult. She needs a woman she can emulate.”

“You’re really making it hard to say no. And you’re really making it sound like work.”

“Gus needs to be around someone who treats her like an adult. Someone who doesn’t want anything from her.”

“You don’t think paying me to live with her counts?”

“No. Because I don’t think paying you will affect how you act toward her. When she’s ready to move on, you’ll tell her without a thought for the money.”

Oh, God. Sometimes he could say beautiful things to her. She wasn’t sure he knew they were beautiful.

Maybe she just hadn’t looked at him enough yet today and it was coloring his words.

Maybe he was doing it on purpose.

“I’ll think about it.” When she wasn’t looking at him.

Jack nodded. “I haven’t said anything to her about it yet. I thought you could bring it up at lunch.”

She stood, heading to her paints and saying over her shoulder, “I’ll think about it.”

But all she thought about was Jack telling her she would be a good influence on his sister.

When the three of them sat down to lunch, Delia said to Jack, “Before you order for me, I’d like chicken today.”

Gus said, “The chicken club is good. That’s what I want.”

Jack lifted an eyebrow at Delia and she nodded. He ordered three chicken clubs and Delia didn’t have to even glance at the menu.

Jack stared at her without blinking. Delia took a sip of water. She wasn’t going to just bring it up.

Jack tapped her with his shoe under the table.

Delia shook her head and he said, “Delia is looking for an apartment. What if you roomed with her instead of with Nate?”

Delia was impressed he was able to say the boy’s name without sounding like he wanted to vomit. She was not real impressed with his subtlety.

Gus looked at Delia. “Would you want to?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know. You’re looking for somewhere to live, I’m looking for somewhere to live.”

Gus sat up. “The two of us? In a real apartment?”

She sounded excited about it. Maybe Nate didn’t live in a real apartment?

Delia narrowed her eyes. “I wouldn’t mind sharing an apartment with you. I don’t want to share an apartment with you and your boyfriend. I don’t mind him staying overnight once in a while, maybe just on the weekends. But if I ever see him in his underwear, or less than his underwear, he’s gone.”

Jack cleared his throat and Delia ignored him. “And no parties. I need my beauty sleep.”

Gus thought about it. She said, “You can’t say when I come home.”

“I don’t care when you come home. You’re an adult. Just don’t wake me up at three in the morning.”

“I can do that. Or not do that.”

Delia leaned forward. “Now, this is important. Have you ever cleaned your own bathroom?”

Gus wrinkled her nose. “No.”

“You will have to learn.”

“Can’t we just get a maid?”

“Can you afford a maid? Because I can’t. I don’t think peons who work in human resources can usually afford a maid.”

Jack said, “She’s not a peon. She owns part of the company.”

Gus said, “Only ten percent. Mother gifted me some of her shares when I turned eighteen. And I don’t even get the income, it goes into a trust.”

“Only ten percent?” Delia glanced up, shaking her head at the woman upstairs. “Why didn’t I get born into a family company? I, at least, would be grateful.”

Jack said to Gus, “I can release some of the funds for you. The restrictions are you must be in college or be gainfully employed. Partying every night isn’t gainful.”

Delia kicked Jack’s leg under the table and said, “Why
aren’t
you off at college? Even I went for a year. It was fun. It was a place to go to learn how not to be a kid. How to clean your own bathroom.”

Jack took a bite of chicken club, using his fork and knife. “That’s what you learned in college?”

“I said I only went for a year. I also learned how to pour beer without too much foam.”

“Delia, she’s only eighteen. Don’t put ideas in her head.”

Gus said with a smirk, “I learned that in high school,” and Delia chuckled.

“Kids these days. They grow up so fast.”

Jack closed his eyes. “I paid way too much for that high school. And you wonder why she isn’t off at college?”

“Yep. Still wondering. I just doubt that all colleges would reject her because she already knows how to pour a beer.”

Gus said softly, “I didn’t get into Harvard.” She hung her head and whispered, “Not even waitlisted.”

Delia laughed at her obvious pain. “Don’t most people not get into Harvard?”

Gus looked up. “Do you know how embarrassing it is to not get accepted to a school that has your mother’s name
and
your brother’s name on buildings? Do you know how much money Jack gives them every year? I couldn’t even buy my way into a school.”

Jack said before Delia could even ask, “I’m an alumni.”

“Of course you are.” Delia crunched into a perfectly crisp, light and fluffy, golden french fry and said to Gus, “So you’re not going to go anywhere? That’ll show ‘em.”

“I’m just. . .reevaluating my options.”

“It’s not a bad idea. See how the regular people live. Maybe you should try to live on a regular people salary instead of being subsidized by your piddly ten percent.”

And okay, it would be good for the girl, but mostly Delia didn’t want to be subsidized either. It just felt wrong.

Jack said, “Only if it’s safe.”

Delia said, “It’s not like the choices are Beacon Hill or a crack den. We can find a regular apartment in a regular part of town.”

Gus sniffed. “I’d like just a regular apartment in a regular part of town like a regular person.”

Delia nodded. “Okay.”

Gus nodded. “Okay.”

Jack smiled at them, then he nodded. “Okay.”

When Jack handed his card to the waiter to pay for lunch, Delia caught a glance at it. “John F. Cabot. Not Jack?”

“My family calls me Jack.”

“What does the ‘F’ stand for.”

“Fitzwilliam.”

Delia snickered, “No. You’re making that up.”

He pulled out his driver’s license and handed it to her.

She looked at it and tried not to laugh. “Fitzwilliam?”

“It’s a family name.”

The laugh bubbled out.

He said, “And what’s your middle name?”

“You will never find out.”

He chuckled. “I can guess.” He tapped his chin with his finger. “Rainbow?”

Delia laughed, shaking her head, and Gus said, “I know. Moonbeam.”

“Good guess. But no.”

Jack looked at her hair. “Sunset.”

Close. Very close. She said, “Even if you guess right, I’m not going to tell you.”

Gus nodded at Jack. “It’s Sunset.”

He nodded, too. “Delia Sunset Woodson.”

“It’s not. It’s actually not even Delia. Delia’s a nickname.”

Gus’s mouth fell open. “Delia is a nickname? For what?”

“Again. You will never find out. But I will say that it makes more sense than Jack for John. Who came up with that?”

Jack stood. “We will never know. It is lost to the ages.”

He pulled Delia’s chair out and she murmured under her breath, “Thank you for lunch.”

He said into her ear before pulling Gus’s chair out, “That hurt, didn’t it?”

She said “A little bit.”

Gus said, “Jack doesn’t care if he pays for your lunch.”

“She’s right, I don’t. But Delia doesn’t like to say thank you.”

How could he know that about her?

He smiled at her and she thought lunch with him was probably a bad idea. And not just because she felt like she had to say thank you.

Also because he was getting entirely too comfortable with her. Getting to know her entirely too well.

Delia and Gus found a regular apartment in a regular part of town that they could afford on two regular salaries. It even had the luxury of a washer and dryer. That had been a surprising requirement from Gus.

Delia had said, “Have you ever done your own laundry before?”

“No, and I’m not going to learn at a laundromat.”

So there.

But even with a washer and dryer, there had been no need for extra payments from Jack that would just feel weird. No need for Gus to ever know he would have paid Delia to live with her. That just had hurt and nightmare written all over it.

Delia had talked Justine into going to Paul’s for one more weekend so Delia wouldn’t have to see Paul’s boxer briefs. Everyone was happy.

Delia even plopped down the cash for a brand-new bed. True, it was a twin. True, it would have been softer to lay a blanket down on the carpet and sleep there.

But it was hers. And it was brand new.

She put brand-new sheets on her brand-new bed, hung up her clothes in the closet, and sighed. She had a bedroom with a door.

Pretty good.

And then she went back out into the living room and watched a troop of movers carry in Gus’s furniture.

Bed, dresser, desk, entertainment center, TV.

Gus carried in a box labeled towels and Delia said, “Never heard of less is more?”

“Never heard of more is more?”

Delia didn’t know how everything was going to fit.

She sat on the couch, Gus’s of course, and watched the boxes pile up around her.

Jack carried up a box labeled kitchen. When he saw her sandwiched between two boxes, he said, “Doing okay?”

“How can one person have so much stuff?”

“This is half of what she wanted to bring.”

Delia whimpered and he chuckled sadistically before heading back down for another box.

Finally, the furniture was in, the boxes were stacked, and Gus happily unpacked.

“This goes here and this goes here. Delia, where should we put this and this and this and this. . .”

Delia’s eyes glazed over and she said woodenly to Jack, “I change my mind. Can I change my mind?”

Three hours later, they’d put a dent in half of it. Gus lay on the floor, limp.

“I’m tired. And I think we need a bigger apartment.”