Dark Wild Night (Wild Seasons #3)(88)
Author: Christina Lauren

“Have you met your wife?” Lola asks.

Finn’s mouth curves into a cocky smile. “She’ll get into it.”

“If you say so,” she says with a wink. Fuck. My chest does a tight twist at the playful side of her coming out. “And yes, I think she has the weekend off.”

“Lola, you’re still here,” Joe says, walking out from the back room with a banana, peeling it suggestively. “Ready to run away with me yet?”

“Not quite,” she says, grinning.

“What were you doing all the way back there, anyway?” he asks.

She stares at him, before glancing quickly to me. “Browsing. And then Benny called. I have something big due next week. So . . . I’m changing the trip I had scheduled to L.A. for the week after.”

I file this away. I didn’t even know Lola had a trip coming up, let alone one she needed to postpone. I hate this distance between us—the pointlessness of it all, the absurdity—the way things seem to be moving forward in both of our worlds and we aren’t compulsively sharing any of it. I miss her.

Fuck. I need to get over it.

“Well, I’m glad you’re here,” Joe says, “because I wanted to show you something.” He walks to where he was just a moment ago, pointing Lola’s attention to a shelf. “Look what came in.”

“Oh my God,” she says, and moves to get a closer look. From where I stand, I can’t see what they’re looking at, but Lola adds excitedly, “Can you get it?”

Joe smiles over at me. “Oliver? Can you reach the new consignment item?”

“I got it,” Finn volunteers, taking a step toward the ladder, but Joe stops him with a hand to the chest.

“I think Oliver knows what I need.”

I give him a warning look, sensing he’s up to something. But as soon as I get on the ladder and glance up, I know immediately what they’re talking about. Joe has somehow managed to find a set of the action figures based on Lola’s book, and placed it up on the shelf for her. I start to tell her that I haven’t even been able to get these new yet, but when I turn to hand it to her, I realize that her eyes aren’t on the box at all, but on my bare stomach, where my shirt is riding up.

I clear my throat and Lola blinks back up to my face, before turning about six different shades of pink. Joe is already laughing, and wearing the smuggest I told you so face I’ve ever seen.

“You are such an asshole,” she says under her breath to Joe, laughing and punching him in the shoulder before taking the box from my hands. I’m half-irritated with him, half-amused at his persistence.

“Where did you get this?” she asks, avoiding my eyes.

I shake my head, having never actually seen one in person before. They’re not even available online yet. “I didn’t know we had one.”

“I bought it today,” Joe says proudly. “It’s the first one I’ve seen.”

“Someone was selling this?” I ask, and notice that even Finn—a guy who looks like Superman but probably couldn’t differentiate Catwoman from Batgirl—has moved in for a closer look. Even Ansel is interested.

Joe shrugs as if it was no big deal, and takes a bite of banana. “Yeah.”

“They made this for the book?” Ansel asks, peeking over Lola’s shoulder to get a better look.

Nodding, Lola says, “It’s part of the promo for the paperback release in a few months. I don’t even have one of these. I’ve been waiting to hold one for weeks now.”

I love that she feels this way, and love even more that I’m here for this moment because work has been shit for her lately, and she needed this little victory. I reach over and take it from her, before dropping it into a fabric shopping bag with the store’s logo on it. “It’s yours now.”

Her mouth drops open. “I can’t take this.”

Joe shakes his head. “The guy brought in a bunch of stuff. I get the sense he swiped it from a random assortment of promotional goodies sent to his work, and had no idea that it hasn’t been released yet. I didn’t pay much for it.”

“I could kiss you guys,” she says, looking down into the bag, and then quickly realizes what she’s said. Her bottom lip is pulled between her teeth and she stares at the floor.

Despite the mess she’s made of things, something primal comes to life in me, and I have to look away.

“I would totally let you do that,” Joe says, “but I have a date. Oliver can have my share, though.”

It’s like an elephant has been dropped in the center of the room, and everyone suddenly finds something to study, intensely.