Page 13 of Perfect Praise

Quiet, less, is just within reach, but I give her a few seconds while I let my eyes drift.

I wish her legs weren’t so long. I bet they’re even softer than her wrist. And why does she always wear short, tight golf dresses if she doesn’t play golf, let alonelikeit? Yesterday was pink. Today is light purple.

“Well?” I challenge her, trying to distract myself from checking out the neckline of today’s purple. She brings her wide, green, still-teary eyes to mine. “Offer expires in three… two—”

“I’m in.”

“Good.” I go to reach for her thigh without thinking and divert my hand at the last second. “Phone,” I demand with my palm out. “First lesson.”

She ogles my arm for a second too long, unlocks her iPhone with her face, and places it gently into my hand. “You’re like this hot icicle, and I think you know it. Throwing your smile around whenever you feel like it’s convenient to melt people.”

“That’s an oxymoron,” I say.

“You know what I mean,” she replies slowly, then at the same time seems to realize what exactly she said. The blush starts in her ears and makes its way down her neck and over her chest.

Confidence will have to be a lesson for another day, but I still can’t help myself. “Own it, Maren.”

“What?” she whispers.

I refuse to break eye contact. “What you said. You think I’m hot.”

“I saidyouthink you’re hot,” she argues, looking down at her feet. The red pushes up against her skin stronger and brighter. “There’s a difference.”

“Uh huh,” I chuckle before I decide to let her off the hook.

Her phone looks like an OCD person’s nightmare. The social media apps on her phone are exactly what I imagined—red bubbles with numbers reaching the hundreds. “You read all these comments?”

She blanches instantly and lunges across the foot-wide gap between us for her phone, but she’s not that type of quick. I hold it out of her reach until she slinks back into her seat.

“No,” she lies.

“None of these people would say this shit to your face. You have to stop reading them.”

“I don’t read them.”

Every line in her face gives her away.

“What do they say?” I press.

Maren looks away with a shrug and sighs out, “Everything. Read them for yourself.”

I tap on the one with the most notifications. Under the latest picture of Maren with a woman who could be her twin—I tell myself not to ask because I’m not trying to get to know her—there are hundreds of comments.

I skim to get the general idea:

Maren is gorgeous.

Maren is hideous.

She’s just keeping her engagement private since there haven’t been any photos of her with Russell lately, and they can’t spoilTriple Bogey.

No, Russell’s dumped her because he deserves better than a groupie.

There’s two of them, and thank god her sister isn’t on the show, too, to make it double annoying.

Oh my god, there’s two of them, and her twin needs to be on the show as soon as possible because they’re adorable together.

I can’t read any more.

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