Page 41 of The Ruse

“If you want.”

But it didn’t sound like she really thought it was the greatest idea. So I waited for her real thoughts to come out.

She turned in her seat to face me better, and after glancing around to make sure Nash was still talking to Miss Crawley, she said, “I was actually thinking that you should just kind of sneak up behind him and go for it.”

“What?”

She nodded. “You’re like me; you overthink everything. If you ask him to go on a moonlight stroll, you’re going to start walking and your mind is going to start racing, and you’re going to try to figure out the exact right moment for it to happen… But then an hour will go by and you’ll be freezing your toes off, and then you’ll come back to the girls’ loft still wondering what it would be like to kiss my brother.”

I wanted to argue. To tell her that the walk would be the perfect setup for a romantic kiss…but I knew she was right. Nash and I were really good at walking around and talking and then getting too nervous to take the next step.

“So what do you suggest?” I sighed. “How do you suggest I ‘sneak up and go for it,’ as you say? Because it sounds like some sort of sexual assault charge waiting to happen. And your parents are billionaires, so I’m sure you have lawyers on call to help with that kind of thing.”

“Nash will not be pressing charges.” Cambrielle chuckled. “More like he’s going to be so happy that he won’t be able to stop smiling for five days.”

“Are you sure he won’t run his hand across his lips and wipe my kiss back on my shirt?” I asked, referencing what had happened when she kissed Ben Barnett a while back.

She made a face. “I never should have told you about that.”

I laughed. “At least I’ll know I’m in good company if that does happen.”

She glanced at the front of the bus and her eyes widened. “He’s coming back.”

We both turned to face forward again, not at all looking like we’d just been talking about Nash.

But when he got stopped by the guy playing Andre, one of the new opera house owners, Cambrielle whispered, “He’d probably kill me if I told you, but Nash has told me himself that he likes you. Like, a lot…” She gave me a meaningful look that made me believe what she was saying. “He’s just too in his head and wants everything to be perfect.”

Nash started walking toward us again, and my heart started beating faster with each step he took closer.

I really did like him.

So much.

I inhaled deeply. “Okay, I’m going to go for it,” I said to Cambrielle under my breath.

“Good,” she whispered back. “I’ll get him outside, then you can do the rest.”

I just hoped that when I took the leap, Nash would be ready to catch me.

“Areyou ready for me to send the text to Nash?” Cambrielle asked after we’d finished our last activity for the night.

We were upstairs in the loft where the girls would be sleeping, and all the other girls were chatting as they got ready to turn in for the night.

“Almost,” I said, my heart racing at the thought that this was actually happening. Cambrielle was going to text Nash to ask him to meet her outside, but I was going to meet him instead. “I want to brush my teeth first.”

A slow smile lifted my friend’s lips. “You don’t want your first kiss with Nash to taste like the Dutch-oven chicken and potatoes we had tonight?”

“I thought about it,” I said. “But I think I’ll stick with my trusty minty-fresh taste instead.”

“I guess that’s probably a good call.”

We waited for a few of the other girls to leave the upstairs bathroom, and then Cambrielle and I went to the double sink to brush our teeth together.

“Are you having fun so far?” I asked Cambrielle as I put some toothpaste onto my toothbrush.

“Yeah, it’s been super fun,” Cambrielle said, her blue eyes bright. “I wasn’t sure how I’d feel about all the games since I’ve only been a crew member before, but I can see why you and Nash like acting so much. It’s actually really fun.”

Cambrielle had initially only auditioned to be one of the dancers, not expecting a speaking role. But Miss Crawley had seen how gifted she was at not just dancing but also performing in front of a crowd and had asked if she’d play the part of Meg Giry, Christine Daaé’s close friend in the play.

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