Page 26 of One For my Enemy

She gestured with her chin. “Right there,” she said, pointing to a series of tiny bottles with matte pastel labels, each of them the precise color of a French macaron. “Third from the left.”

“Terrible customer service,” Lev noted, pointedly giving her a look, and she arched a brow.

“Do you need me to hand it to you personally?”

“I’m just saying it’d be nice,” he sniffed, and she gave a low, facetious sigh, rising to her feet and wandering around the counter to where he stood. She paused, purposefully clipping his shoulder as she passed him, and then tilted her head, gesturing for him to follow as she led him to a set of copper-wire baskets that each contained something that looked like a jewel-shaped pill box.

“Here.” Sasha offered one to him, and he reached out to take it, frowning a little with confusion. “Bath bombs. They make the water fizz and whatever,” she explained with stunning ambiguity, waving a hand. “This one is Rosé.”

He sniffed it, making a face. “You think I want to smell like this?” he asked, and to that, she spared half a smile.

“It’s designed for relaxation,” she told him. “Also gives you a little bit of a buzz.”

“Okay, sure, but—”

“Try it,” she instructed, taking it back from him to place it in a small paper bag. “I’ll let you try the first one for free, but the next one’ll cost you. That’s the trick,” she added slyly, holding the bag out for him. “People always come back for more.”

“I don’t take baths,” Lev said, though he warily accepted the offering. “Sort of a feminine thing, isn’t it?”

“That’s very heteronormative of you,” Sasha remarked, slipping a loose lock of hair behind her ear. “And impractical. Are men exempt from craving relaxation?”

“Well, I hate to be any sort of normative,” Lev permitted, tucking it into his pocket. “Though, I thought you said I had to buy something,” he commented, and she shrugged.

“I’m not totally heartless,” she said, and at her nearly not-antagonistic tone, he leaned ever-so-deliberately into the radius of her space, resting his arm against the display behind her. She seemed to have noticed, her gaze quickly scanning the distance between them before settling on his, but she neither invited him closer nor pushed him away.

“So,” she said, tucking her hair behind her ear again. “That’s five minutes gone. Per our agreement, you have ten more.”

“Tell me about your day,” Lev suggested, and she made a face.

“That’swhat you want to talk about?”

“Well, we don’t have to. You can tell me about anything,” he assured her, watching with amusement as her attention slid unwillingly to the lean of his hips, then dragged back up. “Anything you want.”

She seemed to find this unconvincing. “You came here just to talk to me about my day for fifteen minutes?” she asked, and Lev shrugged.

“You’d have done the same, I’m sure.”

“I definitely wouldn’t have.”

“Ah,” he said. “Well, that’s too bad.”

They paused, each shifting slightly.

“So,” he beckoned. “Your day?”

She looked up, considering him. Or, alternatively, looking at him.

“Fine,” she said eventually, seeming to have arrived at some unknown conclusion inside her head. “Spent most of it here. Emailed with my classmates for a bit about our group project.”

“Ah, right, the group project,” Lev said. “How’s Eric’s face?”

She fought a smile. “Oddly enough, he didn’t say.”

“Well.” Lev leaned forward, waiting to see if she’d lean away. She didn’t, though he thought he felt her breath quicken sharply. “That’s very interesting.”

That time, he could have sworn he felt her shiver. “How was your day?”

“Oh, not bad.” He leaned down, his nose brushing hers, and felt her lashes against his cheek as she let them flutter shut, open. Shut, open. “Ran a few errands. Counted the hours until it was reasonably ‘tonight’ enough for me to show up here.”

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