Page 33 of The Accidental Beauty Queen
“I get it. You think I’m a liar.” I try to force myself to look away from those startling blue eyes but I can’t, not even when he responds with a wince.
Followed by a blunt question. “Aren’t you?”
I refuse to answer, for obvious reasons. “Are you always so judgmental?”
“Judgmental?Are you serious?” He takes a step closer, until I can feel the heat of his indignation rolling off his muscular form in waves. I find myself leaning into it, like a wildflower basking in the warmth of the sun. I’m not sure why, because I hate him. I really do. “I may be many things, but I assure you that judgmental isn’t one of them.”
I aim an accusatory glance at the little gold badge pinned to the lapel of his impeccably cut suit. The one that hasJudgeengraved on it in elegant script. “Really? Because judging people is literally your job.”
His eyes go dark now—grayish blue, like a storm gathering over the ocean. And the set of his jaw is suddenly so hard it looks like he could cut diamonds with it.
A weighted silence settles between us, but not the calm kind of quiet that I know and love so well. This stillness feels alive. Anticipatory. If it were a color, it would be a deep, glittering red.
He’s angry.
I don’t care. I’m on a roll, emboldened for reasons only partially related to the man standing in front of me. I’ve kept too many secrets. I’m full to bursting with them, and he’s right here, listening to me as though it matters.
As thoughImatter.
“Do you find it at all creepy that later today you’re going to be sitting at the end of a runway judging fifty women on how they look in a swimsuit?” I’m officially losing it. Where has my filter gone?
I’ve never spoken to anyone so bluntly in my life.
“As a matter of fact, it does make me feel slightly uncomfortable.” He arches a brow. “I suppose Iama creep. A judgmental one at that. I should probably move into Slytherin and call it a day.”
Another Harry Potter reference. A clever one, considering Slytherin is known as the Hogwarts house where all the evil, cunning wizards reside.
I’m both furious and charmed.
And as much as I hate to even think about it, I’m also slightly aroused. Damn him, and damn his sexy, bookish mind.
“I have to go.”Before I do something completely idiotic like kiss you.
He steps aside for me and Buttercup to pass. The dogs are reluctant to leave each other, locked in a playful somersault and grunting with joy. I manage to drag Buttercup away, but just as we’re about to step out of reach, Hamlet’s dad gives the belt of my robe a gentle tug.
His voice goes soft, but there’s an edge to it that scrapes my insides and makes me ache. “No one is forcing you to do this, Hermione. Remember that.”
Actually...
I take a shuddering inhale and force a beauty queen smile. “You’re absolutely right.”
9
Just under four hours later, I’m standing backstage with forty-nine other girls who, like me, are wearing nothing but half a yard of Lycra swimwear, their state sash, and enough adhesive spray to permanently destroy the ozone layer.
The aerosol adhesive is a pageant trick, apparently, and it’s kind of miraculous. Ginny sprayed it liberally on my rear end so my swimsuit bottoms wouldn’t ride up when I walk.
Correction: glide.
I’m supposed to glide like Kate Middleton when I cross the stage. No walking allowed, because I’ve apparently been doing it wrong for the past twenty-nine years. Ginny schooled me in the pageant walk all afternoon. I’m a hopeless cause. And even though I never managed to cross the length of our hotel room without tripping, she held my glasses hostage and refused to let me put them on.
This is going to be a complete and utter disaster. I’m dreading every minute of it, partly because I’m still fuming over my stairway encounter with Judge Fitzwilliam Darcy and partly because I’ve never been quite this naked in public.
There must be solidarity in numbers, though, because I feel much less conspicuous now that I’m here with the other girls. I mean, we’re all basically in the same cringeworthy position. Even though the amount of body fat in the room is probably too microscopic to measure, all of us have the same expression on our faces. It’s a cross between a deer caught in the headlights and Wonder Woman preparing to smash the patriarchy.
We’re brimming with confidence. After all, forty-nine of us have been preparing for this moment for months. Yet at the same time, there isn’t a single contestant who isn’t sneaking anxious glances at the full-length mirrors that are strategically placed in the four corners of the backstage area.
I’m searching for Miss Nevada somewhere among the sea of flat stomachs and spray tans that are just shy of tanorexic when a woman in a black T-shirt emblazoned with the Miss American Treasure logo blocks my path.
