Page 54 of Sleeping with Her Enemy (49th Floor 2)

“Dax! Hi!”

Or, there was always Amy.

Amy, strolling down College in tight jeans, red heels, and a flowing, sleeveless white blouse, looking like a siren moonlighting as a Calvin Klein model. He squinted past her, looking for evidence of Mr. Crest Whitestrips. He glanced at his watch. It was only ten thirty. Was it possible the date was already over? Or maybe she really was serious about keeping things casual, and she’d already…gotten what she’d been looking for. Judging by the big grin on her face as she ambled to a stop in front of him, he feared she had. “What happened to the Tinder guy?”

“Oh, he lives just up Grace Street,” she said, gesturing over her shoulder. He refrained from pointing out that that didn’t answer his question at all. She tilted her head back to look at the marquee above them. “Oh—it’s Godfather night! How was it?”

“The third one is just about to start.”

“I never saw that one. Only the first two.”

“The first two are by far superior. Francis Ford Coppola reportedly said that the first two were part of a series and this one was meant to be a semi-stand-alone epilogue, but the studio made him label it the third. It’s not really my favorite, but I have this weird compulsion to finish what I start, so I have to stay.” He was going to regret this, but… “You want to join me?”

She grinned. “Are there any horse heads in this one?”

“Nope. You’re safe on the horse head front.”

“Well, that’s a bummer. I actually loved the horse head. In a horror movie sort of way, I mean. I don’t think I’ve ever been so startled by something. Somehow, even though I was watching it almost twenty years after it came out and it’s a pop-culture touchstone, I didn’t know it was coming. Anyway, I think it was the best part of the movie.”

“You surprise me, Amy Morrison.”

She looked genuinely perplexed. “Why?”

“I don’t know many women who would get so excited about the prospect of a bloody horse’s head plopped onto someone’s bed.”

She shrugged. “Okay, well, I’m in. Date ended early anyway.”

“But you went to his house.” He didn’t want to ask. But he couldn’t not ask.

She sighed theatrically as she followed him into the theater. “Don’t ask.”

Can’t not ask—already established that. But maybe he’d weasel it out of her later. “I’m going to get some popcorn. Want some?”

She wrinkled her nose. “I’m not really a popcorn person.”

“How can you not be a popcorn person? Everyone likes popcorn. Especially movie popcorn.”

“It’s not that I dislike it.” She sidled up to the glass display cabinet. “I just like candy more.”

Once they were settled into their seats in the almost-empty theater, she ripped into her candy.

“You don’t even want a bite?” he asked, holding his popcorn bag in front of her.

“Not even a bite,” she said, taking a big chomp of a peanut butter cup. “Oh my God, I’m so hungry, though.”

“Didn’t Mr. Tinder feed you?” Or did you just skip right to the main event?

“Oh, he did. I ate a huge plate of pasta at one of the spots on this strip. We had tiramisu, too. I don’t know why I’m so hungry.”

Because you worked up an appetite after dinner? Christ, he had to stop it. Torturing himself like this was not productive. “Did you sleep with him?”

She turned pink. Good. Let her feel a little discomfort. “I’m not sure that’s any business of yours.”

“It isn’t. But I still want to know.” He hoped she didn’t ask why, because he wasn’t sure he had an answer.

She buried her head in her hands, and it was a moment before a muffled, slightly tortured sounding “no” emerged. Then her stomach growled.

He refrained from fist-pumping. “Change of plans,” he said, standing up. “Let’s go eat.”

She blinked. “But what about your thing where you have to see all three movies?”

“I’m over it.”

…

Half an hour later, Amy found herself seated at the kitchen island in Dax’s condo in the Saint Lawrence Market area while he whipped up a cheese sauce on the stove. When he’d asked her what she wanted to eat and she’d said, “nachos,” this wasn’t at all what she expected. And it was kind of funny to be eating something so lowbrow as nachos in this palatial condo. She’d known his company was successful, but taking in the views from the impeccably decorated, cavernous penthouse made her wonder if she’d underestimated the extent of that success.

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