Page 89 of Just For Her

Tove was laughing so hard that she had to get up and pour herself more tea.

It was late enough for Kayla to think about driving home. Although she had gathered her things in her purse and taken her dirty dishes to the kitchen sink, Tove had disappeared into her room to “get something” more than ten minutes ago. The door was left ajar and the clattering and thumping of objects continued, but Kayla did not feel close enough to her ex to simply march in there and see what was going on.

After another two minutes, though, curiosity got the better of her.

“Tove?” she called down the hallway. “I’m going home. Everything okay in here?”

Tove peeked through the doorway. “You’re leaving?”

“I mean, it’s after nine. If you want, I can stop by tomorrow afternoon to keep going over stuff. I don’t have to be at work until six for the dinner hours.”

The door opened wider. “Oh. Um, sure…”

Kayla tiptoed closer. “What are you doing in there?”

“Nothing. Looking for something.”

“What is it?”

With a haggard breath, Tove gestured for Kayla to come in. “You left something here that I forgot to give you when we broke up.”

“You mean you forgot to stuff it in a box and drop it in front of my door?”

Tove blushed. “I’m sorry about that.”

A shrug told Tove not to worry about it. “I hadn’t noticed anything missing.”

“Maybe I was wrong then. It was one of the T-shirts you wore to bed. The black one with the white design on it. Some kind of metal T-shirt.”

Kayla laughed. “You mean the My Chemical Romance shirt? Metal? That’s funny.”

“Come on, now, I barely know who that is.”

“So you have heard of them?”

Tove’s hands were on her hips faster than Kayla could apologize.

“Sorry. I already have it. You didn’t forget to throw it back in my face.”

“Oh, good. I mean, I shouldn’t have done that, but I’m glad I haven’t lost it.”

“Well…” Kayla pushed her weight into the doorway. “Guess I’ll get going. Have a nice, long think about whether you want to take over the shop, because I want an answer tomorrow.”

She was halfway to turning around when Tove said, “Or you could stay the night here.”

Kayla let those words wash right over her. “Dare I ask what you mean by that?”

“I don’t know. Just came out of my mouth.”

“So isthatwhat you’ve been thinking all night? Has this all been an elaborate ploy to seduce me back into your bed?” Kayla pretended to be put off when she crossed her arms and turned away in a huff. “You could have been more direct. Flirted with me. Gotten down on your knees andbeggedme to take you back.”

“Let’s not get ahead of myself.”

“Oh, so you want me without gettingbackwith me? Next, you’ll be telling me it’s to test the waters. Which is it?”

She wasn’t surprised when Tove snapped out of her humiliated stupor and adopted the countenance of a woman who knew how to play these games. “I don’t need to ‘test waters’ with you. I know exactly what you are.”

“So what am I?”

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