Page 67 of First Comes Revenge

“Hi,” I say. Can’t ever go wrong with a solid, friendly, “hi”, right?

I’m about to say something that I’m sure will be grand and heart-melting when Earl pops to his feet and snaps his fingers. “Boys!” he hisses. “This is what he told us to be ready for. Come on!”

“Oh, shit,” I mutter.

Charli looks confused. “What?” she asks as Earl, Petey, Teddy-Two-Toes all rush between us and start awkwardly twitching, gyrating, and shaking their butts at me. Earl is doing some kind of approximation of beat boxing as he reaches to lift his shirt–which also blasts all of us with a hefty wave of body odor.

“Guys, guys,” I say, standing and trying to move them out of the way. “I saidonly if I give the signal.Did I give the fucking signal?”

Petey and Earl stop dancing and at least look a little embarrassed as they move their attention from me and then to Charli. Teddy is still dancing, hands on his hips as he’s getting more and more into it by the minute.

I laugh a little nervously and rub the back of my neck. Then I unbutton a few of my buttons and show Charli a hint of the ridiculous leather get-up I’ve been wearing under my clothes every day. It’s a bikini-style one-piece, similar to what I convinced Charli to wear to the Halloween mixer. I called in a favor to have that friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend make one in my size. “That was my ‘break in case of emergency’ plan. I get a lap dance wearing this ridiculous suit from the boys.Uh, for you,” I add, when she’s looking at me like everything out of my mouth has been pure insanity.

“Your plan was to wear a leather dominatrix suit and get a lap dance.For me?” she asks.

“I told him it was stupid!” Margaret helpfully lobs from the bus stop behind me.

My recently acquired friends are all watching with wide eyes and no apparent sense that we might want a little privacy for this conversation. I guess they probably feel like they deserve to watch the drama after they’ve waited with me out here day after day. Teddy Two-Toes gives up his dance, produces a bagel fromsomewhere, and takes a big, noisy bite. I glare over my shoulder at him and he pauses mid-chew, then smiles with his teeth full of cream cheese as if to say, “sorry, Boss, I’ll keep it down.”

“This isn’t going the way I planned it,” I say.

“Oh,” Charli says. “I could go back up to my room and keep watching you from the window if you prefer?”

“No,” I say quickly. So she has been up there watching me the whole time? I knew she was sneaking out the back exit because my growing group of friends have been acting like a network of spies. Ididn’tknow she’s been watching me. “This is good. I would apologize for the crowd, but I heard you might be the reason they’re here.” I hook a thumb over my shoulder and see Earl flash Charli his single-toothed smile.

She smirks. “It’s okay. So, um, what are you doing, exactly? Other than being ready to get a lap dance for me, that is.”

“Well,” I turn around and hoist the big bag, then gesture quickly for Margaret to hand me the book she has. “At first I was just going to give you as many signed books as I could. I noticed you were collecting them at the convention in Arizona. I got bored the first day waiting to give them to you so I started to read. Then I realized some of them weren’t very good, and I thought it would be a pretty shitty gift if I gave you a signed book that wasn’t even a good read. So I started reading to decide which ones were good enough to give you.”

Her smile is crooked. “So you’ve been out here reading these books every day to decide which ones are good enough for me? That’s… actually really sweet.”

I try not to smile.This is good.She’s talking, for starters, and it’s not angry talking or flower stomping. She’s standing still and talking to me. She’s hearing me out, so I had better not screw this up. “I was also planning to tell you what an idiot I was if I got the chance. And how I’ve spent every day thinking about how I’d do anything to change what I did and get you back. The book thing was more of a… gesture.”

“I’ve missed you, too.” She says the words so quietly I almost don’t let myself believe I really heard them. Then she starts speaking again and it’s like she’s letting out something she’s had bottled up for weeks. “I had a lot of time to think about what happened. I mean, you were trying to get me to admit my feelings for you were real the whole time. You were open about how you felt. And I kept pushing you away. And you have this company full of people to worry about and I was just this girl you met a few weeks ago. All that, and you were still planning to tell me the truth, even if you didn’t do it right away. So I–”

“Charli,” I say, cutting her off. “I was kind of planning to apologize. First, you screw things up by coming out and interrupting us waiting for you to come out. And now you have the nerve to try to out-sorry me? Do you mind?”

Her lips twitch and she adorably clasps her hands in front of her waist, nodding and waiting.

“Like I was saying,” I say. “I thought about all the excuses I could make. I thought about trying to convince you my actions made sense. But ultimately, I think all that matters is for you to know thatIknow I fucked up. I really, really fucked up, because being with you, even for as little time as we had, was easily the best thing that has ever happened to me. I should have never let anything come between us, and I did. If that means you can never forgive me, I understand, and I’ll regret it for the rest of my life. If you can forgive me, then I won’t deserve it, but I’ll spend every day trying to make it up to you.”

“Wow,” she says.

“Wow,” Margaret agrees from behind me in her scratchy, lifelong smoker voice. “If you don’t take him back, I will. God knows I’d never run out of panties if he was my man.”

“Um,” Charli says, leaning so she can see Margaret. “I’ll let you know when I decide, but you can’t have him yet.”

Charli’s eyes lift to mine, then fall to the bag of books by where I was sitting on the bench. “So are those the keepers or the ones that weren’t good enough for me?”

“These are the keepers. You want to see them?” I ask. I didn’t realize how excited I’d be to share these with her, but I am. I’ve spent the last few weeks thinking about almost nothing but making sure the books I select are right for her. I want this to make her happy.Really happy.

“I want to see how well you did. If there are any real stinkers in there, maybe I’ll have to think twice about forgiving you.”

I’m trying desperately to read her expression for signs of playfulness, but I can’t figure her out right now. She could be one hell of a poker player.

She flips open the top of my bag and starts pulling out books, checking the titles and making appreciative or contemplative noises.

Her eyebrows shoot up when she pulls out a romance book with nothing on the cover but some words and a big, yellow banana. The title is “His Banana” by Penelope Bloom. She laughs, and turns it toward me for me to see. “Really? You thinkthisis what I want to read? What are you trying to imply, Jameson?”

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