No.
Instead, I shower. Dry my hair. Smooth some product over it that makes it slightly sleeker. Slightly shinier. Stare at myself in the mirror while I try to get my brain to work.
A pink box waits for me when I step back into the room. More new clothes, these ones even softer than the previous outfit. I put on the underthings and black leggings and long-sleeved shirt and stare into the bottom of the box. There is no humiliating lingerie. Not a scrap of it.
I don’t know what it says about me that I’m slightly disappointed.
No Mrs. Page in the hallway. No Gerard. The dining room downstairs is empty. I wonder if Leo’s out on business. He must be. He can’t be staying here all day, every day, just because we have an agreement.
I don’t long for him. God, no. Not at all. I just rub my knuckles against my chest and walk the halls until I find myself in his den. The built-in bookshelves pull me in like a current in deep water. There. Yes. It feels better with my hands on the spines of books. I pull one down at random and flip it open.
It’s Leo’s.
The neat print of his name inside the front cover makes me look twice to confirm that it is in fact his name inside a book. A book he intends to keep, since I can’t imagine he sends anything with his name on it to used book sales. Not like my family. Our house churns with books. They come in, they go out, they get sold back to the student bookstore. There wasn’t space to keep all the books I loved, anyway. The only other mansions I’ve visited, like Aunt Caroline’s, have shelves full of decorative fakes and a few uncut first editions for looks.
This is the real thing. There’s even a crease in the spine.
I fold it to my chest like a life preserver and take it to the armchair closest to the fireplace. It’s classic sci-fi. I fall headfirst into it like a swooning teenager, which is embarrassing, because I know in my heart that it’s not the plot or the characters or even the perfectly fine writing that’s doing it for me.
It’s Leo’s name inside the cover.
Chapters tick by, page by page by page, the light outside the windows shifting from one winter glow to the next. Dusk comes, and so does Mrs. Page. She turns on a low lamp nearby without asking and replaces my tea. Not long after I trade my prim seated position for a slouch and then finally let my legs dangle over the arm of the chair.
That’s how I’m sitting when I feel the presence in the doorway.
Leo leans against the doorframe, watching me with undisguised amusement. He’s dressed for the office in what’s obviously a custom suit, judging by how well it fits him. “You’ve made yourself at home.”
I swing my legs forward and tug at my clothes. “I am home, according to our contract.”
He laughs, and I expect him to say something cutting about how a Constantine could never be at home here. But he doesn’t. His eyes sweep over the room. I follow his gaze. The evidence of my daylong staycation in his den is on the side table. My last mug of tea. A plate with a half-eaten sandwich. A can of Diet Coke I haven’t opened.
“Mrs. Page says you’ve spent all day here.”
“It’s a decent book.”
“Not the best book?” It’s not fair how good he looks in the suit. And under the suit.
“The best book is Jane Eyre, obviously.” Nobody can argue that point with me.
“Yet you’ve spent an entire day of your life sitting in my den reading something mediocre. You love reading enough to settle?”
“No. Leather furniture turns me on.”
Surprise bursts across Leo’s face like a sunbeam through clouds. It’s gone almost instantly, fitted back into his usual piercing expression. He straightens up. “Get up and get dressed.”
I’m on my feet embarrassingly quickly. “I’m already dressed.”
“Not for going out, you’re not. Mrs. Page.” She’s there instantly, like he snapped his fingers and made her appear from thin air. “Haley needs a dress. We’ll leave in twenty minutes.”
What am I supposed to do, question it? I don’t. Of course I don’t. I climb the stairs to the guest bedroom and make myself slightly more presentable. My hair is flat on one side from all the reading, so I fix that. There’s makeup in neutral colors in one of the guest bathroom drawers, everything new and in the package. Leo’s sister has thought of absolutely everything. The only thing she couldn’t do was match foundations in advance. She solved that problem by putting ten of them in the drawer, all miniatures. By the time Mrs. Page bustles in with a garment bag I look pink-cheeked and human.
Part of me dreads this. Going out was never supposed to be part of this arrangement. Going out is for people who are in real relationships, or at least dating each other. At the same time, I’m...excited? Yes. It’s excitement that makes my heart beat this way.
Last night rattled my brain. He saved me, and he let me in, and there’s nothing I want more.
Mrs. Page unzips the garment bag and pulls out a gown. It’s a gorgeous champagne gold. I would never have picked this out for myself. The color wouldn’t look good with my pale complexion, would it? I hold it up to the mirror. It looks…effervescent. Shimmering. I seem otherworldly in this color. “You’ve got four minutes left.” She’s brought underthings and shoes, too—the kind that go with a gown like this. Delicate and expensive in a matching gold color. “Step in, quick as you can. Mr. Morelli doesn’t like to be kept waiting.”
I abandon all previous shyness and focus on dressing. “Do you know where he’s taking me?”
“Somewhere in the city, I would think. He didn’t give me any specifics.”
“Maybe next time,” I say wistfully, but secretly I like this, too.
With one minute to spare, I go down to meet Leo at the front doors. He watches me come down the stairs with a light in his eyes that I’m sure I imagine. Leo offers me his arm when I reach him, and I swallow a giggle.
I am not going to giggle in front of him. Jesus Christ.
Leo’s driver is waiting for us by the black SUV in the circle drive. He opens the door for us and jogs around to the front. We get in and go.
“Are you going to tell me where we’re going?” I ask when we’re closer to the city.
Leo gives me an indulgent smile. “It’s a surprise.”
I make a face. Having a creative inventor for a father has given me a dislike for surprises. There are only so many times you can wake up with freezing water flooding the second floor of your house before it stops being exciting. “Just tell me.”
He gives a low chuckle. His face isn’t visible in the shadows of the limo, but I can imagine his expression—subtly amused, darkly challenging. “You can guess.”
“A restaurant.”
“No.”
“A movie?”
The faint sound of a scoff. “You know me better than that, Haley.”
Do I? It’s an intriguing idea, that I might know Leo Morelli. He seems unknowable. A mystery. No one could have him figured out, but he seems to think I might. “A charity gala.”
“No, darling. That’s much too tame for what I have in mind tonight.”
I’m left to imagine the possibilities. We wouldn’t go dancing, would we? I’ve heard that Leo likes to visit clubs, but maybe he doesn’t—maybe he only uses them, the way he uses everything else. As a distraction and a shield. Maybe it is a restaurant and he’s just keeping me on my toes by saying no. I spend the last few minutes of the drive swinging between nerves and delight at the thought of eating with him in public. It would be a relief, honestly. Being a not-rich Constantine means that meals out are rare and come with a side of pressure to do the right thing, to not spend too much, to not eat too little.