Claire huffed a laugh. “Not really, no.”
“Then we won’t.”
She didn’t say it like it was a relief, or like she didn’t want to talk about it in the first place. She said it gently, like she understood hard things and how, even though talking about them could be therapeutic, the words themselves were a labor and, sometimes, one just didn’t have the bandwidth for them.
Claire nodded and met Delilah’s eyes as the other woman took a large banana clip out of her hair, wild tresses haloing around her head. Claire meant to offer a smile of thanks, but a laugh burst out of her instead.
Delilah flinched.
Claire clapped a hand over her mouth, then spoke through her fingers. “Oh my god, I’m so sorry. It’s just . . . you . . . your . . .” She waved her free hand around her head, indicating Delilah’s hair, which was huge. No, what was bigger than huge? Gigantic. Ginormous. Her curls had frizzed in the evening air, but she must have clipped it up to wash her face, and now that it was set free again, it seemed to have a mind of its own. She looked like she’d been electrocuted.
Delilah’s eyes lit with realization, but still she smirked and folded her arms across her chest, which drew attention to the fact that she was, most definitely, not wearing a bra.
A fact Claire did her best to ignore, locking her eyes on her Bride of Frankenstein hair.
“What’s wrong, Claire?” she said, her voice a teasing lilt.
Another laugh escaped.
“Do I have something on my face?” Delilah patted her cheek, before smiling and pulling at her locks, stretching them out even bigger. “Oh, that. Yeah, do you have a hair tie I can borrow? I left all of mine in the Kaleidoscope Inn’s floral hell, and all I have is this clip.” She held up the black clip, then tossed it into her suitcase.
Claire nodded. “It looks amazing, just for the record.”
“Sure it does.”
“It does. It’s unique. Not like my boring straight hair. I always liked your hair when we were teenagers.”
Something flickered in Delilah’s expression, but it was gone just as fast as it arrived. She cleared her throat. “So, a hair tie?”
“Oh yeah.” Claire motioned to her own suitcase on a chair in the corner. “I know I have some in my toiletry bag, but I think there’s one or two floating around in there too. I never leave home without them.”
“A lesson I should learn,” Delilah said, heading toward the turquoise-and-navy-striped suitcase, and Claire felt a spike of anxiety. Everything in her bag was organized, folded neatly. Claire was pretty sure her underwear was tucked away in a zippered pocket, and she hadn’t brought her vibrator—
Her spine snapped straight.
Because she hadn’t planned on packing her vibrator. It hadn’t been on her list, but then she’d thought about how she’d be at a five-star spa and vineyard, enjoying a room of her own and probably trying very hard not to think about a certain big-haired, blue-eyed woman she couldn’t for the life of her figure out.
She’d tossed the thing in last minute.
“Delilah, wait, I’ll get it—”
“Oh. Wow.”
Crap.
Delilah turned around, a black satin hair tie in one hand and Claire’s bright pink California Dreaming Malibu Minx vibrator in the other.
Claire’s face ignited. She knew a lot of people used vibrators. Hell, Iris had gifted her the very one that Delilah now held, raving about its abilities. Iris even forced the thing upon Astrid and asked often if it was collecting dust in Astrid’s nightstand drawer. But Jesus Christ. Of all the people to find her sex toy, clearly well used if Claire packed it for an overnight trip, it just had to be Delilah Green.
“Um . . . that’s . . .” Claire trailed off, unsure of how to play this. She knew her cheeks were bright red, and she could feel the sweat beading on her upper lip.
But then Delilah smiled and nodded. “Oh, I know. I’ve got the same one. Amazing, isn’t it?”
Then she tossed California Dreaming back into Claire’s suitcase and piled her hair on top of her head, wrapping the tie around her messy locks with a snap.
Chapter Fourteen
GOD, THIS WOMAN was adorable.
Delilah finished wrapping her hair, all the while keeping her eyes on Claire as her light pink blush burgeoned into a deeper red. The other woman didn’t say anything else about the admittedly very large battery-operated dildo in her suitcase, so Delilah didn’t either. Which was fine, because watching Claire fight a laugh when Delilah threw the toy back into the suitcase, then proceed to be simultaneously embarrassed, was . . .
Well, it was just about the cutest fucking thing Delilah had ever seen.
Her stomach suddenly felt a little unsettled, fluttery, like it did before the Fitz show or every time she approached an agent at an event or hit send on an email. She hadn’t felt this belly-churning sensation over a woman since Jax, and she wasn’t a fan. But, she supposed, Claire wasn’t just some woman Delilah had met at an event or in a bar. She was Astrid’s BFF, had known Delilah as an awkward teenager. It was a different context, that was all.
At least, that’s what Delilah told herself as she tried to calm what felt like a million bees flying around in her stomach and grabbed her digital camera out of its bag. Her hands needed something to do as she approached the bed, something to focus on when she pulled the covers back.
A king mattress was like an ocean, but still. Claire was right there, and Delilah suddenly forgot how to make her limbs get into a bed like a normal person. She slid her knee in first, but then realized she’d be sitting on her legs, so she kicked her foot out from underneath her, which made her very nearly topple over on one elbow since her camera was still in her other hand.
Graciously, Claire ignored the awkwardness and picked up her phone, staring at the screen, but Delilah swore one corner of her mouth lifted a little. Delilah finally got settled in the cool sheets and flicked her camera to life. She began scrolling through the images she’d taken so far from the other wedding events, cringing at some bad lighting and then grinning at how, sometimes, that bad lighting made Isabel look like a crypt keeper.
“Have you gotten some good photos?” Claire asked, dropping her phone into her lap.
Delilah kept her eyes on her camera. “Yeah, I think so.”
“Can I look at some? I don’t think I’ve ever seen a photograph of yours.”
Delilah glanced her way. Glasses, makeup-free face, hair in a pile on top of her head with her bangs brushing her eyelashes. One strap of her tank top had slid a little down her shoulder, and Delilah fought the urge to put it back in place.