by Lisa Daniels
She turned over the words in her mind, and only online might be her mistake. But people did meet online. Plus, Date-Monsters contracts were kept private once instigated and when requested. Chloe wouldn’t see Lena’s contracts.
Still, she wondered if she should ditch the reunion all the same.
No. This is the whole point of having Oskar. I’m not paying five thousand just to not turn up. No way.
She just had to make sure she survived long enough.
Lena’s phone vibrated, and she glanced at it in eagerness.
Oskar: Hey. Can’t meet up tonight, sorry. Have to fly and meet my father for something but will be back by the morning.
Heart sinking, she re-read the message, preparing herself to endure the emotions, before sending, No worries. Looking forward to seeing you tomorrow.
Oskar: I was planning to seduce you tonight, too. Believe me, I’m annoyed about this.
Lena: Seduce me? I might already be a little seduced.
Oskar: Tomorrow, Lena. I promise… you’ll have the night of your life.
Heat burned between her thighs at this, and she squeezed her legs together in an attempt to suppress the sudden arousal.
Seemed her fake boyfriend really wanted to turn up the charm and get her into his bed.
And she might just let him do it.
She took a deep breath. Whatever Chloe was planning, she’d endure it, somehow. She’d show Oskar off to everyone, and he’d take her to the hotel afterwards. She closed her eyes, mind running through a fantasy, until the footsteps of a new customer walking in yanked her out of it.
Tomorrow, she thought firmly, swallowing the last of the initial disappointment. Tomorrow, everything will change.
Chapter Six – Lena
Day six was here at last. The day of the reunion.
And six days didn’t feel long enough with Oskar, especially considering that Lena had worked all week. Although she had memories of Oskar’s kisses lingering in her veins, his smiles, his soft words and little stories, she still didn’t know much about him, and a week would never be enough for Lena.
Now she sat in Oskar’s rental car, stiff, nerves running high. Even his gentle ministrations of her hand, rubbing a thumb along her knuckles, did nothing to quell the building anxiety. Katie glanced at them occasionally through her front mirror, yellow eyes in a heavy squint. Under Lena’s coat lay the purple Louis Vuitton dress Oskar had picked out for her, sparing her the original plan of her black, floor-length dress. The purple had frills in the front and was sleeveless, with a neat V that hinted at the cleavage she possessed. She’d used her strapless black bra underneath the dark purple, and felt like the dress she wore was worth more than her own body.
“It’s only going to be for a few hours,” Oskar assured her, amber eyes laced with concern. “And I’m sure people won’t pay that much attention to us.”
“You realize about half the town’s charmed by you now?” Lena’s gaze quickly darted to his lips, before she forced herself to focus completely on another part of his face. Even though she was sorely tempted to kiss him and caress those lips against hers like the other night. She’d been dreaming of that mouth, of his tongue. Of the sweet shivers that went down her back when his hands scratched over her skin. “I can almost guarantee everyone’s going to be looking at us.”
“Then let them,” Oskar purred. “You look like a queen tonight.”
Lena shivered, before all resistance melted, and she went for Oskar’s lips. He ran his fingers through her hair, kissing her back, grinning against her mouth.
“Mm, I feel like you really missed me last night.”
“You have no idea,” Lena breathed.
“I’ll make up for it tonight,” he promised, his tongue dabbing against her bottom lip. She took it in with a delightful shiver running down her spine.
Eventually, she pulled away, tugged at her butterfly sleeves, and ran her spare hand down to the tapered ends of her dress, which spilled just over her knees with the acetate ruffles like purple waves. “Can’t believe you got me this.”
“How could I not? I knew you’d look like a diamond with it on. And I’m still intending to make that heart of yours beat faster than a hummingbird’s.”
She laughed, though she felt a little inadequate about the dress. This wasn’t her at all. Who was she fooling, really, with these things? Next to Oskar, at least the purple suited what he’d chosen, a silken, light purple shirt, a neat, artfully tailored waistcoat, and his sleeves rolled up to expose the well-toned muscles in his arms and the Rolex glinting on his right wrist. His formal wear long shoes curled and thinned at the tip, adding to the sophisticated image shared between them.
For one more night, she had to pretend. Stupid Lena, though, starting to develop feelings for her fake date. Starting to wonder on a level if this was all superb acting from Oskar, really getting into his role, or whether he genuinely cared for her.
This is what happens when you’re lonely, she thought fiercely to herself. You’ll attach to anyone who shows you even a scrap of affection, no matter how false it is.
“Lena, you look like you’re about to walk to the guillotine,” Oskar said. “If you want, we can go somewhere else. If that’s better for you.”
“No,” she croaked, gripping his hand tight. “We go. We put on the show, and I’ll try very hard not to vomit.”
“You’re more confident than you think you are,” Oskar said, one eyebrow arched, a smile lifting his lips.
Annoyance stabbed Lena. “You’re the one who gets to be on television all the time. Dealing with crowds is easy for you. Always so confident.”
“Want to know the truth?” He drew her in as close as possible with the seatbelts strapping them in. Lena noted with a pang how he’d been strapping himself in ever since her commentary on him the first time he’d sat there without being secured. “I’m always nervous. I’m just fantastic at hiding it and feigning the confidence. There’s a trick to it.”
“Imagine people naked?” Lena had heard that one. Didn’t work for her.
“That could work as well, maybe. My tip is that people react to your body language. They react to your tone of voice. If you can at least appear confident, then people treat you like you are confident. And then it all falls into place from there. It’s just an illusion, really.”
She didn’t believe him, but he seemed so convinced by his own words that she found herself nodding along. “All an illusion, huh?”
“Everything,” he said. It was the wrong thing to say, but he didn’t know it. Again, Lena’s thoughts brooded on the whole fakeness of her relationship, on her own stupidity for allowing herself to get attached to him.
Tomorrow, he would be gone, the contract done. The realization sank into her and did nothing for her mood.
I’m wasting the time I do have right now like this. Finally, she wrenched herself out of the moment, long enough to reply, “Okay, I can do this. One more night lying my ass off, and we’re good.”
Oskar ruffled her hair, an oddly tender expression on his face. “Like I said, we’re all lying a little anyway.”
“I thought you said you disliked liars,” Lena replied, closing her eyes and relaxing into Oskar’s touch. Which she definitely shouldn’t be doing.
“I dislike everyone equally. But some lie… less than others. And some might just be worth it, even if they feel the need to hide themselves from others.”
Before Lena had any time to answer that, she felt the car slowing down, and opened her eyes to witness Katie pulling into the parking lot of her old school. Lena’s stomach did several ungainly flips, and she took some deep, calming breaths before gathering enough courage to exit the vehicle, stand up straight and tall, and hook her elbow with Oskar’s, before heading to the entrance. Faces she recognized swam in her vision, many with partners she didn’t, and some with partners she did. Sweethearts who had stayed together, and some unlikely pairings as well. Brad and Verity were the surprise pairing sh
e eyed, as she remembered Brad used to be a horrific bully to Verity, and she’d always rejected his advances and attempts to conquer her. Strange how things worked out.
“Lena Tate. And this is your plus two, of course. A handsome man and his handsome assistant.” The older receptionist, Ruth Walbeck, was also one of the regular library visitors, who had spent an ample amount of time complimenting the flowers and saying when a man had done that to her back in the last century, she’d fallen into his bed faster than a lady could sneeze.
What was it with the people in this town, anyway?
“Pleasure to meet you,” Oskar said, taking the time to bow and deliver a kiss upon Ruth’s knuckles. The older lady went pink and plucked at her fluffy white sweater, and made cooing noises of delight as she ushered them in, ready to sign in the people behind. Stepping into Geevor High School felt like stepping into the past. The student pictures on the walls were different, and the lockers had been upgraded since (they were far too easy to crack before and had issues with people pranking each other).
Walking into the main assembly hall, the fruits of Chloe Galer’s efforts were evident for all to see. Lena’s low heels clacked on smooth wood, the sound echoing and mixing with the footsteps of the others. Around forty people occupied the room, many with their plus ones. As far as Lena was aware, almost all their school year planned to turn up, and since Geevor High School had around sixty people in their year, it’d get a lot more crowded as the evening went on.
Mining hats and pickaxes decorated the walls, along with paintings of caves and pasties and Pappy’s. Sorted along the tables were typical Geevoran foods, like miniature pasties, cream scones, and some less typical ones like Mexican quesadillas and plenty of vegetable options. Music trilled out of the school speakers, which sounded like some old-style country folk song Lena couldn’t identify.
Almost immediately, someone bumped into Lena, barely preventing themselves from spilling a glass of bubbly all over her dress. “Oh, Lena!” It was Hailey, one of her former cheerleader buddies, eyes already glazed over from drink, and a fierce smile on her face that was probably hiding great pain. “Nice to see you! And your man-meat. Oh…”
“Sorry,” Lena hissed to Oskar, who merely looked amused. She was embarrassed for her town’s behavior, ogling Oskar like a popsicle, referring to him as hunk and meat and sometimes just plain salivating. Just when she thought women were the ones who got objectified… “Hey, Hailey, long time no see. Where’s your husband?”
“Ha.” Hailey’s eyes flashed, and she went from fierce smile to murderous. “He’s just fine. Not here, though.”
“Why not?”
“Oh, he didn’t want to come to some silly reunion,” Hailey said with a donkey’s bray of a laugh, drawing attention from the others in the hall. “Also, fucking Brad—him and Verity. Who would have thought?”
Still chortling in a hysterical way, she swayed off to crash into someone else, this time actually slopping some of her drink, and Lena stood there, frozen, clutching Oskar’s hand for support.
“I take it Brad and… whoever she was had a thing?” Oskar carefully probed, still appearing vastly amused. Maybe he was warming up to the small-town hijinks.
“You could say that,” Lena said, now watching Chloe descend upon Hailey like a vulture, swooping her up and taking her away. “She and Brad did Seven Minutes of Heaven in a closet once, and we’re fairly sure there was sex involved. Rumor went that Brad could probably do it in One Minute of Heaven as well.”
Oskar snickered, and Katie was now scanning the crowd, her yellow eyes alert for any potential threats. Though at a reunion, she’d be hard pressed to locate them. “We had some party games at my private school and fraternity as well. The fraternity, though, everything was about sex. Daring to get women into our beds, adding to our conquest points… probably shouldn’t spare you details.”
“Fraternities,” Lena muttered. “I’ve heard some messed-up shit happen in them. I never made it to the sorority in my years. Just had my dead-end degree in Archeology.”
“Least you weren’t a theater student,” Katie said suddenly. “I was.”
“Really?” Now Lena stared at Katie in complete surprise. “I never would have thought you to be interested in performing arts.”
“Why not? Werewolves were super popular in television and film, and I thought I was being smart, setting myself up for it. Can’t act to save my life, though,” Katie said, now snatching three wine glasses off a waiter’s tray, handing one each to Lena and Oskar. “And I was about eighty thousand in debt after the whole thing.”
Lena’s eyes widened. “Do you still want to act?”
“Sometimes.” Katie shrugged. “I can dance a little, sing in tune, but acting… maybe I’d try audio books at some point.”
Their conversation got interrupted by more of Lena’s old schoolfriends approaching them, including one of her previous crushes once upon a time in sophomore year, Samuel Prescott, looking very shiny and hair bleached, reaching out a pompous hand for Lena to shake.
“Looking good, Lena.” When he glanced over at Chloe as he said so, Lena got an immediate, stomach-clenching suspicion that Chloe had sent Samuel over. “I remember how you used to massively crush on me. Shame we never hit it off, right? I mean, look at you now.”
When Oskar and Samuel shook hands, the grips seemed so hard that Lena thought she heard the sound of cracking bones. Samuel’s pale blue eyes watered in pain, and the sight was enough for Lena to fight through some of her embarrassment.
“It was a long time ago, Sam. Crushes are normal, we get over them. How have things been with you?”
“Oh, just fine,” Sam gasped, rubbing his hand and springing a quick smile to his sharp features. “Damn, your shifter dude hurts.” He narrowed his eyes, but otherwise still remained friendly as he walked off, and Lena recalled vaguely that not everyone was on board with shifters. Especially in small towns, and those straddling the bible belt, who didn’t think those who transformed into animals were considered trustworthy.
After all, it was only three hundred years since the last shifter was burned at the stake. Mostly people no longer cared, but some residual moods lingered, some suspicion focused on the shifters, who humans naturally disliked because they were higher up on the food chain, with identical levels of intelligence.
Katie seemed to come to a similar conclusion, and pointed out one obscure corner of the hall, where one woman held an actual bible in her hand and was talking animatedly to a small audience of three. “We’ve got a missionary at eleven o’clock.”
“Seriously?” Lena huffed in disgust. “This is a reunion. Not a conversion hall.”
“They’ll take their opportunities where they find them. Notice one of the audience is a female shifter. The missionary’s ignoring the shifter and talking to her partner.”
Lena did notice, and it irritated the hell out of her. The song changed to Hit Me Baby One More Time, and several groups of people spontaneously started dancing, wiggling their booty to the music. “I swear, if that bitch comes over here and does the same thing, I’m going to punch her in the face. Hard.” She paused. “I can’t punch. What am I talking about? I’ll just slap her.”
“Good luck with that,” Oskar snorted, planting a quick kiss to her forehead that was so unexpectedly intimate and sweet that all thought emptied out of Lena’s mind. She might have also forgotten to breathe somewhere. “Well, let’s go and get some food.”
They wove through the steadily increasing trickle of people, sipping on their wines, snatching some of the mini pasties and vegetables, while Lena attempted to explain the complicated politics of her year. “Madison’s parents were old-fashioned—they made her wear a sanitary belt all throughout her school, and at some point, she got about a quarter of the girls interested in wearing them as well.”
“Sanitary… belt?”
“A device invented by Satan himself,” Lena assured him, running a finger across her throat. “Back in
the days where men ran out the room as soon as a woman even hinted at cramps, and where no one really talked about them because I guess it was one disgusting body function too many.”
Katie was already Googling, and shoved a picture of a pink, elasticated waist strap in front of Oskar and Lena’s faces. “This?”
“Yep. You wore it, and then attached the sanitary pad to these parts…” Lena jabbed at the clasps. “I’m ashamed to admit I tried it. I think I genuinely was out of my mind when I agreed, because that shit is so horrible and uncomfortable. I’m glad they vanished.”
She enjoyed the way Oskar’s face lit up in interest as she rattled off these stories, and kept digging further and further into her murky school years, trying to come up with events she hadn’t thought about for a long time. She prompted Oskar to say some things as well, feeling a little self-conscious she was talking too much, not giving him any room to breathe.
“I honestly didn’t know much about the women stuff,” Oskar admitted. “They never talked about it to us, and we never discussed it among the men, either. We did have a dare to jump off a sixty-foot pier into the harbor when we went on a school trip, and a few of us were dared to belly flop it.” Oskar gulped down more of his wine, using his spare hand to lightly caress Lena’s arm, making the little hairs there stand on end. “The ones who flopped ended up in hospital, so not our best decision-making, I must say. And four of my fraternity were arrested for third degree murder. Depraved-heart murder, whatever you want to call it, because they were all drunk as skunks, and locked out one of our members from the fraternity as a joke. Not much of a joke when it’s cold enough to snow at night, and he dies of exposure the next day because he’s too drunk to peel himself off the step.”