Hiring Mr. Darcy - Valerie Bowman Page 0,31
strangle him. He was certainly doing a good job of convincing Mitchell that he’d been secretly pining for me for years, and Mitchell was sure to tell Harrison, but on the other hand, I felt as if he was laying it on way too thick by making me lie along with him. Though I suppose when I really thought about it, it wasn’t technically a lie. He had had to convince me to go to eat with him last night. “It’s true,” I said curtly, wanting to run out the door and hide in the Jetta. “Let’s go,” I ground out.
Mitchell and Ms. Julia slowly waved us off with a handkerchief as if we were going to war, and I hightailed it out to my car. Jeremy’s truck was parked close by but he followed me to my car.
“He’s going to tell them you know,” I said.
“Tell who?”
“Harrison and Lacey.”
“I know. I want him to.”
“Thanks. I guess.”
“You’re welcome. I guess.”
I unlocked the car door with my fob and Jeremy promptly opened the door for me.
I paused. “You don’t have to walk me to my car and open the door for me. Haven’t you seen my bumper sticker?”
“The herstory one? Yeah, I like it,” he said. “And I wanted to walk you to your car. Besides, I thought you were an old-fashioned sort of girl. Like 1815 old-fashioned.”
Despite my lingering anxiety, that made me laugh. “I study it. I don’t want to live it.”
“Why not?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Disease, no plumbing, racism, lack of women’s rights, and no HVAC. I could go on.”
He leaned an elbow on the top of my opened car door. “If it makes you feel any better, I’d do the same for my sister.”
“Do what?” I frowned.
“Open the door.”
Oh, great, he’d compared me to his sister. Any momentary insanity that had made me think he might actually be digging me vanished.
“How much are the clothes going to cost?” he asked next without waiting for me to reply.
“That’s for me to worry about, not you.”
He opened his mouth to say something, but the door to the shop jangled open again and Mitchell stuck out his head. “I forget to tell you. Come back next Tuesday for your first fitting, and the Tuesday after that to pick up everything.”
“Thank you, Mitchell,” I called back.
“Don’t worry.” Mitchell waved his handkerchief in the air again. “I’ll be sure not to schedule you at the same time Professor Macomb and his actress friend are here. Oh my. That would be awkward, wouldn’t it?”
Chapter 11
Wednesday
Harrison was sitting at our favorite table in our favorite restaurant at precisely eleven thirty in the morning. He was wearing his favorite ‘uniform’: a pair of khakis, a buttoned-up, stiffly starched shirt, and a jacket with corduroy elbow patches. His hair was swept away from his forehead with the smallest bit of gel, and he looked fresh-faced and rested. Meanwhile, I’d gotten a total of about four hours of sleep in the last several nights.
It was a bit early for lunch, but we preferred to eat early. That way we bypassed the big crowds. We loved the little soup and bread shop on the corner of campus because it had quick, efficient service and yummy food. It was the type of place where you ordered at the counter, however, and Harrison had obviously already ordered because his water bottle was sitting on the table in front of him, and that meant he’d already paid.
Keeping my face carefully blank, I waved to him to indicate that I’d seen him and then made my way up to the counter to order my own lunch. Soup and salad. V. healthy. Who cared if the soup was loaded baked potato? Half-ass dieter here.
The girl behind the counter gave me a plastic number tent and a cup for my Sprite. While I signed the screen to pay for my lunch, I couldn’t help but think about how Jeremy had bought me pizza last night. When was the last time a man had paid for my meal? Maybe on my last birthday? Harrison paid for me on my birthday, of course. But we both agreed that it didn’t make sense for a modern couple to pay for each other. We each had a good job. It was sexist and outdated for a man to always pay for a woman. Still, it would have been nice for him to offer from time to time.
No, that thinking was wrong and sexist. What the hell? Was my