had eaten it up.
“Two down, one to go,” I say, lifting my hand for a high five.
He stares at my hand. “Must we?”
“I saved our ass, remember?” I say. “You owe me.”
He obliges me, slapping my palm. “Guess you were right about the hair.”
I make a primping motion. “Don’t get used to it. Tomorrow it goes back to tousled waves.”
“The hairstyle has a name?”
I shake my head. “Of course it has a name. Jeez. You know—Rebecca owes me. I’m like your wife training wheels, teaching all the things you need to know about living with a woman, starting with the importance of our hair.”
He gives a distracted nod and sips his bubbly. “I didn’t realize the third and final interviews would take place with us separated.”
“Me neither,” I say. “But I guess it makes sense, separating the couples so we don’t know what the other said. Come to think of it, you’d better bring your A-game.” I point my drink at him. “I won’t be there to save you that time, so don’t screw it up.”
He scrunches up his face in concentration. “Just so I’m clear, I should or should not mention that you and I had exchanged fewer than a hundred words prior to saying I do, and that I really wanted that green card …”
“Another joke!” I say, delighted. “I’m rubbing off on you.”
“God save me.” But he’s smiling as he says it, and I can’t help but think how far we’ve come in two short months, from two strangers literally counting down the days until this hell was over to …
Well, whatever we are now. I don’t know that there’s a name for it.
“Want to order in?” he asks.
I look up in surprise. “You’re not having dinner with Rebecca?”
“She has a client meeting,” he says, flipping through his phone. “Thai or pizza?”
I stifle disappointment that he’s only doing dinner with me because she’s not available, which I know is ridiculous. Rebecca is someone he chose. I’m someone he’s stuck with. But selfishly, I’ll take whatever time I can get with him, so I push the glum aside.
“How about Thai?” I say. “No, pizza. No! What about tacos? Ooh, or that Indian we ordered last week was super yummy. Or maybe—”
He holds his cell phone. “Thai. Ordered.”
“You don’t even know my order!”
“Coconut shrimp, chive dumpling, pad Thai, and you’ll help yourself to my green curry without asking, eat half of it, and then tell me all the reasons you don’t love it.”
“Nice.” I nod in approval. “Keep it coming with all this domestic discontent, especially during your solo meeting with Gordon Price. You’ll sell not only our marriage but also our impending divorce.”
“Only one month to go,” he says, lifting his glass.
I manage to raise mine in an answering toast.
But I can’t quite manage a smile to go with it.
Chapter 33
Thursday, October 29
“Did you find the spare sheets?” I call out, pulling Colin’s pillow off his side of the bed. He’s got a surprising amount of pillows on the bed for a guy who lives alone, and the Thai food churns a little in my stomach as I wonder if the mountain of extra pillows is Rebecca’s touch. I wonder how many times she’s slept over, I wonder …
No. That’s enough. I’ll never be able to get to sleep in this bed if I continue with that train of thought, and I’m not up for another fifteen-minute argument with Colin over who takes the couch.
If I had to guess, I’d imagine Colin a single pillow kind of guy, but on the off chance he likes a mountain of them, I grab three of them off the bed.
“Colin?” I call, tilting my head up so my voice can carry over the pile of pillows. “Did you hear what I said about the spare sheets? I put them in the—”
The rest of my sentence ends with an oomph as I step into the hallway and collide with something—someone. The pillows thump softly to the floor.
“What was the plan, building a fort?” Colin asks, as we both lean down to pick up the pillows.
“Nope. Smothering. I wanted to try out a couple different ones, see which felt the best as I held it over your face.”
“Uh-huh. Also, I’ve already got a pillow,” he says, a pillow under each arm, leaving me holding just one. “I grabbed the one in the linen closet with the guest sheets.”
“Yeah, but these are your pillows. If you’re going to have to sleep on the couch,