10 Things I Hate About Pinky - Sandhya Menon Page 0,72

high on her thighs. “Hi.”

“You mind if I sit out here with you for a bit?” he asked, gesturing to the empty chaise lounge next to hers.

“Not at all.” Pinky found herself sitting very stiffly and artificially as he kicked off his sandals and made himself comfortable next to her.

Folding his hands behind his head, he said, after a moment, “This is nice. Really peaceful. The burned-out husk of a barn in the corner really adds to the ambience.”

“Oh, um, yes. I think so too.” Her mind was whirring again, wondering if he’d try to take her hand here in the darkness, or if he’d come out here to talk about them or—

“Are you okay?”

“Huh? Yeah, why?” She turned to him. His face glowed in the softly filtered light coming from the house through the curtains at the French doors.

“You look…” He frowned. “Like you’re in pain or something.”

“Oh. I was just thinking.”

He laughed. “And it’s that agonizing, huh?”

She whacked him on his chest with the back of her hand. His really nicely muscled chest. “Shut up.” After a pause, she asked, “Did you really mean it? You want to help me with whatever Gloria has planned for the habitat?”

Samir nodded. “I do. I really want to help you.”

“But… why?” she forced herself to ask. It was important to her that he tell her. She felt like she’d been going back and forth in her head all day, thinking about the kiss, the things he’d said to Gloria about her, how he’d wanted to visit the habitat in the first place and how he’d volunteered to help with it. She needed to know what Samir’s agenda was. Did he really like her? It didn’t make any sense; the two of them together made zero sense. So, really, she was hoping he’d tell her what she wanted to hear, something that would make all of this less complicated. She was hoping he’d tell her she was full of herself like he had before. She was hoping he’d give her an out.

Samir looked a little confused. “Do you not want me to?”

“No, I do. I just… This is really out of character for you, right?” He nodded his assent. “So why are you doing it? It wasn’t part of our original deal.”

In the dim lights of the deck, Samir’s face was frozen and shadowed for a moment, unreadable. And then he smiled.

Samir

It was funny; she was asking him the same question he’d spent all day asking himself. Why had he agreed to help her with the habitat in a city he had absolutely no ties to? They were bound to lose; of this Samir had no doubt. So then… why?

He gazed into her softly shining brown eyes and ran a hand through his hair, feeling discombobulated. “Why? I don’t know. You’re loud and obnoxious and pigheaded and sometimes you make absolutely no sense. Most times, actually.”

Her eyes turned flinty. “Oh, really.”

“Yeah, really. You yell at me and needle me and you make fun of just about every single thing I do. You’re a walking ball of chaos; you’re practically my biggest fear.”

Pinky made a move to gather her flip-flops and go. “Got it. Thanks.”

“And you’re funny and beautiful and brilliant and probably the most interesting person I’ve ever met.”

She paused, her flip-flops in her hands, and stared at him. “What?”

Samir continued, his heart thudding, his mouth going dry. He was really doing this now, on a semi-dark deck with her family in the house behind them? Yep, he was really doing this now, on a semi-dark deck with her family in the house behind them. Samir knew he should’ve scheduled this outpouring of feelings in his planner for a better time, but that’s what you got when you decided to live life on the edge. All he could do now was plunder forward and hope for the best.

“I’ve never met anyone like you,” he continued, wanting, needing her to see how much he meant it. “I never wanted to, to be honest. Even back in Atherton, I was always intrigued by you, but usually just the way someone might be intrigued by a tarantula in their yard. You want to see it, but you want to keep your distance too, in case it spits face-melting venom or something.” Pinky narrowed her eyes, setting her flip-flops on the deck as if to put them on, and he rushed to continue. “But over the past two weeks, I’ve come to realize something: You say