As she ventured down the dimly lit hall, located the impeccably outfitted guest bathroom, and closed the door behind her, her head began to ache—dehydration again—and she wondered who Dina might be. A girlfriend he somehow hadn’t mentioned before now, despite all his incessant rambling?
That seemed unlikely. Dina was probably a housekeeper or his cook.
Lauren’s shoulders loosened. Only because it might have been awkward to reconcile her need to watch over Alex with the demands of a girlfriend, who might understandably want privacy for a long-awaited reunion.
Otherwise, his having a girlfriend wouldn’t bother her at all.
After relieving her bladder and washing her hands, she splashed more water on her face. Only to discover that his hand towel was made from some form of cotton she’d never encountered before, one presumably blessed by angels during the manufacturing process. The towel simultaneously dried her face and caressed it, and if she weren’t a pathologically honest person, she’d have slipped it in her purse.
Once she’d dried the marble-topped vanity with another one of those miraculous hand towels, she contemplated herself in the mirror. Rumpled, water-splotched tee. Under-eye circles fully as dark as Alex’s fading shiner. Limp hair falling from a haphazard ponytail.
Still, she’d never emerged from a plane this unscathed before. After a single business-class flight, she was likely to weep in despair the next time she sat in coach.
Faced with Alex’s inimitable charm and gimlet eye and expensive tickets, no one had blinked at either her size or her need for a seat belt extender. As he’d promised, the wider seat gave her just enough room to sit comfortably. More than that, its various controls allowed her to lie almost flat after a three-course dinner, a quilted blanket on top of her as she resisted removing her complimentary eye mask and glancing to her left, where Alex was seated by the window in their two-person row.
She hadn’t slept much, but she’d had substantial time to herself in the dim cabin. He’d even kept his promise, despite those inadequately hidden fingers he’d crossed behind his back, and let her rest without bothering her. Probably because he’d done some napping himself. At mealtimes, he’d picked at her in his usual way, but—
He hadn’t complained that she took up more than her share of the wide armrest between them. He hadn’t remarked on how the tray table sat at a wonky angle as she ate because of her belly. And when they’d lifted off and landed, he’d somehow reached new heights of ridiculousness, his whispered asides so outrageous, she ended up paying more attention to him than the thud of gears or the sight of land either dropping away from them or zooming closer with dizzying speed.
She blinked at the mirror, then realized she’d been staring blankly at her own reflection for minutes now.
Exhaustion. That was all her current stage of confusion indicated. Travel fatigue.
When she came back to the great room, she saw a newly lit area off to the side. A casual dining nook, the table now carelessly set with a couple of mismatched napkins and two plates and a jumbled pile of silverware in the middle.
“Grab your own drink from the fridge,” she heard from around a corner, and she followed his voice to a gorgeous, white-tile-and-marble kitchen with gold accents.
After plucking a sleekly curved bottle of grapefruit soda from the refrigerator’s gleaming depths, she closed the heavy door and turned back to him.
Alex stood bent in front of a built-in microwave, his elbows resting on the marble countertop as he watched a glass container spin inside.
“Hope you like chicken enchiladas. If you don’t, you’re objectively wrong, because chicken enchiladas are fucking delicious. Especially Dina’s.” He pursed his lips. “Still, there might be a couple other prepared meals in the fridge, if you’re determined to be contrary and incorrect. Shit, I should have put a top over this. It’s popping now, and—”
He opened the microwave door and touched the side of the glass container with his fingertip. “They’ll still be lukewarm in the middle, but let’s throw caution to the wind and eat them anyway. Apologies for my culinary laxity, Nanny Clegg. I know you must be scandalized.”
She leaned against a counter and crossed her arms over her chest. “Do you ever run out of words?”
“Nope.” He popped the p in emphasis. “I remain consistently delightful at all times.”
Once he grabbed a marble trivet to put beneath the dish, she followed him into the dining nook. And despite what he’d just told her, he hardly said a word after serving up enchiladas onto both plates. Too hungry to waste time speaking, she supposed. Or maybe he was simply as tired as she was, because he was slumping a bit now, his elbows again propped before him.