My face burns hotter with every page.
The chapter ends with Nadine walking into the office right in time to see her two assistants giddily celebrating something. With a cutting glare, she says, “What?”
Her assistant announces she’s pregnant.
Nadine smiles like the shark she is, says congratulations, then goes into her office, where she starts thinking through all the reasons she should fire Stacey the pregnant assistant. She doesn’t approve of distractions, and that’s what pregnancy is.
Nadine doesn’t deviate from plans. She doesn’t make exceptions to rules. She lives life by a strict code, and there’s no room for anyone who doesn’t meet it.
In short, she is a puppy-kicking, kitten-hating, money-driven robot. （The puppy-kicking is implied, but give it a few more chapters, and it might become canon.）
As soon as I finish reading, I start over, trying to convince myself that Nadine—a woman who makes Miranda Priestly look like Snow White—isn’t me.
The third read through is the worst of all. Because this is when I accept that it’s good.
One chapter, ten pages, but it works.
I stand woozily and head toward the dark nook where the bathrooms are, rereading as I go. I need Libby now. I need someone who knows me, who loves me, to tell me this is all wrong.
I should’ve been looking where I was going.
I shouldn’t have worn such high heels, or had a martini on an empty stomach, or been reading a book that’s giving me a surreal out-of-body experience.
Because some combination of those poor decisions leads to me barreling into someone. And we’re not talking a casual Oh, I clipped you on the shoulder—how adorably clumsy I am! We’re talking “Holy shit! My nose!”
Which is what I hear in the moment that my ankles wobble, my balance is thrown off, and my gaze snaps up to a face belonging to none other than Charlie Lastra.
Right as I go down like a sack of potatoes.
6
CHARLIE CATCHES MY forearms before I can tumble all the way down, steadying me as the words “What the hell?” fly out of him.
After the pain and shock comes recognition, followed swiftly by confusion.
“Nora Stephens.” My name sounds like a swear.
He gapes at me; I gape back.
I blurt, “I’m on vacation!”
His confusion deepens.
“I just . . . I’m not stalking you.”
His eyebrows furrow. “Okay?”
“I’m not.”
He releases my forearms. “More convincing every time you say it.”
“My sister wanted to take a trip here,” I say, “because she loves Once in a Lifetime.”
Something flutters behind his eyes. He snorts.
I cross my arms. “One has to wonder why you’d be here.”
“Oh,” he says dryly, “I’m stalking you.” At my eye bulge, he says, “I’m from here, Stephens.”
I gawk at him in shock for so long that he waves a hand in front of my face. “Hello? Are you broken?”
“You . . . are from . . . here? Like here here?”
“I wasn’t born on the bar of this unfortunate establishment,” he says, lip curled, “if that’s what you mean, but yes, nearby.”
It’s not computing. Partly because he’s dressed like he just stepped out of a Tom Ford spread in GQ, and partly because I’m not convinced this place isn’t a movie set that production abandoned halfway through construction. “Charlie Lastra is from Sunshine Falls.”
His gaze narrows. “Did my nose go directly into your brain?”
“You are from Sunshine Falls, North Carolina,” I say. “A place with one gas station and a restaurant named Poppa Squat.”
“Yes.”
My brain skips over several more relevant questions to: “Is Poppa Squat a person?”
Charlie laughs, a surprised sound so rough I feel it as a scrape against my rib cage. “No?”
“What, then,” I say, “is a Poppa Squat?”
The corner of his mouth ticks downward. “I don’t know—a state of mind?”
“And what’s wrong with the Greek salad here?”
“You tried to order a salad?” he says. “Did the townspeople circle you with pitchforks?”
“Not an answer.”
“It’s shredded iceberg lettuce with nothing else on it,” he says. “Except when the cook is drunk and covers the whole thing in cubed ham.”
“Why?” I ask.
“I imagine he’s unhappy at home,” Charlie replies, deadpan. “Might have something to do with the kinds of thwarted dreams that lead a person to working here.”