Three Hard Lessons (Blindfold Club 2)

“Oh my god, just because I’m yours doesn’t mean you get to tell me what to do.”

It sounded like he fumbled with the phone. “I don’t have a problem with that, but you don’t have any underwear on. Remember?”

I blinked, and then chuckled. He was probably bright red on the other end of the line. “Don’t worry, they’ve got some stuff here for me to try on.”

“Oh.” He let out a sigh of relief. “Okay.”

“Thanks for your help.”

“No problem. I can’t wait to hear about this tonight.”

On Friday evening, he came home with carryout dinner and was eager to hear the story about the shoot.

“It was way less glamorous than it sounds,” I said with a mouthful of kimchi. “They sell swimsuits in catalogs, at least, that’s what the photographer told me.”

“But the fact remains, I’m now dating a swimsuit model.”

“You’re such a guy.” Meredith was right, he was going to rub it in. “The whole thing took, like, two hours.” It didn’t pay much, but it had been fun. “Oh, I got to keep the suits.”

“Bikinis?”

“A few, yeah.”

His bottle of beer clunked on the table. “You’ll have to model them for me.”

“You want to see them?” I gave a small laugh. “Of course, because you like checking inventory.”

“I like looking at your sexy-ass body, is what I like doing.”

It was silly to attempt a fashion show. I only modeled one before he pulled the strings loose and we sank to the living room floor. I’d become an expert at getting him out of his suit.

Saturday morning I Skyped with Evie while Dominic slept. She stared at me like I had two heads.

“Boyfriend,” she repeated.

“Yeah.”

She blinked and looked like she was evaluating me to see if I were an imposter. “Okay. So, what happens whenever you get back here? I mean, you’re coming back, right?”

Was she crazy? “Yeah, I’m coming back.” I couldn’t live in Japan. It was a nice place to visit and all, but Dominic was right. People all around and yet it was isolating. I didn’t think I’d ever feel like I belonged here. I’d mentioned that to Dominic yesterday and he shot me a strange look, maybe an ‘I told you so.’ “I don’t know what happens. We don’t, like, talk about it.”

“You’re going to have to, eventually.”

“I know,” I said, annoyed.

“Hey.” Her body straightened in her chair. “I got a weird call yesterday from Joseph.”

Ugh. I’d deleted the few voicemails he’d left me, without listening to them. He’d always call when I was asleep, probably unaware I was on the other side of the earth.

“What’d he want?”

“He asked if I knew where you were. He said he really needs to talk to you.”

Forget it. That part of my life w

as in the rearview. “What did you tell him?”

“That you were out of town. Is that okay?”