“Sure,” I say, letting my face and my voice go as blank as I can.
“You haven’t tried them?” he asks, eyebrows going up. He spins the pen around one finger without looking.
I say nothing.
“Seems like false advertising,” he goes on, giving me that smile that means I’m kidding exactly enough to claim later that this was a joke, but you and I both know it isn’t, not really.
“It’s for charity,” I say, still perfectly flat.
“I’m only messing with you.”
I look him dead in the eyes and do not smile like I know he wants me to.
“I know,” I say.
Evan looks down at the table, then up at me. He takes a small step forward, leaning in a little, like he’s about to share a secret in this big room filled with people. At the other end of the table someone bids on a couple of pies, glances at us, walks away. I’m thrumming with so much unspent anxiety I must be radioactive.
“Listen, Kat,” he says, and he smiles at me in that way he thinks is charming and slightly bashful. “I know things ended badly between us.”
I say nothing.
“And your feelings were hurt,” he goes on, using the passive voice as if it’s something that just happened one day instead of something he did to me.
I keep saying nothing.
“But since you’re going to be working for me for the next month, I really need you to put those feelings aside and be professional,” he says.
“With you.”
“I understand completely if you still haven’t moved past our relationship,” he goes on, like I didn’t say anything. “But I’m with Olivia now, and if you tried to act on your lingering feelings for me, I’d probably have to talk to my bosses at B&L about it.”
My face goes hot. My lips go cold. My body is somehow every temperature at once, I can’t feel my fingertips, and I think I might pass out from the sheer, all-consuming blinding rage. It feels like someone hooked my brain stem to a car battery, it’s so forceful, so palpable that I swear if I move at all I’ll send shockwaves through the room.
I’ve moved past our relationship. Of course I’ve fucking moved past our relationship. I drove over it and backed up and then drove over it again, for good measure, and now I’m so far away that I can’t see it in the rearview mirror any more.
I wish I had a comeback. All I can manage is to stare at him, trying not to shake, for a good five seconds while I try to shape my rage into words and he looks at me. I don’t even know why he’s saying this here when I already got his obnoxious email.
“It won’t be a problem,” I finally manage, my voice not even shaking. “Trust me, I have no interest whatsoever…”
He’s already not listening to me. He’s already looking away, somewhere else, gripping his beer bottle a little tighter, the muscles in his jaw working. He doesn’t seem to notice that I’ve trailed off, mid-sentence, and I have the sudden, wild urge to hit him in the face with the nearest pie and see if the fucker pays attention to that.
“Are you fucking serious?” I ask, low enough that in the hubbub of the room, no one else can hear me.
“What?” he says, swinging his attention back to me, only now he’s distracted.
“I said,” I say, a little louder, loud enough to be heard but not loud enough to cause a scene. “I have zero intention of—”
“Meckler!”
Evan turns as Silas comes through the sparse crowd, walking like this old theater is his own personal fiefdom. There’s a grin on his face, wide and easy and probably charming to other people, and a beer bottle dangles from his fingers.
“Flynn,” Evan says, the word flat. His head is turned to the side, his jaw tight, his hand suddenly fisted on the table.
He remembers to smile once Silas is even with him, but it’s forced and angry and doesn’t reach his eyes.
“Didn’t know you were in town,” Silas says. He holds out a hand.
Evan takes it.