Page 45 of Lady Killer

“Merde, Autumn, sorry. I’m so incredibly happy for you,” I said quickly. “I just kind of assumed you already were, and my brain was somewhere else. But this is so exciting. Seriously.”

A small breath left her, taking some of the tension with it.

“She seems to make you happy,” I added with a sincere smile. I meant it. Mostly.

“She does . . .” Autumn said, her eyes dropping.

“Is there a but?”

“No!” She looked up at me with big eyes. “No,” she repeated. “Simone’s perfect . . . It’s . . . it’s me. I’m the problem.”

I nearly choked on my soda.

I liked Simone. I liked her for Autumn a lot. My gut told me she wasn’t a threat, but I hadn’t forgotten her odd reaction when she saw me and Aaron together at the party.

I trusted my intuition, which was why she wasn’t on the list. But now that they were dating, I might have to revise that. Or at least dig a little deeper.

“You’re one of the sweetest, most bubbly people I know, Autumn. Please tell me, how are you the problem?”

She started picking at her manicure. “You know my parents are . . . difficult.”

Uh-oh.

“They, uh, they wouldn’t take me being with Simone very well, like, at all. They’re not like, conservative, per se,” she stammered on. “Like, they voted for Hillary and everything.”

I wanted to reach across the table and hold her hand, but I wasn’t sure if I should.

“But what’s okay for others isn’t okay for a Morgan. In their eyes.”

I nodded. Lots of people were hypocrites. “Can I ask a tough question?” Asking was good, right?

Autumn made a bitter scoff I’d never heard from her before. “They wouldn’t love that she’s Black, but they would probably be too polite to ever say anything.”

No, they would just subject poor Simone to microaggressions for the duration of her relationship with Autumn.

“They wouldn’t be crazy about the fact that she’s a woman either,” she added, shocking me not at all. “But that’s not what their biggest issue with her and me would be.”

Well, now I was confused. It couldn’t be because Simone was British, right? This wasn’t 1776.

The server returned to top up the basket of chips that had seemingly disappeared in front of me. Autumn and I sat in silence wearing polite smiles as she started to pick at her nails again.

I gave her a second to compose herself.

“You don’t have to tell me.”

“No, I do, I just want to say it. I should just say it, I just, like, don’t want you to, like . . .”

“Just say it, Autumn,” I commanded, not unkindly.

“I’m ace!” she blurted out.

I blanked on what she was saying but remembered to smile encouragingly this time.

“Ace, like asexual,” she went on.

Ohhh.

Suddenly, all sorts of pieces about Autumn clickedinto place.