Page 61 of Party Favors

“You’re always telling me people should have the benefit of the doubt and so I recommend extending it to your newfriend,” she said. “You should also stop pretending that you want to be just friends with this man. If I fed that line into a lie detector, it would explode.” She took her food out of the kitchen and into her room, where she locked the door.

While I considered what she’d said, my phone rang and I answered without looking to see who was calling. I’d been on my phone nonstop over the last few days, trying to get everything lined up for the birthday party and the baby shower.

“Hello?”

“Everly?” Max’s voice made me happy sigh.

“Hi!” Was that too enthusiastic? Did I need to tone it down? I tried to modulate my tone. “How are you?”

“Good.” He paused and it felt a bit awkward. We never had any issues while we were texting, but this was different. It was the first time we’d spoken with our actual voices since I’d taken him out for a mini-tour of New York City.

Max cleared his throat. “So I talked to Sunny and she said she showed you around the Belmonts’ apartment.”

“Do you mean their palace?” I asked.

He laughed, and it was like that broke the tension for both of us. I lay down on the couch. “I haven’t personally been there, but I’ve heard the same thing.”

“It’s ridiculous-looking. I can see why she’s so worried about impressing them.” I’d only seen apartments like that onGossip Girl. “But her in-laws want her to have it out on the terrace. Which I’m not thrilled about.”

“How come?”

“One, it’s winter, which is never good for an outdoor event, and two, I’m not very happy about how high up it is.”

“Everly Aprile, are you afraid of heights?”

“Yes, I would run the opposite direction if I encountered them in the wild.”

“You’re not supposed to run from heights,” he said. “You’re supposed to raise your arms above your head and make a lot of loud noises to scare them off first.”

“That’s bears.”

“Same thing,” he said, and I could hear his smile. I wished I could see his face. “So you do have an Achilles’ heel.”

“Everyone does.”

“Everyone has Achilles tendons, not heels.Heelsmeans figuratively. That you have an actual weakness. And here I thought you were Wonder Woman.”

I sat straight up. Okay, that was freaky. How had he known about my Wonder Woman confidence-boosting thing?

There was no way he could know. It was a coincidence. “I have many flaws and weaknesses.”

“So do I,” he said, but I had a hard time believing him. “And one of my flaws is not being able to navigate the city easily on my own. I know you’re incredibly busy and that’s partially my fault, but today I was thinking about how you haven’t shown me everything yet.”

My mind immediately went to a very not-safe-for-work place and I managed to squeak out a “What?”

“Are you still my official tour guide?”

Oh, he wanted me to show him the city. “Yes, I’m your tour guide.” I would be anything he wanted me to be.

“Then I was hoping you might guide me through some of your culture.”

“My culture?” He wanted to watch reality shows and eat junk food?

“Something that’s southern, like where you grew up.”

“Oh! Like you want to fly to Alabama? I personally have neither the funds nor the time—”

He gently interrupted me. “No, I figured there must be someplace here that we could go.”

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