Page 42 of Try Hard
I scrunched my face up, bobbing my head from side to side as I continued down the row. “Right make. Right colour. Wrong car.” I stopped in front of my actual car and turned back to her with a smirk.
Her mouth dropped open in shock before she laughed and jogged after me. “Soclose.”
“Devastating, truly,” I said, unlocking the vehicle and gesturing her towards the passenger seat.
Like she belonged in the car, she pulled her wallet, phone, and the business card with Sammy’s number on it from her pocket and slotted them into the centre console.
I couldn’t resist looking from them to her. “What are you going to do about Sammy?”
She sighed. “Not sure, honestly. I don’t want to hurt her.”
“She’s not exactly taking a hint. It might be on her at this point.”
She shot me a knowing look and I didn’t want to think about what she thought she knew. “She’s just… enthusiastic and committed.”
“There’s a line.”
Her smile dropped and she shrugged. “I guess… if she’s still as insistent at the hen party, I’ll have a word.”
“You don’t think she will be?”
Eve laughed. “Not at all. It’s overwhelming for a moment, but then you get some distance and you realise that, no matter who someone is, they’re still just a person.”
I looked at her. She wasn’t just sexy tailoring and a ridiculously impressive physique. She was a great person. Always had been. “You don’t see yourself very clearly.”
She lifted her head from the headrest and looked at me intently, making my heart pound and having me almost regretting my words.
The quiet between us as our eyes were locked grew, filling the car around us, and, by the time she finally spoke, I felt like I was shaking.
“How so?” she whispered, and I could feel my neck heating up.
I cleared my throat, pressing a hand to it as casually as I could. “Well, you know, you’re… impressive. I don’t think Sammy’s going to get over you that quickly.” I forced a smileonto my face. “Sapphics don’t have the same ridiculous hang-ups as those insecure guys you mentioned earlier.”
Eve bit her bottom lip, that same expression from when I’d told her those men were wrong about her filled her eyes. Something close to being overwhelmed. “Maybe you just like me.”
I laughed and looked away, starting the car. “Ah, no. Can’t be that. Haven’t you heard? I don’t like anybody.”
“I don’t think that’s true, Ophelia.”
Something about the way she said my name—maybe the fact that she was the only person who used my whole name—pierced through me every time she said it. It was intoxicating, and that was dangerous.
Before I could respond, the car came alive and connected to my phone, picking up from the song I’d been playing when I arrived.
Eve grinned and looked at the stereo. “Eva Pagàn?” she asked as ‘Loud’ filled the car. “You just love those Eves and Evas, huh?”
“Oh, my god,” I muttered, shaking my head.
She laughed. “I just wouldn’t have guessed you were into sapphic pop.”
I tilted my head in her direction. It was ridiculously easy being with her, even when she was teasing me. “Right, because I look like I should only listen to poser indie stuff?”
She was so relaxed and so amused, looking at me like she had all day for it. “Oh, of course. I imagine you listen to that all day, every day, and, then, once a week, you treat yourself with lesbian pop.”
“Wow. I don’t know why you went into interior design when a career in profiling was right there.”
“Ah, nah. I’d rather learn what you like from asking, rather than just guessing,” she said, her voice and her expression softening in a way that made it hard to breathe again.
“You can just connect your phone and play whatever you want.”
