Page 54 of P.S. It’s Always Been You
I freeze. “Single men are on display?”
“Well, not really. But she’s fixated on getting me to meet someone, so she claims a ton of hot single guys are coming tonight.” She laughs, then shrugs like this is not a big deal.
But it is.
It’s a huge deal.
It’s furnace level.
Because my skin is on fire with raging jealousy. “You’re not going for that reason, are you?”
She looks up from the tube. “Is there a reason I shouldn’t?”
She’s so matter-of-fact. So cool about it, as if my hands weren’t in her pants earlier today. Hell, it feels like they weren’t. It feels like we’re ten thousand miles away.
I part my lips to answer, You wouldn’t and shouldn’t, because of the car, because of what happened, because we have unfinished business, but Jared raps on the door.
“Think we can get a stand-up of you right now?” he asks. “Maybe outside the house. A quick little tour of the grounds would be good. Probably be thirty to forty minutes. Cammi said the director wants some shots like that.”
I suck back the sigh of frustration. “Sure, yeah.” I drag a hand through my hair and turn to Presley. Her expression is businesslike, professional, reminding me that we’re supposed to behave that way. I’m supposed to behave that way. There’s no room for misplaced envy.
“You can take the car to get to your event,” I say, gritting my teeth.
“Are you sure? How will you get back?”
I wave a hand. I’ll walk because I’m pissed and I need to burn off this anger. I have no right to stop her. No right to ask her not to go. “I’ll go see my mom,” I say.
“That’s great. Thanks. We’ll talk later, okay? I’ll be thinking about the clues in the letter.”
“Yeah, we have lots to figure out.”
Why the hell am I pursuing a goddamn love letter? I’m a man of action. I’m an adventurer. I have a shoot in Utah and an expedition to plan for my next book. That’s what I do. I don’t track down silly love stories. Certainly not when the woman I want to chase them with is chasing other men.
As I shoot my stand-up with the crew, my blood stays on boil, and I clench my jaw and tighten my fists.
“This is great. You’re full of all sorts of coiled energy, like you want to pounce on the house,” Jared remarks.
He’s wrong. I don’t want to pounce on a goddamn house.
I want Presley, and as I head back to my mom’s place, all I can think of is about the guys Presley might meet tonight. Guys who are wrong for her, guys who will never understand her like I do. Dicks, dweebs, and pretentious prisses.
And smarty-pants too.
She’s too intelligent for her own good. She’s so damn book smart that she’ll lure that kind of guy. But she’s more than book smart. She’s streetwise, and she needs someone who’s seen the world, who shares the same love of it that she has.
She needs me.
And I need to impress her, so I call the Exploration Society and ask the sweet receptionist if she can let me in again.
“We closed a few minutes ago at six, but I’ll make an exception for you.”
“You’re a doll, Melody.”
I tell my mom I’m working late and staying in the city, then I return to the house in Lenox Hill, studying the photo of the letter as I go.
I keep circling back to the circus.
The line the next part of the tale might require you to find a curiosity near the boards with the greatest of ease sticks out to me. “Greatest of ease” is a circus term; it’s in the song about the daring man on the flying trapeze. It’s become a slogan of many circuses, so that must be pointing to the Caribaldi connection. At the society, I read up on him, learning he came from a family of circus owners, that he bought the circus and later sold it at the height of its success, choosing to then invest the money in theaters in Manhattan alongside his good friend.
Why the hell isn’t there a Caribaldi Theater? A Valentina Theater? That would be curious. That would make sense and would be a great spot to look for the next letter—near the boards.
I look in other books, reading stories of other expeditions undertaken by other explorers, and something tickles the back of my brain. The seed of an idea.
When I read about an explorer who finally found what he wanted when he looked in a different spot, it occurs to me that perhaps I’ve been looking in the wrong place.
I’ve been looking in the past.
What if I need to look in the present?
It’s as simple as asking my phone.
And when I see the results, I think I’ve got it.
Excitement rips through me, and I call Presley, even though it’s well past nine. She doesn’t answer, and all I can think is one of those guys took her home.
