LITMIR.BIZ

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      “You can’t let on you know it’s him.”

      “Obviously, no. Then he’d assume I’m out to get my hands on it.” She sighed. “God knows, I’ll never win the lottery, but if I help him accept his destiny, it will feel in some small way like I won, too. You know?”

      Steph chewed on her lip. “Yeah,” she finally said. “I see what you mean. Especially if he’s like you said—a hero, always saving the day.”

      “Maybe this time,” Acey said, “the hero needs someone to save the day for him.”

       Chapter Four

       T he door buzzer startled Harry out of slumber. It was just as well, because pressing his right cheekbone against his desk blotter probably wasn’t considered an ideal place for a nap. A long nap, he realized, glancing at his clock and seeing it had gone from midafternoon to early evening.

      The buzzer blared again and Harry jogged to the living room. “Who is it?” he called. He knew he’d probably have to go outside anyway because the quality of his intercom was terrible, something he had learned when he ended up buying thirteen boxes of Girl Scout cookies his second week here.

      What he heard was garbled but sounded an awful lot like, “Pizza delivery!”

      “Uh, I think you have the wrong apartment,” Harry replied, and listened.

      “Pizza,” he heard again.

      “But I didn’t order a pizza.”

      “That’s the problem, sir.”

      Huh? Wait…

      Harry went down to the front door and there was Acey, holding out a huge flat box.

      “Howdy,” he said with a grin.

      “Hey, there. Thought I’d kill two birds with one stone—repay your niceness yesterday and prove to you how right I am about Focaccia’s.” She handed him the box. “There you go.”

      Harry patted his pockets. “Sorry, I’m wiped out. I can’t tip you.”

      “What a cheapskate,” she said, laughing.

      “How about I offer you a slice? If you don’t have dinner plans, of course.”

      “As it happens, I don’t.”

      “Unless you’re tired of pizza.”

      “I never get tired of pizza,” Acey said, following him into his apartment. Harry lifted the lid on the box and took a big sniff.

      “Everyone does that,” Acey said.

      “It smells amazing.”

      “I didn’t top it. I didn’t know if you were a vegetarian or had an aversion to anything. It’s best plain, anyway. Then you can taste it. Are you really sure you don’t mind my dropping in like this?”

      “Of course not.” Harry put the box on the table and took two plates from the cabinet. “It’s real nice.”

      “I’m glad. I was thinking it had been so long since I met a real friend.”

      Harry’s hand stilled on a glass for a fraction of a second, then he carried on setting the table. There was no mistaking Acey’s emphasis on the word “friend.” It’s just as well, he thought. I don’t want any entanglements. And she’s real outgoing and probably has lots of male friends. And maybe a boyfriend. Though wouldn’t she be bringing pizza home to her boyfriend after work?

      Well, if she was coming here and throwing the word friend around, Harry thought, then his problems were pretty much solved, weren’t they?

      He turned. Acey sat at the table and smiled. She was wearing a low-cut white clingy shirt, and a tiny sliver of a pale pink bra strap peeked through. A strand of little pink plastic-looking beads dipped into her deep cleavage.

      Harry was suddenly grateful for his impromptu nap. He had a sinking feeling another sleepless night was ahead.

      “Care to eat alfresco?” he asked.

      “Sure.”

      “I have a little porch off the—” damn “—off the bedroom.”

      Acey seemed unfazed. “Lead the way.”

      “Grab the box.”

      Hoping he’d left nothing offensive in plain sight, he led Acey through the apartment and out onto his tiny porch, where he had a table and two little folding chairs. Luckily, they had dried out in the sun today after yesterday’s downpour. He gestured to one. Acey sat and dished out two slices.

      “I only have regular soda, not diet,” Harry said. “I hope that’s all right.”

      “Do I look like I drink diet soda?” Acey asked. Harry wished she wouldn’t keep calling attention to her appearance, because it made it hard for him to try to ignore it. “Eat,” she commanded.

      Harry took a bite, then another, then another, and was halfway through his slice before he remembered to look up. “Wow.”

      “Did I lie?”

      “No. It tastes… The sauce is almost sweet. It goes beyond expectations.”

      Acey nodded.

      “And now I’m very angry at you,” Harry added.

      “Why?”

      “Because now that I know how good this pizza is, I’ll have to buy new jeans when I gain forty pounds.”

      Acey chewed and looked down at the street. “I’ve never paid full price for a stitch of clothing in my life. Let me know when you need those jeans and I’ll give you some tips.”

      “Deal.”

      “Although,” she said, taking another enormous bite and shielding her full mouth with one hand, “I must say it would be nice to afford some really fancy designer clothes. Just once. Don’t you think?”

      Harry felt a twinge. Acey struck him as a very hard worker. Yesterday, she’d mentioned working weekends for years. She probably deserved to have any beautiful thing she wanted. Harry used to throw clothes, jewelry, expensive trinkets at women who barely looked at them, women whom he was merely passing time with. “But that outfit you have on now looks real nice,” he said.

      Acey blushed a flattering pink. To match that insistent strap. “Well,” she said, “you probably wouldn’t be into that anyway. Clothes are mostly a girl thing.”

      “Certainly.”

      She fell silent then and Harry thought it odd. She seemed not to be relaxing within the conversation but rather to be searching for words, and after knowing her only a short time, Harry would have guessed she rarely ran out of words. Or questions.

      He reminded himself he wasn’t on a date with Acey, but he wasn’t ever the kind of man who had circles of female friends, so he would have to rely on date techniques, at least in this get-to-know-you phase of talk. “What do you like to do?” he finally tried. “When you’re not working, that is.”

      Acey swallowed, then she sighed. It was a great sigh. She used her whole head to do it—first sucking in a lungful of air through her open mouth, holding it for a hot second, then arching her neck and blowing the air through puffed lips up toward the sky. Then she rolled her eyes, like an ending punctuation.

      Harry nodded with appreciation and clapped his hands four times. “Very nice. The Oscar for most dramatic moment goes to…Acey Corelli.” Acey curtsied with the top half of her body. “Now,” Harry added, “how about telling me why I deserved that?”

      “Oh,” Acey said. “I’m sorry. It’s just that that question is always the first thing every guy asks me on a blind date.”

      Oops. “I am interested,” Harry said

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