Alison Kent – All Tied Up (страница 2)

Lauren rolled her eyes, shook her head. Healthy strands of sun-streaked blond hair brushed her shoulders. “I was being facetious. We’ll be eating leftovers for a week, at least.”

“Not a problem.” Macy pinched a tiny tomato square from the serving bowl, popped it into her mouth. “I can eat Tex-Mex morning, noon and night.”

“That’s because you have the metabolism of a man. I, on the other hand, have no metabolism, which means I have the hips of a woman.”

“Hips, ha! You and your perfect C-cup boobs. Don’t be giving me any of your metabolism crap.” Macy tugged on the hem of her hot-pink T-shirt, glanced down the scooped neckline in search of cleavage. “Oh. I know. You forgot the guacamole.”

Lauren stopped in the middle of setting out rows of plastic cutlery to lift a delicate brow. “Looking down your shirt makes you think of avocados?”

“If only. More like green grapes. Key limes, if I’m lucky.” Macy adjusted her shirt hem and went to clear a place on the table for the platters of meat. “I owe what bustline I do have to the push-up bras Kinsey stocks. Employee discount be damned. I’ve invested a fortune.”

“Are you sure you’re getting your money’s worth?” Lauren’s expression was the picture of fresh-faced innocence. “I don’t see any pushing up going on at the moment.”

Macy stuck out her tongue. “That’s because my pusher-uppers are all still wet. I’ve been busy with the party and didn’t get my laundry done until this afternoon.”

“That explains the funky-looking delicates hanging in my bathroom.” Lauren headed back to the kitchen.

“My bathroom’s open to the public. Yours is off the beaten path. I didn’t want just anyone fondling my things.” Of course, she might make an exception for the right man. The right man with the right hands and a kiss to knock her socks off.

“Then your things should be safe. No one but Anton has any reason to be in my room. And I’ll make sure the only thing delicate he fondles is me,” Lauren said, returning from the kitchen with her hands full of serving utensils.

“Thanks for rubbing it in. Now I only have you to worry about. You and the guacamole, which I see you have once again managed to forget.” Macy waited for an explanation more reasonable than the one she knew would be coming.

“It’s in the fridge.” Lauren gestured over her shoulder with a tilt of her chin. “Behind the fruit trifle.”

“And you left it there why?”

“I thought we just covered this? Metabolism? Hips?”

Macy considered smacking the grin from Lauren’s face. But that was best-friend rule number one. No smacking allowed.

She took the serving pieces Lauren offered. “So now I have to set the table, get the guacamole from the fridge and grab the chicken and shrimp off the barbie?”

“Cute. Aussie Tex-Mex.” Lauren reached for the platter and barbecue tongs. “I’ll get the meat. The guacamole might not make it to the table if left up to me.”

Grr. “Will you stop already with the food obsession? I’ve seen what you eat. If you ate any less I’d be worried.”

“If I ate any less, I’d be a saint. Which I’m not. And you can keep your unsaintly comeback to yourself.”

Macy bit back the unsaintly comeback on the tip of her tongue. “I was only going to say that I can’t believe you’d worry about calories on game night.”

Lauren stepped through the sliding glass doors and out onto the balcony. She tossed her reply back into the room. “Your game nights are beginning to scare me. It’s like you’re a walking, talking Cosmo poll. Where do you come up with these ideas?”

A walking, talking Cosmo poll? Macy chuckled, even while recognizing the analogy to be a fairly accurate description of the ease with which she created gIRL gAMES and gIRL gUIDE, the fun and advice columns she wrote for gIRL-gEAR’s Web site. Her job was child’s play. She liked it that way, and planned to get away with not working for a living as long as she possibly could.

Meeting Lauren between the table and the balcony door, Macy took the platter of chicken from her roommate’s hands. “Don’t ask me where the ideas come from. They just show up. I test them, work out the kinks, write the columns. And the rest, as they say, is history.”

“Well, I guess that’s all good, since yesterday Sydney mentioned your two columns are still generating the most feedback for the site.” Lauren headed back to the grill.

“Wow! How cool is that!” Macy left the chicken on the table and followed, wanting to hear more.

“Actually—” Lauren gestured with the tongs “—we talked about a new design for your Web pages. I think you need a logo. Maybe a caricature. Or a cartoon-type figure.”

“Hmm. Cartoon is good. A takeoff on my name? A cuddly spider, maybe? Big eyes and long lashes. None of that black widow, Barbie doll, comic-book cleavage.”

“Cuddly, huh? I’ll see what I can do.” Lauren plucked the last of the shrimp from the grill. “Oh, and I think Sydney wants you to write an ongoing serial, too. Where readers vote on ideas or submit suggestions for each installment? Anyway, I’m going to run a few design ideas by Anton later.”

“Wow, super.” Macy pasted on a broad smile. “Hey, what would I do without you and Sydney to take care of me?”

“That’s what best friends are for.”

Macy wandered back into the loft before sarcasm got the better of her. Yes, she was excited. Yes, she was thrilled. She loved her career, after all. But success was blowing in on hurricane winds and she wasn’t prepared for the storm.

It was now that mattered, now that counted. Living for and in the moment. Not worrying about the price of technology stock years down the road. She didn’t want to lose a minute of today planning for the future. Why couldn’t anyone see that?

Lauren stepped inside, catching the balcony door with her hip and giving a gentle shove. With food, drink and all things paper, plastic and edible in place, she lifted a brow at Macy, looked back at the table, then to Macy again.

Macy shrugged. “If you cook it, they will come?”

“You’d better hope they come soon or I see a whole lotta freezer bags in your future.”

As if on cosmic cue, the buzzer signaled the approach of the loft’s renovated freight elevator.

“I don’t know how you manage to do that every time. But there’s something about a gift horse and his mouth that I think applies here.” Lauren scurried toward her rooms at the far end of the loft, her low-slung jeans topped by a billowy gauze shirt a shade lighter than the purple tube top beneath.

“Hey,” Macy called. “Where’re you going?”

“I need to check my stuff before Anton gets here.” And, with a wiggle of her fingers, Lauren disappeared behind one of the hanging panels of hammered brass that separated her living quarters from the loft’s main room.

“Stuff? What stuff? Oh, never mind. Who cares about your stinky ol’ stuff, anyway?” Pouting, Macy headed for the kitchen and the guacamole. She could eat both her helping and Lauren’s, return for seconds and never gain an inch or an ounce.

The only way the avocado salad would make any difference to her figure was if she scooped it directly into her bra. Sort of an edible implant. Kinky, but, hey. A girl had to do what a girl had to do if she wanted to have stuff of her own.

And anyone worth checking it for.

“THIS SHRIMP IS outstanding. Absolutely outstanding.” Eric Haydon shoved another in his mouth and gave Macy a closed-lipped, shrimp-eating grin.

She added a fifth throwaway plate to the stack balanced from fingertips to elbow, added a hint of twisted wickedness to her parting shot. “Just doing what I can to fatten you up for the kill. Hansel.”

Chipmunk-cheeked Eric stopped chewing. Then swallowed. “I was afraid of that.”

“You know, Eric, if you weren’t so easy to tease, well, I wouldn’t tease you.” Macy reached the kitchen alcove separated from the rest of the loft by eight floor-to-ceiling lava-lamp bubble sculptures. She dropped the discarded plates into the trash. “Tonight’s game will be painless. I promise.”

Longneck in hand, Eric leaned a shoulder on a turquoise figure eight. His dark-blue Henley shirt seemed hard-pressed to cover his broad shoulders, but did great things to his eyes. “I’ve figured something out about you, Macy Webb.”

Well, that made one of them, because sooner or later she needed to figure out why he wasn’t her type. “What’s that? That no matter how creatively you beg, I’m not leaving gIRL-gEAR to come cook for you?”

Eric owned his own sports bar, Haydon’s Half-Time, and had been after Macy for months to give up writing and editing to sling his hash instead.

Except Macy only cooked for fun, not for money. Money made work out of play, and what kind of a life was that?

“I wish. But I know you’re not going anywhere.” He finished his beer, tossed the empty bottle in with the plates and utensils. “Can’t blame a guy for trying, though.”

“I don’t blame you. As the object of your culinary pursuit, I have been flattered.” Macy thought for a minute, then puffed out her lower lip. “As a matter of fact, now that I think about it, I’m going to miss being wooed.”

“You want woo? I’ll give you woo.” Eric took a step closer and slowly smiled, allowing his dimples to deepen to maximum impact. Then he leaned down and poured all that macho charm into Macy’s personal space.