“And when are you going to find yourself a nice girl or boy or otherwise categorized individual to shower you with lifelong affection?” Gigi demanded, warming to her topic, which reminded Dani quite abruptly that—
“Oh, shit. I think I’m late.”
Gigi gasped in delight. “Late for what on a Tuesday evening, Danika Brown? Something other than working yourself into a husk, I hope?”
“Husk is a strong term, Gigi.” Dani felt mildly affronted. She touched an absent hand to her cheek to see if it was husklike, but it felt moisturized as ever by her Super Facialist hyaluronic day cream.
“Don’t tell me you have a date?” Gigi went on.
All right, I won’t. Since Chloe and Eve had apparently managed to keep their mouths shut on the topic of Zaf—clear evidence that magic really did move through the world—Dani certainly wouldn’t be the one to spill the beans. And anyway, this wasn’t a date; it was a favor. Or a professional engagement, if faking relationships with charity founders for publicity could be counted as a second profession. She’d better hope it wasn’t, or Her Majesty’s tax office would be all over her.
Not that Dani could see herself ever providing such a service for anyone other than Zaf.
“Danika,” Gigi nudged, “don’t think so loudly. Speak.”
Dani was saved from stammering more excuses by a sudden knock at the door. Of course, saved was a relative term, since that knock was almost certainly Zaf, and she’d already let him down by being in her pajamas and on the phone with Gigi when she should be ready to face the music-slash-radio-microphone.
Which, Dani supposed, was no surprise: there was a reason none of her past relationships had worked out, after all. They hadn’t all been like Mateo, but she’d always been herself.
“I don’t have a date,” Dani lied brightly to Gigi. “It’s just Sorcha. Must dash, love you, tell Eve to get ahold of herself.”
She put the phone down, abandoned her Wall of Doom, and went to the door. Before actually letting Zaf in, Dani took a moment to glance down at herself, just in case her outfit had magically transformed.
Sadly, it had not. She was still wearing enormous, ratty Minion slippers (one purple and one yellow), reindeer-print sleep shorts (Really, Danika, in March?), and an oversized T-shirt she’d originally worn to a final Chaucer exam, on which she’d scored a 98. Since Dani despised Chaucer and had no knack for Middle English, that grade had been an obvious miracle. Ever since, she’d worn her lucky T-shirt while working on especially difficult projects.
Unfortunately, said T-shirt was now a faded grayish white and mildly see-through. Wonderful. She kicked off the slippers and wondered if she should do something to hold up her tits—when left unattended, they sagged dramatically like twin grande dames. Then she reminded herself that if all went to plan, Zaf would eventually see the girls flopping around like drunk puppies anyway, so there was really no point.
Having dealt with that strangely nervous moment, she finally opened the door.
Zaf stood there with his hands in his pockets and his thick, dark hair falling over his brow. Seeing him in street clothes after months of nothing but that navy-blue security uniform was . . . something of a revelation. Dani bit her lip and reminded herself that sensible women didn’t swoon at the sight of a man in a Henley, even if that Henley was forest green and clung to every inch of him, from thick forearms to meaty biceps to that solid chest and torso.
Then he produced one of his small, cautious smiles, and Dani was forced to admit that she wasn’t a sensible woman after all, because she was definitely swooning. On the inside, anyway. Looking at Zaf was like walking out of an air-conditioned room into a wall of midsummer heat: lust slammed into her, surrounded her, and she proceeded to gently suffocate.
“About an hour ago,” he said, “I realized I don’t have a clue what you wear to a radio interview.”
Her heart melted, drip-drip-drip, like an ice pop on a scorching summer’s day. Oh dear. “I suppose it doesn’t matter,” she told him, because if she said, You look so delicious I’m seriously fighting the urge to sink my teeth into your scandalously plump pectoral, he might be alarmed. “Come in! I’m afraid I’m not quite ready—”
“Really?” He followed her into the living room, looking around in open curiosity. “I thought the reindeer shorts were a statement.”
“Hilarious,” she said. “Make yourself at home. I’ll be as quick as I can.”
“It’s okay. I’m twenty minutes early.”
Her eyebrows flew up as his words sank in. Dani finally looked at the clock hanging on her kitchen wall and realized he was right. “Oh. You . . . erm . . . so . . . ?”
“I had a feeling,” he said wryly, “that you might need a nudge.”
Dani supposed she should be outraged by the presumption, or at least mildly annoyed, but frankly, she was just pleased to have one less irrelevant thing to think about. And yes, she was aware most people considered time to be the opposite of irrelevant. But pretending to agree with them had always been exhausting.
Still, she couldn’t let Zaf know he’d done something helpful, or he might start thinking they had some sort of doing helpful things for each other arrangement, and that was a dangerous dynamic to get into. People tended to take it personally when the other party defaulted. So she scowled and said, “What, are you trying to manage me now?”
His smile was slight, lopsided, and . . . fond. That was the word. Fond. “I know you have a lot on your mind, and you don’t do well with time when you’re busy, so I thought coming early might help. That’s all.”
He made it sound as if she
