Sure enough, when Jamie spoke, he said, “Wouldn’t that be stealing? And, you know, trespassing?”
“Probably.” I shrugged.
A palpable silence descended upon us. I could just picture Jamie calling his friends on the way home, telling them aboutrunning into Nikki’s crazy friend, who used him as human furniture and then tried to get him to commit a felony.
I put down my empty champagne glass on a high-top table and made to leave. “Okay, well, I think I’m gonna—”
“Wait,” Jamie said suddenly, his hand shooting out to grab mine. His hand was warm and soft. “Come with me.”
I was so surprised, I let Jamie lead me toward the front door of the gallery, and nearly tripped when he stopped short a few feet shy of the entrance.
“Oh, sorry. Did you want to say bye to your friend?”
I shrugged. “I’ll text her.”
And with that, Jamie led me outside and over to a tall glass building a block away.
“So… you want to break into a totally different building?” I asked.
“You’ll see,” Jamie said, ushering me through the revolving door.
The lobby was empty except for a security guard sitting behind the desk who waved at us. “Burning the midnight oil again, Mr. Kauffman?”
“Just popping up to grab something, Henry.” The security guard, Henry, nodded and turned back to a crossword.
In the elevator, Jamie swiped his key card and pressed the button for the top floor. The doors closed, wrapping us in that particular intimacy of being alone in an elevator with only one other person. I could feel the hairs on the back of my neck prickle as we rode up the thirty-five floors in silence. Should I say something? Ask him about his job—because clearly this was his office building that we were not-breaking into? For his part, Jamie seemed completely at ease. That bashfulawkwardness he’d displayed at the art gallery was nowhere in sight.
When we reached the top floor, the elevator deposited us into a little corporate lobby, with the wordsThe Kauffman Groupin steel letters on the wall.
He swiped his key card to unlock the glass doors, and I followed him down a long hallway. “Give me one sec. You can wait in here.”
It was a large, extremely tidy office. The only thing on the desk beyond screens and a keyboard was a photo of an older woman with a dark brown bob beside a clearly recently graduated Jamie. She was a good foot shorter than him, her arm wrapped proudly around his waist. I picked up the picture to get a closer look, noticing how the ruby and diamond of her ring matched Jamie’s cap and gown.
Then, Jamie was back. I put down the photo and met him in the hallway. He was holding a dark green champagne bottle in one hand and then moved over to a bar cart that I hadn’t noticed in the corner of the room, grabbing two wine glasses. “The roof is this way.”
He led me to the left, and we walked up a narrow, short flight of stairs. The intimacy from the elevator settled around me again. Jamie tripped a little on his way up the final step. So maybe he wasn’t immune to the slight awkwardness of the situation after all. “Whoopsie,” he muttered to himself, and then, seeming to realize that he’d just said this adorable thing out loud, he coughed and said, “Here we are.”
All of LA opened up before us. It was glorious. Far better than the view we would have gotten from the art gallery across the street, which was only two stories tall. The last rays of sunshimmered across the high-rises of downtown, and the lights from their windows were just beginning to twinkle.
“Wow. This is stunning. I bet you bring all the girls up here.” I said, stepping toward the edge of the roof.
Jamie barked out a laugh. “This is the first time I’ve been up here, outside of company parties.” Jamie came up beside me, setting the wine and glasses between us. “But I’m thrilled you think I have that kind of game. I guess it would be a good move. I’ll have to keep that in mind.”
His honesty was so refreshing. He wasn’t posturing like Liam used to do, or even playfully showing off like Sebastian. He was just himself.
“Okay, Mr. No-Game, if you’ve never brought a girl up here before, how come you just happen to have a bottle of champagne at the ready in your office?”
“What if I need to urgently celebrate a great fiscal quarter?” His eyes were playful. “Or, you know, what if I need something to drown my sorrows when I’m working late on a Friday night? Again.” He twisted the cork off with a small pop, pouring a glass for each of us. “The truth is, I swiped it from my dad’s office. He’s the one who keeps the good stuff on hand.”
“Jamie Kauffman!” I let my face contort with mock outrage. “You are a thief after all!”
“I guess I am,” he said with a small smile, handing me a glass.
“So your dad works here too?” I asked, taking a sip of the champagne. The bubbles burst along my tongue. I was hardly a champagne expert, but even I could tell that it was remarkably better than what they’d been serving at Chloe’s show.
“Yeah, it’s kind of a family thing.”
“Are you guys close? I saw that photo of you and your mom on your desk.”
