Page 34 of Seven Rules for Breaking Hearts

“NASA really just hires anyone these days, huh?”

“Correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m pretty sure there’s no Venmo on Mars.”

“Not with that attitude, there’s not.”

Down the hall, the doors to the elevator rattled open, and Jo stepped onto our floor. She started toward us at a brisk pace, arms laden with a makeup bag, a can of hair spray, and a vaguely phallic object that might’ve been a fancy curling iron. “I hope you haven’t planned anything that’s going to ruin my makeup.” Her gaze swept over the scene in front of her as she arrived at my shoulder. “Hey, Declan.”

“What are you doing out here?” I demanded. “It’s not time yet.”

Her dark eyes narrowed as they came to rest on the garment bag folded over Declan’s arm, but then they cut back to me. “I could ask you the same question.”

Declan glanced at the bag on his arm like he was just remembering it was there. “My suit for the wedding,” he explained. “I spilled sangria on it.”

“His own sangria,” I hurried to add. “That he was drinking by himself. In his own room.” Actually, he had come over to my room last night after I’d sent him that text, but nothing had happened beyond us sitting on opposite sides of the bed and downing a couple bottles while we plotted together. Which was maybe a first. I could count on one hand the number of times I’d had a hot guy alone in my bedroom and not done something about it. But last night’s conversation with Jo had lingered over me like a seaside haze, muddling the line where this experiment ended and the real Margo began. My irritation with him yesterday was real, but maybe that meant the rest of what I felt was real, too—the giddy feeling that overcame me whenever he flirted back, or the way my body responded to even a fleeting touch—and that made it harder to compartmentalize.

So no, nothing had happened last night. And I woke feeling pretty good about things this morning, even if the worry lingered.

“As long as it didn’t stain,” Jo said slowly. Apparently deciding that the garment in question—covered in sangria or otherwise—wasn’t a pressing concern at the moment, she turned back to me. “I thought maybe it would be fun if I did your hair and makeup for tonight. You know, for old time’s sake.”

“Sounds fun.” I steered her toward my room. “Make sure Peter behaves tonight,” I called over my shoulder to Declan.

“Don’t worry,” he said with a wink. “I’ve got everything under control.”

While Jo deposited her armfuls of beauty products on my bathroom counter, I shot Declan a quick text to finish off our interrupted conversation.

Margo: I’ll text you when it’s almost time.

We’d agreed to keep our respective parties on opposite ends of the city. For now. Which wasn’t easy, considering Avalon was a town of only five thousand or so people, and almost all the businesses were within a mile of each other, but so long as both parties adhered to the schedule, it would work.

“So, I understand that I’m probably not supposed to know what you’re planning, but I’m going to need a hint,” Jo said as she arranged her arsenal of makeup in chronological order across the marble countertop, starting with primer and leading up to setting spray. “What are we talking here? Glitter? Smoky eye? Does it need to be waterproof?”

“What?” I glanced at my phone, distracted by all the buzzing.

Declan: sounds good

Declan: have fun

Declan:

I stared at the eggplant emoji. Unsettling and vaguely sexual. Jo was still waiting for my answer. “Oh. I mean, whatever you want,” I said, smiling to myself as I tapped out a reply.

Margo: ew, don’t use that emoji with me

I locked my phone and hoisted myself up onto the bathroom counter. Jo had always done my makeup for special occasions. I liked to think it was my tenth-grade brown lip liner and overplucked eyebrows that really set this arrangement in stone. She dabbed some silky-smooth primer on her fingers and started rubbing a coat of it over my face. I stared up at the ceiling so that she could get the area under my eyes.

My phone buzzed. Another text.

“Who’s that?” she asked, screwing the cap back on to the primer.

“Probably nothing important.” I snuck one last peek at the screen.

Declan:

I withheld a laugh. I was kind of surprised he knew what all those emojis meant, since all signs pointed toward him being technologically illiterate. “In fact,” I said, swiping down on the screen, “I’m going to silence notifications. Don’t need any distractions on your big day.” More important, it would be easier to keep my collusion with Declan quiet this way.

“My bachelorette party is not my ‘big day,’ ” Jo reminded me. “The actual wedding is.”

“I like to think that the ‘big day’ is in the eye of the beholder.”