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Rowan shakes her head at me. “Check your text messages, Mason. We have a meeting in two days. We’re supposed to catch up and review how well our little public image makeover project is going.”
“Rumor has it that you like chocolates with a certain handsome hockey person’s face on them. I will buy you twenty of those chocolate boxes if you tell me what my next costume is going to be.”
“After you just savaged my sundae?” She drew herself up, looking at me with a wounded expression. “I think not.”
“Rowan. Is he talking about the Rovers ganaches? Those are like fifty dollars a box. Those things are crack in a box, and I don’t even like sports.” Ruby protests. “Tell him what your next costume is.”
“Are you kidding me?” Rowan laughs. “Keeping that secret is what gives me the strength to wake up in the morning. It’s the only light in my life. Well, okay, except for you. Come along now, Ruby. Evil cooties are contagious and I don’t want to have to get a cootie shot. See you soon, Mason.” She wiggles her fingers at me, and she and her sister walk off.
“See you later, hockey hottie. You’re not as hideous as Rowan described you.” Ruby calls over her shoulder.
I feel a twinge as they walk away, falling into a sisterly rhythm, their strides matching each other.
And Ruby still has whipped cream on her nose.
It must be nice to be close to your family. Rowan probably has great parents, too. She just carries herself like someone who was raised with love. She probably talks to her parents every week, and I’d bet a million dollars that Rowan’s mother sees her as a daughter, not an ATM.
7
ROWAN
I hunchover the desk in my office shortly before our meeting is due to start, poring over my notes.
Ruby, once she stopped singing “Mason and Rowan, sitting in a tree,” gave me some excellent ideas and feedback for the rest of the publicity campaign, and I’m rewriting some of my plans to incorporate them.
I glance over at the stuffed Rover dog on my desk. It’s wearing a Rovers jersey, of course. I pick it up. “Mason does not know who he’s messing with,” I inform Rover. “I just had to invest in noise-cancelling headphones that cost me more than a week’s salary as a protective measure, and he will pay. He will pay dearly.”
Rover does not answer. This is a good thing. I’m not saying I’ve ever pulled multiple all-nighters and ended up hearing a stuffed animal talk back to me, but then again, I’m not saying that I haven’t.
There’s a knock on the door, and I call out, “Come in.”
The door opens and a delivery man enters.
“Mrs. Mason Raker?” he asks. “I have a package for you.”
Who the heck?
I stare at him for a second, wondering what this could be about, and then I remember my sarcastic comment to Mason about writing that very phrase all over my apartment. Did he actually ...
Wow.
“Close enough.” I smile as he approaches me, holding a small cardboard box.
“Who is it from?” I ask.
“No return address. There’s a hockey star named Mason Raker,” he observes. “A really famous guy.”
“There is?” I say, all wide-eyed innocence. “Well, the Mrs. Mason Raker this package is being sent to is definitely not married to a hockey star. Big coincidence, I guess.”
“She’s your boss?”
I nod. “Yep. She’s the worst, honestly. Total slave driver, never appreciates anything I do.”
“I feel that.” He grimaces in sympathy and sets the box down in front of me.
I am then forced to signMrs. Mason Rakerin order to accept the delivery, which seriously irritates me. A gross smell drifts up from the box— one of my least favorite scents.
And then, of course, I have to tip him.
