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“Actually, yes,” I say. “He added the fake account.” After setting up an Instagram of all things for myself (yes, Evie helped) my request had sat ignored for days. Then Evie had suggested coming up with a fake name.
“I still think Margo Mercedes would have worked,” I add.
Evie rolls her eyes and stamps her foot. “For the last time, nobody adds accounts that sound like porn stars, Nick! He would have seen right through that.”
“He would have looked at her boobs and nothing else,” I insist.
“We’re not revisiting this,” Evie says, putting a stop before we get too deep into the debate again. “‘Ava Lawrence’ worked just fine.”
The account uses photos from my secretary Alyssa, who, learning from Kara, I bribed with Louboutins. Ava Lawrence is a part-time NYU student, part-time model, and now full-time friend of Jack Madison.
“Unfortunately,” I say, “it looks like he doesn’t post.”
“Let me see,” Evie says.
I hand her my phone and immediately marvel at the ease I’d given it over. Six months ago I would have bitten a hand that was reaching for my phone.
“He’s not tagged in anything either,” Evie says, scrolling to another part of the app.
“Do kids not use Instagram anymore?” I ask. “I thought it was the big thing.”
“I mean, TikTok is the ‘big thing’ right now,” Evie says. “But most people still use Instagram.”
“I’ll take your word for it,” I say.
“No, he probably just has a Finsta, which will make this a little harder.”
“I’m sorry, a what?”
“A Finsta, Grandpa. A Fake-Instagram.”
I make a face. “I actually think that was in the New York Times crossword puzzle a few months ago.”
“Wow,” Evie says, shaking her head. “You’re lucky you’re cute.”
I look down, trying and failing to hide my smile.
We haven’t acknowledged our kiss since that day in the car, both agreeing to focus on the search for Jack before unpacking whatever it is we have together. As difficult as it’s been to not fall asleep beside her, to stroke myself alone to a completely inadequate mental picture of her, it hasn’t been all bad. Pretending to be friends is far from ideal but it’s miles better than the hell I was in for the week after she left.
I used to want it all. Now I’ll take what I can get.
And look forward to the day when she’s mine again.
“And I’m lucky that some women are willing to put up with me.”
Her blue eyes roll. “Some?” she repeats. “Who are these ‘some’?”
I shrug. “Alyssa?”
“You pay her to put up with you.”
“Touché. Okay, fine. One woman will put up with me.”
Evie looks at me almost shyly, an expression I’m not used to seeing on her beautiful face. “Just barely,” she says, but she says it with a smile.
I walk around the side of my desk and hold out a hand. She stares at it like she’s not sure what I’m doing, and then she puts her hand in mine, daintily, like I’m about to lead her to a regency dance floor. She looks up at me in confusion.
I swallow my laugh and say, “Can I have my phone back?”
