And yet she insisted on this peculiar hobby—other people put on wealth they didn't have, she dressed herself in failure she couldn't manage to achieve. As if there were a strange pleasure hidden there.
Sabrina set her cup down and waved a hand. "Hardly worth mentioning."
Grace couldn't be bothered to spar. When the server brought the first course, she ladled a steaming bowl and set it in front of Oakley Ponciano. "House specialty. Try it?"
"Gladly." Oakley warmed her hands on the bowl and glanced up at Grace, some unreadable light passing through her eyes before she sipped.
They talked idly until the food settled and the hour turned soft. Then they left the private room and headed for the spa.
Showers, lockers, the hush of tile and steam. Grace and Sabrina walked out first to the thermal pool they'd reserved and slid in one after the other.
The water held the precise kind of heat that convinces the body it's being held—an embrace made of cloud and mineral and patience.
"Your wife still getting ready?" Sabrina looked around.
"Seems so," Grace said.
They'd gone in separately; Grace had no idea what was delaying her.
"Oh." Sabrina drifted closer, voice lowering to a conspiratorial hum. "Tell me—what's it like living with Oakley?"
She imagined: nine chances out of ten—volatile, electric.
Grace didn't answer directly. "We've only just started," she said. "What's there to report?"
Sabrina's thoughts strayed somewhere less respectable; a slyness curved her mouth. "Be honest—she's… a lot. You sure you can keep your hands to yourself?"
Grace tapped the water's surface with one finger. "I have no idea what you think you're asking."
Sabrina had to fight the urge to give a thumbs-up. With a woman like Oakley in your orbit, staying this composed—whether feigned or real—was a feat. Terrifying, even. Had Grace taken vows somewhere, done a stint in a monastery? How else did she manage this level of calm? Forgive her; she was a simple creature, and the math did not compute.
"This is heaven," Sabrina sighed, letting her arms rest on the stone lip, eyes half-closed as the warmth soaked deeper.
Her phone shattered the quiet a beat later. She fumbled, answered, listened.
When she hung up, her face had set. "I have to go."
"What happened?" Grace asked as Sabrina rose, water falling from her shoulders, and wrapped herself in a towel big as a sail.
"My mom says my cat's suddenly sick. They're taking her to the vet right now."
For a lifelong single woman, there was family, and there was the cat. That was the order of things.
Grace understood immediately. "That's rough. Go. The cat matters."
"We'll do a rain check," Sabrina said, already moving.
Grace watched her hurry away, then let out a breath and glanced toward the women's entrance. Still no Oakley. She closed her eyes and waited.
After a while, footsteps.
"You changed?" Grace turned as she spoke.
Oakley stood there in a black one-piece cut like a tiny dress, the waist a handspan, the chest generous, the legs long and clean. Every step sent a little weather through the room—sway and stillness mixed—like someone had opened a door and let a warmer breeze in.
"I did." Oakley sat beside her and lifted her arms to gather the damp weight of her hair. "The zipper jammed, then caught my hair. Took forever. I'm exhausted. Where's Sabrina? Didn't see her."
"She had to run. Something came up." Grace rolled her neck, then added lightly, "And what took you so long? I've been waiting."
Oakley laughed and hugged her knees, then reached to tap Grace's bare shoulder with one fingertip. "What is it? Miss me after five minutes?"
Grace looked at her once. Said nothing.
Oakley studied the blade of Grace's shoulder and the smooth line of her collarbones and, without meaning to, bit her lower lip. How had she never noticed? A woman's body was lovelier than any man's—clean, soft, a promise of comfort.
She eased one foot into the pool, then another, and drifted closer. "I really like your shape," she said. "Like a tailor's hanger—everything must look good on you."
Grace turned and found herself looking into eyes thick with lashes, quick with light.
"Not compared to you," she said, and faced forward again.
Oakley chuckled. "You're a strange one. Confident about every other corner of yourself, and the one place you're weirdly shy is your looks."
Which was odd, considering the first thing that had captured Oakley was Grace's face.
Grace glanced over. "Am I shy?"
"You are," Oakley said, flicking water. "Ask you to take a photo and you vanish. I compliment you and you sidestep. What's that about?"
Confidence—or the lack of it—often lived in the smaller habits, not the headlines.
Grace considered. "Maybe because I got teased as a kid—'tomboy' this, 'boyish' that. Leaves a mark in your head whether you want it or not."
"What?" Oakley winced. "People are awful."
Grace kept her gaze on the water. "There was 'flat as a board,' 'man-girl,' 'braces nerd.' I shaved my head once because of a scalp thing. And I wore braces forever. I looked odd. I was quiet. People thought it was hilarious— including my sister. Whenever she was mad, she went for my face."
Oakley rubbed her temple and shook her head. "Don't listen to any of that. They don't even know how to spell the word respect."
Grace's mouth tipped. "It doesn't matter now. I just don't like cameras. And I just happen to think you're prettier. To be precise—you're the most beautiful person I've ever seen."
Oakley blinked, then grinned, bright as glass in sun. "Didn't expect such a high rating."
"It's true," Grace said. No reason to hide this. "I thought so back in college."
Oakley loved that—loved it far too much. She caught a drifting petal and turned it in her palm. "So back in college," she teased, "you were always… watching me?"
Grace took her in. "When I saw you, I looked."
Praise made Oakley giddy. She cut the water with her arm, came close, leaned in, studying Grace's face at a distance that charged the air between them. "And now you get to see me every day. Consider it… an all-you-can-look pass."
For a moment, they were very close. Close enough that the warm surface of the pool felt suddenly, sharply cool.
Under the lights, the water shivered in ring after ring. Oakley Ponciano surfaced like a lotus rising from a pond—skin glazed with a dusting of droplets, eyes lush with mischief, mouth a ripe red, the line of her chest like a new bud just learning to open.
The sight unspooled a memory in Grace Barron's hands: the way Oakley had once fitted against her, all cloud-soft and yielding. Dangerous, that softness. The kind of comfort a body could drown in without noticing.
She had been ordering herself not to think about it. Then Oakley spoke, and resistance became a thin, useless thing. Did Oakley know what she was doing—what each small trespass meant?
Grace steadied her breath, tipped her chin, and looked at her through half-lowered lashes. "Ms. Ponciano," she said, quiet as warm water, "sometimes I think you ought to be grateful I'm still… reasonably decent."
"Mm?" Oakley's brows tilted up, delicate and amused. "Grateful you're reasonably decent—meaning what, exactly?"
Grace weighed the words, then let them fall. "Meaning… you don't seem to have the nerve that tells a person where the edge is."
Oakley held her gaze, serious now, reading the dark in Grace's eyes. "You mean, I stand too close. And if you weren't decent, you'd—what—do something?"
A bead of water clung to her chin; it made her look carved and polished, a small stone warmed in the palm.
Grace's eyes dropped to Oakley's mouth, then slid away. The last of her composure nudged her into a warning, soft but real: "You forget? You're straight. I'm not."
She had trusted herself. Believed she wouldn't cross lines. But after last night's kiss, she'd learned she was only acquainted with the visible tip of herself. Below the surface—unknowns.
Oakley heard that and her expression flickered—as if she'd found a loose thread in Grace's logic. Her gaze traced the clean jawline, the pretty cut of Grace's lips. The corner of her mouth lifted. "Didn't you also say… these days, you look at everyone like they're just another cut of meat?"
She narrowed her eyes playfully, detective at the scene. "If that's true, then even if I stand too close and talk nonsense, you should be… unmoved, right?"
Something warm moved across Grace's back. She hadn't expected Oakley to remember, word-for-word, a throwaway line Grace could barely place in time.
Oakley pressed her lips together, then tilted her head, the question finally spilling out—the one she'd been holding like breath. "I've been wanting to ask, Grace—last night… did you kiss me?"