“Sorry!” Erik called to her across the beach. “Don’t know my own massive strength.”
“Not as sorry as you’re going to be.” She retrieved the Frisbee and launched it back at him. He waited, gathered himself, made a leisurely leap and grabbed it. “Aww, lucky catch!”
She’d spent another hour in the attic today after she and Jonas got back from their hike and picnic lunch, unpacking yet another trunk of fabulous clothes—less fabulous than the ones she’d already opened, but still fabulous. The second round of trunks, one of Bridget’s, one of Josephine’s, held everyday dresses, some of which were timeless enough to wear now. There was also a wonderful array of handbags in gorgeous leathers, beads, velvets and satins, even one made out of ornately etched Lucite.
Then she’d dived into Josephine’s diary again and come up with page twenty-seven and the corresponding Cleopatra lingerie outfit, a hilarious but sexy combination of a gold bandeau and black sequined panty with a tiny swatch of skirt in front and back. Completing the outfit were a black sequined cap, an ornate arm bracelet and gold chains for around her bared waist. On her feet she’d wear fabulously complicated strappy heeled sandals.
She might have kept Jonas at arm’s length yesterday and today, but tonight they’d get very, very close.
“I’m done.” Erik fell onto his towel, pretending to be exhausted. Sandra was upstairs taking a nap. Jonas had gone into town for groceries, then for another run. Allie had jogged with him earlier, but his stride was so much longer than hers that she doubted he’d gotten much of a workout and wasn’t surprised when he said he was going out again.
“Yeah?” Allie lowered herself to her own towel, spread out next to Erik’s. A few yards away, waves splashed in, the wake of a passing boat reaching them. Above them, cotton-ball puffs sailed past. So beautiful. “That’s your workout for the day, huh?”
“For the week.” He patted his slightly soft stomach. “I save my heavy exercise for the dinner table.”
Allie snorted. “Nice.”
“Allie, Allie, Allie.”
“Ye-e-es?”
“You doing okay?”
She knew what he was asking. “Yeah. You?”
“I’ve been thinking.”
“Don’t strain yourself.”
“Ha ha.” He turned on his side and shaded his gaze from the sun. “You and Jonas are perfect for each other. Long term. Like forever.”
“Uh...” Her insides burned with excitement, which annoyed the hell out of her. She didn’t want to marry Jonas. But clearly her fantasies were running far ahead of reality.
“No, really, hear me out. You’re classy. You grew up in a good family. You can deal with all this.” He gestured around, indicating their property. “Not everyone is comfortable in our world. I don’t blame them. It can be intimidating if you’re not used to it. Money pisses a lot of people off. They struggle all their lives and never have enough, and here we are with so much and we never even had to lift a finger to get it.”
Allie rolled her eyes behind her dark glasses. Oh, Erik. She’d never told him she grew up in a “good” family, whatever that was. He’d just assumed. Was she comfortable in his world? She pretended to be. She’d love to be. Maybe someday she could be. But he was right about one thing: he wouldn’t be too comfortable in her mom’s squalid three-bedroom apartment with five McDonald boys and however many girlfriends, all yelling at one another. Neither would Jonas.
When the Meyer boys had dinner with their parents, you could probably hear cells dividing.
She turned on her side toward him, anxious to change the subject. “I was thinking that you and Sandra are perfect for each other.”
“What?” His lips curved in a smile, belying his outrage. “You can’t be serious.”
“She’s a little wild, the way you are, but she fits here. She’s taken this place totally in stride.”
“She grew up in South Boston.”
Allie groaned. “You say stuff like that, and I just want to smack you. Seriously, Erik, who cares? She’s a class act, and you’re a moron if you can’t—”
“No, no, you’re right. That slipped out. I didn’t really mean it. See, you have to understand. Jonas and I were raised by snobs to be snobs. Neither of us really thinks money gives us value as people. But for our entire childhoods, this ‘us versus them’ philosophy was taught, by action if not words. It’s hard to shake that off.”
“I understand.” She did. Because she’d learned, from her childhood and experiences with her father’s snotty second family, that everyone with money looked down on those without. And her brothers never failed to point out that she should take pride in her poverty and stick to her own kind. Her aspirations for getting an education, dressing and speaking differently from her siblings, and making something better of herself earned her family’s scorn and permanently damaged their relationship. There were snobs on all sides.