Beautiful Stranger by Zoey Dean Read Free Book Online Page B

was focused.
    “Don’t put it on until you are sure. We will talk and talk and talk. There is no hurry.”
    And they talked for hours, until day turned into evening. She raised every logical argument about why they shouldn’t get married. He knocked them all down like bowling pins with a bazooka and painted a portrait of a future worthy of Monet. They would travel the world. He would be a diplomat, she would be a filmmaker. They would speak two languages at home as easily as others spoke one. They would make love every day and twice on Saturdays. They’d have wrinkled sex when they got old and die in each other’s arms when they were both a hundred, because they’d love each other too much to keep on living.
    Finally, they were the only customers left. Their original waitress stood by, clearing her throat discreetly.
    “We’d better give her a hell of a tip,” Sam decided. She couldn’t believe how long they’d been out there. Or what had brought them there, to see day turn into evening into night. He’d asked her to marry him. That was a ring on the table. That ring was for her.
    Charlie Kaufman couldn’t write anything this weird.
    “I agree.” But he made no move to do it.
    “I have cash.”
    Sam went to open her Coach hobo bag, but Eduardo caught her hand. “Do you know what’s in your heart?”
    “Yes. A little voice telling me that you’re insane.”
    “Thank you. Thank you very much. Look what you have to look forward to. A lifetime of insanity.”
    “It sounds …”
    How did it sound? It sounded absolutely insane. Absolutely and completely insane. Which is why, finally, Sam took out the ring. Eduardo took the gleaming diamond and slipped it delicately on the ring finger of her left hand.
    She adored it. She adored
him
. The ring sparkled on her tanned finger. She loved it and it made her nervous, both at the same time. She wondered if this was how every bride-to-be felt at the moment when the dream of her childhood turned into the reality of her life.
    Who was she going to tell first? Her father? Cammie? Or Anna?
    This was Hollywood. There was only one answer: conference call.

The Bank of Birnbaum
    “I f you hadn’t spotted this place, there’s no way we’d be here,” Ben exulted as he looked around the dilapidated, neglected interior of Superior Body and Repair. “How incredible would this place be for a nightclub?”
    “The question is, how did you arrange for us to get inside?” Anna asked. She peered around the place as well. It had clearly seen better days.
    He shrugged. “Money talks, bullshit walks. In my case, I expressed keen interest in the property to the owner and even hinted that I’d fork over the back taxes. It’s amazing how fast they got a set of keys in my hands. It’s been a long time since this place was open. Half the keys were bent.” He grinned as he ran a finger through the thick dust on a dented beige filing cabinet. “Not that there’s anything to steal in here, anyway.”
    It was late in the afternoon, two days after they had walked past this abandoned building the night of the
Ben-Hur
party. Now they were inside. Ben had advised that she wear her most beat-up and expendable clothing, because the place was bound to be dusty. He was right—the interior was so sullied with a mixture of dust, filth, and accumulated mouse and pigeon droppings that Anna had immediately donned the mouth-and-nose guard that Ben proffered. She wore an old pair of faded Earl jeans and a black Hanes T-shirt she’d swiped from her father’s drawer.
    Ben was similarly attired, but it was hard to tell, because the exterior windows were so caked over with grime that little natural light came through. Yet Anna could see his eyes, and judging from the faraway look in them, what he saw was pure possibility. Anna squinted and tried to imagine the same thing. She
wanted
to see it, for his sake. But it was hard. All she saw were the grungy remnants of all things automotive. She hoped