The Chemistry of Love by Sariah Wilson

Author:Sariah Wilson [Wilson, Sariah]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781542039246
Google: NKotzwEACAAJ
Publisher: Amazon Publishing
Published: 2023-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

I had never really thought about it before. “I guess it depends on the surprise. Like when Grandpa had to do bird CPR on Wil Tweeton or when Catalina set me up with her third cousin who did not understand personal boundaries. Those were not great surprises.” Or Marco Kimball appearing in my bedroom hadn’t felt like a fun surprise at the time, but I was slowly coming around to it. “The mixer, though, that was a fantastic surprise, and I really enjoyed that.”

“Great! So along that vein, and keeping in mind how much you love that mixer and that I am the one who sent it to you . . .” He trailed off, and now I was worried. Nobody brought up things they did for you unless they wanted something.

What more could he ask of me? Some nutso ideas ran through my head, including whether he might want me to be his surrogate to carry his heir.

That didn’t freak me out as much as it should have.

“Remember how I asked you about hair, makeup, and clothes? How do you feel about me getting you some of those things? If I pay for them?” he asked tentatively.

A makeover? I hadn’t expected that. He was right to be tentative. “You want to do a makeover. On me?”

“Yes?” Much more of a question than an answer.

“Pass,” I immediately said.

“Like a montage from a movie,” he said, as if that would convince me.

“It seems sexist and objectifying. I don’t need to change the way I look.”

“I’m not disagreeing with you. I just know my brother. He’s pretty vain and shallow. Shiny things, remember?”

Surely there was more to Craig than that. Annoyed at what Marco was implying, I snapped, “I want him to love me for me. I want to be myself.”

“You’ll still be yourself, just enhanced. Isn’t that your whole job? Enhancing women’s best features?”

“Yes, but . . .” I let my voice taper off. He wasn’t wrong.

“I don’t know that you’re in a position to argue when you’re the cosmetic chemist,” he pointed out unhelpfully. “Plus, attraction is about keeping the other person slightly off-balance. Craig has seen you one way—he needs to see you in another light. He won’t know what to make of it.”

Again, Marco might have had a point.

Before I could respond, he added, “And what if it works? You can take the empirical evidence and see if it makes a difference. If it doesn’t, you can go back to—” He waved his hand in my direction. “To what you’re more comfortable with. This is just about putting your best foot forward. When you did your science fair projects at school, didn’t you make your presentation board look nice before you submitted it?”

“That’s not the same thing,” I said, even though it kind of was.

“My plan involves a lot of formal events. I thought doing something like this might even give you some extra confidence, and confidence is always attractive.”

Confidence . . . there were things I felt very confident about.

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