Free Out of Her League by Samantha Wayland Page A

greeting downstairs.
    “So, does this mean you’re able to talk
again now? Or am I to speak freely to myself?”
    He didn’t look up. “You know, everyone else
ignores it.”
    “What’s that?”
    “My…issue.”
    “Yeah, not my style, I guess.”
    “No shit,” he said with a smirk, still
directed more at the menu than at her.
    Michaela laughed, but stifled her humor
when the waiter approached to fill their coffee cups and deliver a plate of
sinful-looking cinnamon buns. She beamed up at the young man, and he smiled
back.
    “I hope you don’t mind me saying so, Ms.
Price,” he began, and Michaela could feel the muscles in her face going tight,
years of training holding her smile in place. “But thank you for all the work
you do. The Price Foundation helped start a shelter and community center in my
hometown that made a big difference for me and some of my friends. It meant a
lot to us.”
    The tension in her chest left in a rush and
a genuine smile returned. “Where are you from?”
    The waiter ducked his head. “Asheville, ma’am.”
    And now she could hear the hint of the
south in his voice. She also knew that the shelter they’d helped start was for
LGBTQ youth who weren’t getting the support they needed from their families and
community.
    “What’s your name?”
    “Craig.”
    “I’m glad we could help you and your
friends, Craig. Thank you for saying something. The Albemarle House means a lot
to me, too.”
    His smile made her heart hurt, and when it
seemed like they might both get a little overcome by it, Craig quickly got down
to the business of taking their order.
    She watched him walk away with their menus
tucked under his arm and hoped he was still getting the support he needed.
    “You care. A lot,” Lachlan observed quietly.
    “I love what I do,” she agreed with a shrug.
“It was never about redeeming my reputation.”
    “I never once thought that it was.”
    She sighed at his frown. “Most people do. I
understand why, too. I’ve traded on my notoriety to draw attention to my causes
and the charity work I do.”
    “Why?” He seemed only curious. No
judgement. No questioning of hers.
    So she told him the truth. “It was the only
good thing I could make out of the fallout from that stupid tape.”
    “You were very young. That must have been extraordinarily
difficult. You were— are very brave.”
    She waved that off. “Not really.”
    “As we’ve previously discussed, you could
have become a shut-in. Or at least gone into hiding.”
    “That’s not me.”
    “No, it’s not. You’re brave.”
    “You say that like you’re not. Like you
wouldn’t have done the same.”
    “I can say with absolute certainly that I
would not have done the same. Don’t tell me you’re going to join the rest of
the world in pretending I’m not a total failure at social stuff.”
    “You’re not a failure,” she said sharply,
annoyed that he would say that.
    He cast her a dubious look. “I liked it
better when you were yanking my chain about it.”
    “I don’t see what you do and what I do as
all that different, actually.”
    That made him laugh. “Really? Because it
looks like black and white to me.”
    “We both deal with intense social
situations in a way that gets us what we want—which, ultimately, is distance. I
do it by manipulating people and situations, and the press especially, as much
as possible. I count on them to make assumptions about me and use that. You do
it by withdrawing. The net result, though, is the same.”
    Lachlan appeared to think about that while Craig
delivered their food and refilled their coffee.
    “Why do you want distance?” he asked when
they were alone again.
    “So no one can hurt me,” she said simply,
painfully aware that she’d never spoken with anyone about this.
    “Does it work?” he asked skeptically.
    “Mostly. They can insult the person they
think they know—the one they’ve created out of mountains of speculation and
only a few