Saint Dickens

The banner that hung over the entrance to the Read Between the Wines adult spelling bee literacy fundraiser was supposed to say:

D IS FOR DICKENS

Instead, in hot-pink script, it announced:

D IS FOR DICKINGS

Clementine was not a woman who spiraled. She curated contingencies. Her purse contained safety pins, antihistamines, a Tide pen, emergency earrings, and a tiny screwdriver because you never knew what life might throw at you.

None of those items could de-dick a banner.

Her assistant, Mimi, stood beside her holding a clipboard to her chest like a hymnal.

“What if we lower the lights?”

“It’s twenty feet wide, Mimi. Lowering the lights will make it glow like a brothel sign.”

Then Saint Ryder walked in.

He stopped beneath the banner, read it, and smiled disrespectfully.

“Don’t,” Clementine said.

“I’m admiring your commitment to literacy.”

“I ordered Dickens.”

“The banner suggests a livelier curriculum.”

Three years earlier, Saint had been the chef-consultant for her museum gala. They had spent weeks arguing over menus and whether sugar belonged in grits. In the aftermath of the gala, Saint had found her in the kitchen eating leftover honey lavender panna cotta.

“Do you always eat last?” Saint had asked.

Clementine glanced down at the panna cotta in her hand. “I’m eating dessert.”

Saint stepped closer. “That’s not what I asked.”

She should have rolled her eyes. Instead, she held the spoon out toward him.

Saint licked it without breaking eye contact.

That was how it started.

A month of late-night desserts followed. Saint cooked with his shirt open and kissed like he had nowhere else to be. He learned exactly how long to keep his mouth between her thighs before her fingers tangled in his curls and her voice started to lose its composure. He admired how thoroughly she believed she could think her way out of wanting him. Saint would laugh softly at her failed attempts to talk herself through it. Once, he untied the knot of her robe with his teeth and smiled against her stomach when Clementine completely lost track of whatever she’d been trying to say.

Then Clementine made a list titled Reasons This Will End Badly.

Saint found it on her kitchen island beside a freshly baked red velvet cake. Reasons one through six amused him. Reason seven set his jaw on edge:

He gets me so open I start making decisions with my pussy instead of my planner.

Saint left before Clementine could explain that making the list didn’t mean she wanted him gone.

Now he shrugged off his jacket beside the ladder and rolled up his sleeves. Clementine watched his forearms appear and briefly forgot the problem at hand.

“This vinyl needs heat,” she said.

“What do you need?”

His eyes moved to her mouth and stayed there long enough to make her blush.

Saint climbed the ladder while Clementine held it steady. The band tested a bass line that settled low in Clementine’s stomach.

He peeled off the G. The banner now read:

D IS FOR DICKIN S

Clementine covered her face. “I can’t have philanthropists taking selfies under this.”

Saint pulled her hands down. “Rich people live for scandal.”

Later in the evening, Clementine accidentally passed too close to the croquembouche tower. Saint appeared beside her with a napkin in hand, ready to wipe a drop of caramel from her dress.

“Careful,” he whispered.

“It’s caramel.”

His eyes held hers. “I know, baby.”

“It’s caramel, not sin.”

“Depends who’s tasting it.”

Clementine escaped to the coatroom.

Saint followed.

Music pulsed through the wall. Clementine pretended to organize brochures while Saint closed the door.

“I read your list again last month,” he said.

“You kept it?”

“I was offended by the penmanship first. Then the content.”

“You were never supposed to read it.”

“It had my name on it.”

Clementine rolled her eyes.

“You thought wanting me meant losing yourself.”

“Wanting you made me act brand new.”

Saint stepped closer until her dress brushed his trousers. “I liked you brand new.”

“Saint.”

“I liked you in my kitchen with powdered sugar on your nose pretending you didn’t want to stay.” His hand slid to the bare skin at her back. “I liked how you moaned when I kissed your neck right here.”

His mouth found the spot beneath her ear.

“I loved you,” he said, “and you treated it like a weather warning.”

“You made me feel reckless," she whispered.

“Clementine, you loved me too.”

“You will not seduce me in a coatroom during a literacy fundraiser.”

His lips brushed her jaw. “I would never disrespect literacy.”

Saint kissed her deep enough to make the glowing dick on the banner outside less distracting than the hard one pinning her against the coatroom door.

His voice was rough when he pulled away, “Tell me to stop.”

“Not yet.”

The door rattled.

“Clementine?” Mimi called. “The banner is trending and Aunt Tia started a chant.”

Clementine closed her eyes. “I hate everybody.”

“No, you don’t.”

“I hate you.”

Saint kissed her forehead. “No, you don’t.”

The typo became the evening’s main attraction. Guests posed beneath the banner with champagne flutes and guilty smiles. Aunt Tia, who chaired the board and feared absolutely nothing except dry salmon, announced to the newspaper that the typo was “a provocative invitation to adult literacy.”

The ballroom had mostly emptied when Clementine found the discarded pink G near the stage where Saint waited.

“I still make lists.”

“I’ll bring a pen.”

“I don’t want to be handled.”

“I want to love you, Clementine.”

Saint watched as Clementine turned the vinyl letter between her fingers.

“You know what I think?” he asked.

“I’m sure you’ll tell me.”

“I think you saw my RSVP and decided to create an emergency.”

Clementine laughed then, helpless and warm. “You make me sound unwell.”

“Baby, you made a banner say dick just to get my attention.”

Clementine suddenly became very aware of the thin lace beneath her dress.

“I didn’t know if you would help me. ”

“You knew I would, baby.”

Saint took the pink G from her hand and slid it into his jacket pocket like he planned to keep it. “What now?” he asked softly.

Clementine stepped into him until he could feel every inch of her against his body.

“I think you should finish what you started.”

Saint’s eyes darkened.

“The banner?”

Her nails dragged lightly down the front of his shirt.

“Us.”

“Good,” he growled. “I was hoping literacy would lead somewhere useful.”