Mia is not quiet as a mouse. As soon as she steps inside Ape House, handing me a Starbucks macchiato that Nona bought to assuage her guilt, she lets out a screech that would make a lion’s roar sound muted.
“I can’t believe I’m behind the scenes at the zoo,” she says, taking a long whiff of Clorox and hay. “Olivia from Scouts is gonna lose her mind.”
I tell myself it’s a good thing she’s here; the presence of a witness will help deter me from locking Kai in with the vervet monkeys.
“This way,” I say, leading her down the back corridor.
The nursery, tucked away on the south side of Ape House, is off-limits to the public. Lottie, Jack, and I spent most of the morning scrubbing its floors and piling them with hay in preparation for Keeva’s arrival. We also examined the mesh fencing that separates the nursery from a holding area for the other gorillas, checking for any gaps. The mesh will allow the older females from Ozzie’s troop to watch Keeva in the nursery and hopefully spark their interest in rearing her.
I expect to find Kai waiting for me, possibly clutching a pitchfork and a pair of horns, but the nursery’s empty.
“Well, well, well,” I mutter. “Guess he stood me up.” One point for Lucy, zero points for Elle’s eternal optimism.
“Who stood you up?” Mia asks, then gasps so loudly that I look over my shoulder to check for an escaped gorilla.
“Lucy, it’s Kai Bridges,” she breathes, her eyes bulging like we’ve stumbled onto a bow-wearing JoJo Siwa in the flesh. She points down the hallway toward the employee offices, where Kai faces a wall and presses one hand against it as the other holds a phone to his ear. Unlike Mia, who’s grinning so widely I think her face might crack, Kai’s frowning like Penny the three-legged puppy just peed on his best pair of shoes.
Guess he didn’t stand me up after all. No points for Lucy, three points for Sam and Elle and Team Lucy-hates-everybody-even-Mr.-Rogers.
“Wow,” Mia whispers, smoothing her Girl Scout vest with the ginger touch of someone determined to look her best. “I didn’t expect him to be so . . .”
“Snarly?” I suggest, watching as Kai’s mouth puckers in distaste. “Scowly, like Fitzwilliam Darcy if he wore dumb hats and lacked charm?”
“No.” Mia doesn’t tear her gaze away from him. “Gorgeous.”
“Take it down a notch, Trudy,” I retort. “Sunsets are gorgeous, okay? Michael B. Jordan is gorgeous. Kai Bridges is not.”
I’m not sure if I’m trying to convince Mia or myself, but as if the universe has conspired with Jack to prove me wrong, he cuts through the hallway en route to the lemur exhibit and switches on an oscillating floor fan that sends a sudden gust of air toward Kai. Kai’s hair catches the breeze and he tilts his head back in what seems like slow motion, and damn if I don’t half expect him to open a bottle of water and pour it over his T-shirt.
Double damn if I don’t totally hate the idea, either. Because as much as I want to deny it, Mia has a point. As Kai barks into the phone, probably threatening to fire Lars the assistant for buying the wrong kind of hair pomade, it’s impossible not to notice that his gray T-shirt hugs his well-muscled back with just the right amount of snugness. And though I curse the day he was born, the Bad Lucy part of my brain—the side of me that hasn’t shared an orgasm with anyone besides my vibrator in months—imagines what it would be like to lean against the wall he’s got one hand pressed up on, his tricep flexed mere inches from my body. How it would feel to have his hands pressed on either side of me, his broad shoulders boxing me in until—
No. Fuck no. Bad Lucy is a traitorous little bitch, and I give myself a swift mental kick in the ass.
Kai, who’s so lacking in manners that he ends the call without even saying good-bye to the victim on the other end of the line, glances up to see Mia and me lingering outside the nursery. In the blink of an eye, his sulky pout mutates into a smirk, and I can read his thoughts a mile away: here’s glaringly incompetent Lucy Rourke, here to provide his daily dose of entertainment and smug superiority.
Oh goody.
“So you came to learn from the best,” he says in a silky tone that makes me want to slice my ears off. “Good for you, Lucy.”
He winks at me like he knows what I was thinking about his triceps a moment ago, and I can’t resist the urge to snap back.
“Actually, no,” I say, my voice sugary sweet. “I came to learn from you. But if you know where I can find the best, please point me in that direction.”
Kai laughs, and as he crosses his arms over his chest, I shove Bad Lucy back into her cave and force myself to think of decidedly unsexy things, like funerals and Pap smears and the time I went on a date with a guy named Razor who ate pizza with a fork and declared that the gender pay gap was a hoax.
“You look tense,” Kai says, running a hand through his hair as I focus, hard, on Razor’s misogynistic claims. “Did something bad happen? My God, Lucy, did 90 Day Fiancé get canceled?”
My cheeks heat up as I remember my meandering rant about celebrities and Big Ed at Picnic for Paws, and I curse Kai to a lifetime of getting stuck behind the slowest walker in a crowded hallway.
“I’m not tense at all,” I say in a tone that’s undeniably tense. “And for your information, 90 Day Fiancé would never get canceled. It’s a reality TV empire. It spawned eighteen spinoffs.”
“And how many of those have you watched?” he asks, reaching up to knit his fingers behind his head like he knows it will make his biceps pop.
“Just two or three,” I say smoothly, keeping my gaze locked on his face. I couldn’t care less about his bulging biceps.
Kai smirks like he knows I’m lying—which I am, because as a loyal Discovery Plus subscriber, I’ve seen every spinoff and every spinoff’s spinoff. “I bet.”
I make a note of all his snarky comments so I can present them to Sam and Elle as proof that he’s not a capybara-rescuing Sandy Bullock with a broader frame and too much testosterone.
He’s a jerk, plain and simple.
“That didn’t seem like a fun phone call,” I say, deciding that two can play at this game. “Poor thing, was it Prince William? Did he call to say you aren’t his very favorite boy anymore?”
Kai shakes his head. “Good try, but no. It was a producer from Fresh Air scheduling an interview for the fall.”
“Fresh Air with Terry Gross?” I ask, annoyed that I’ll have to skip an episode.
He grins. “That’s the one. I’m guessing you’re a fan? Well, good to know reality TV isn’t the only media you consume.”
I fix him with a benevolent smile. “I wouldn’t be so quick to criticize reality TV, since your show could technically be classified as such.”
His smirk disappears, and I mentally high-five myself for managing to hit a nerve. “On the Wild Side is an educational docuseries, Lucy,” he says tightly. “Let’s not compare it to The Kardashians.”
“I actually think you have a lot in common with the Kardashians,” I muse, thrusting the knife in deeper. “Your name starts with a K, for starters. And they’ve won an Emmy, too.”
“They haven’t.” Kai drops his hands from the back of his head and fixes me with a look that could melt whatever frozen Antarctic ice ridge he bragged about spending a week on.
“Yeah, I’m pretty sure they have.” I’m talking entirely out of my ass, but Kai’s lips are twisted like he’s sucking on a black cherry WarHead, so I wave a carefree hand at him and keep going. “Or maybe it was a Teen Choice Award. Oh well. They’re basically the same thing, right? Tomato, to-mah-to.”
Kai clenches his jaw like he’s on the verge of a stroke, and even though Sam and Elle would seriously disapprove of my behavior, it’s too satisfying to stop once I’ve started.
“Hi,” Mia says after a pause in which I patiently wait for Kai’s head to pop off his body. “I’m Mia, Lucy’s little sister.”
I got so distracted by landing a shot on Kai that I forgot she was here, and I watch in horror as she holds her notebook up toward him.
“Can I have your autograph?” she asks, barely meeting Kai’s gaze. “I’m, like, your number one fan.”
I die a little inside as Kai fixes Mia, then me, with a radiant grin. He’s the human equivalent of Pac-Man, except he survives on praise and attention instead of little white dots.
“Did you hear that, Lucy?” he asks with enough bravado to make my teeth clench. “Your sister adores me.”
“I really do,” Mia agrees.
Nona owes me a dozen tiramisus for putting up with this.
“My favorite Wild Side episode is the one where you visited the macaques in Nepal.”
He raises his eyebrows at me as if to say, Do you hear how special I am? Even this ten-year-old thinks so, but when he crouches down toward Mia, Kai’s smile appears genuine.
“Thank you, Mia. I like that episode, too. Here, how about a hat?” Reaching for a giant duffel bag behind him, he fishes out a blue ball cap bearing the Wild Side logo and a Sharpie. “To Mia,” he narrates, signing it with a dramatic flourish. “Stay wild! Love, Kai.”
I bet signing autographs is his favorite hobby. I bet he practices his signature every night before bed, and his hotel room is littered with T-shirts and hats and black-and-white headshots signed: To Kai: You’re the most handsome, well-traveled man in the world, and everyone who meets you worships you. Stay wild! Love, Kai.
Mia accepts the hat like it’s a diamond ring. “Wow. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. And you know what, Mia?” Kai says, resting his hands on his knees as he crouches toward her. “I think your big sister wants a hat, too.”
“Half sister,” I say automatically, trying not to feel guilty when a fraction of the joy on Mia’s face flickers. “And I absolutely do not.”
If he tries to stick one of those monstrosities on my head, I’ll rip it off and smack him in the face with it.
Grinning, Kai pulls a purple hat from his duffel and scribbles on it while I contemplate how to murder him without getting caught. Then he holds the cap toward me, and before I can smack it out of his hand, he waves at someone behind me.
“Cheerio there, Phil!” Kai greets, and my stomach drops when I turn to see my salt-and-pepper-haired boss striding down the hallway.
“Hello, Kai,” Phil says like it’s Christmas morning and Kai’s a present-laden tree. “I didn’t expect you back in Ape House until Keeva arrives.”
“We won’t shoot until then, but Lucy asked me to help her with some camera training,” Kai says, as if this was my idea. “I have a busy schedule, but when she told me how much she wanted to improve, I knew I had to help.”
My hatred for Kai grows by the fire of a thousand burning suns, but to my surprise, Phil nods approvingly. “Great idea, Lucy! That’s the kind of initiative I’m looking for. And hey, cool hats.”
He points at the signed caps, and Kai gives him a sheepish grin. “Anything for my fans. Well, mostly anything. As I was just telling Lucy, no matter how flattered I am by her request, I have a firm policy against autographing body parts. A hat will have to do.”
Rage burns inside me, and like he’s freaking Mary Poppins with a bottomless suitcase, Kai grabs another hat to hand to Phil. “Can’t leave anyone out.”
“Wow, thank you,” my boss says. He puts the hat on with the reverence of Queen Elizabeth II putting on her most bedazzled crown.
“Kai, can we take a photo?” Mia asks. “Please?”
He nods. “Phil, will you do the honors?”
Grinning, Phil takes Mia’s phone from her outstretched hand. Seizing her opportunity, she snakes an arm around Kai’s waist and gazes at him like she’s planning to snip a lock off his hair and wear it around her neck.
“Hop on in there, Lucy,” Phil says.
“Yes, come on, Lucy,” Kai says, not even trying to hide the triumph in his eyes. “Get over here and let me make your dream come true.”
I stay planted to my spot, wishing Ozzie the silverback could scoop Kai up with his massive arms and fling him back to whatever circle of hell he came from. I glance from Phil to Kai, realizing there’s no escape. I can’t storm away from the nursery without giving Phil the impression that I’m a bad sport. Swallowing my pride, I force myself to stand beside Kai.
“Atta girl,” he says, and when he reaches over to place the autographed hat on my head, it’s all I can do not to bite his hand off and slap him with the detached limb.
“Say ‘cheese!’ ” Phil instructs.
“Say ‘stay wild!’ ” Kai adds, oozing with good cheer. Taking pictures of himself is probably his third favorite activity, after signing autographs and manhandling his penis.
I wish I were a hippopotamus and he was sailing the Nile so I could capsize his boat and swallow him whole.
“Stay wild,” I mutter between gritted teeth.
I smile for the photo like this is going to be the best summer of my life, and I think that should earn me an Emmy of my own.