Ben saw quite a few reasons why the fuck not, actually.

“Hold on, hold on. How do you know Anna will be able to fit inside? What if she suffocates? Who’s going to carry her? What if she hurts herself? Maddie, this was your fantastic idea?”

The two women ignored him. Maddie already had the suitcase open on the floor, and Anna was inspecting it with that wild grin still on her face.

“These are the things I said all the way across the bridge,” Theo said to him. “She didn’t listen to me, either, but I thought Anna might have some of those same concerns. I guess not.”

Anna was already sitting inside the suitcase, laughing again.

Maddie looked up at the two brothers.

“Stop worrying! Oh my God, Ben, I thought you of all people would be into this, but you’re just as much of a stress case as your brother here! You two will carry the suitcase, you’re both very strong!” Well. She had a point there. “How far away is your car?”

“A few blocks away,” Ben said. “But—”

“Good,” Maddie said. “That’s not far at all. You and Theo will carry Anna in the suitcase to the car—put her in the back seat, obviously. I’ll get in the back seat with her. Once we’re well on our way, I’ll unzip her. We’ll drive her to her hotel, and she can either walk in of her own volition, or we can zip her up before we get to the hotel and you guys can carry her in. Simple, perfect, no one will know it’s Anna inside.”

Shit. She was going to talk him into this.

Ben looked at Anna, who had gotten out of the suitcase and come over to his side.

“This sounds ridiculous,” he said. “But I’m happy to help with this weird stunt if you’re okay with it.” He lowered his voice. “But if you don’t want to do this, Maddie has the disguises, we can just do that, you know.”

Anna put her hand on his arm.

“The whole idea of this brings me so much joy that we have to do it,” she said. “It’s so silly and outlandish and I love it. But thanks for giving me an out. I appreciate it.”

She picked up her tote bag from the couch and pulled her wallet out of it.

“Here.” She handed him a plastic card. “This is my hotel room key; we’ll also need it to get into the elevator. I’m suite 212.”

She handed her tote bag to Maddie.

“Can you take this for me? It would be too bulky inside the suitcase.”

Ben looked at Theo, and Theo looked back at him.

“I think we’re going to be carrying a suitcase with an Oscar-nominated actress inside to my car,” Ben said.

Theo nodded.

“I think so, too. How did these women convince us to do this?”

Ben looked over at Anna. She was already inside the suitcase and looked positively gleeful as she sat there, chatting away with Maddie.

“I don’t think they even tried to convince us,” he said. “I think they just knew that we’d do whatever they wanted us to do.”

Theo shook his head.

“That’s depressingly accurate.”

Five minutes later, he and Theo were walking down the street, carrying Anna. In the suitcase. It was hard-sided, which, thank God, made it feel less like there was a person inside and more like it was just a heavy suitcase.

Except there was a person inside. Anna. Anna was the person inside. What the fuck were they doing?

Maddie had left the zipper only partway zipped in the middle, and at least when they were still in the apartment, Anna had said she could breathe fine, but Ben was still worried about that.

They walked past the filming for a whole block—there were a ton of people around for whatever they were filming, and lots more outside the barriers watching. Ben had even seen the temporary no-parking signs along his street earlier in the week, but hadn’t paid attention, or looked into why. He kicked himself for that now—if he’d done that, he would have taken Anna back to her hotel last night, and they wouldn’t be dealing with this today.

But. Then he wouldn’t have been able to hang out with her last night, in that easy, relaxed way. And he wouldn’t have been able to have sex with her again one more time before they fell asleep. And he wouldn’t have been able to sleep next to her all night, or introduce her to Theo and Maddie, or do this ridiculous—but, he had to admit, kind of hilarious—stunt to get her past all of these people without them seeing her. Maybe he was glad he hadn’t checked after all.

“So, um. How long are you going to be out of town for?” Theo asked as they walked past a big group of people.

“What do you . . .” Ben stared at him, and Theo stared back without blinking. “Oh! Right, yes, of course. Um. I’ll be out of town for . . . a month! For work. Which is why I needed so big of a suitcase. Lots of, um, outfit changes.”

Theo nodded.

“Outfit changes, yes, of course. That makes sense. All of the many different pairs of jeans and sneakers and hoodies you own.” He paused for a second. “Actually, I’m sure your sneakers could fill up this whole suitcase if you tried. How many pairs of them did you bring?”

Well, let’s see, if he did go out of town for a month for work, how many pairs of sneakers would he bring?

“Only ten pairs.” He shook his head. “I didn’t want to get my good sneakers too dirty, so I couldn’t bring most of the best ones—only a handful of my favorites and then a few of the daily workhorses.” Now he started thinking about which of his sneakers he’d pack. “As a matter of fact, I was really sad to leave some of them behind. It’s a real shame. But we’ll be at the beach, and you know what sand does to good shoes.”

“No, what does sand do to good shoes?” Theo asked with a very straight face.

Suddenly Ben thought about Anna inside the suitcase overhearing this conversation. Would she think he was comparing her to his sneakers? Well, if she did, she should be honored—he treated his sneakers very well.

She probably wouldn’t like the way he phrased that.

A laugh exploded from him, with no warning. Theo turned and looked at him, and his face crumpled. They stood still, both laughing so hard they were shaking.

“Guys!” Maddie said. “Don’t we need to get a move on?”

Ben took a deep breath and tried to stop laughing. Yes, right, Anna was still inside the suitcase. He pulled himself together and walked on.

“I’m ashamed of you,” he said to his brother. “Me, you’d expect me to lose it, but I had more faith in you.”

Theo glared at him.