15. Gemma
Chapter 15
Gemma
I walk into Alchemy wearing a short, tight, shimmering white dress.I just couldn’t help myself.If this man wants magic, I’m going to give it to him.
“Damn, girl.” Ainsley lets out a long, low whistle as he takes one of my hands and spins me before him.
It’s forward, and possibly not even appropriate, considering we’ve really only known each other a week, but somehow, it feels right.
He feels right.
Besides, it’s New Year's Eve. If there was a day for taking a chance on serendipitous meetings and new beginnings, it’s this one.
I step forward until my chest presses against his. Ainsley only hesitates for a moment before pulling me close. He smells like orange and pine and something spicy like ginger. I close my eyes and inhale him.
“This place is so close to my apartment, I’m not sure why I’ve never been here,” he says, taking a step back but keeping both of his hands on my arms.
“It’s my favorite,” I answer truthfully.I love this little corner bar, with its dim, romantic corners and cozy plush chairs. The crowd is light for New Year’s Eve, but it’s still early. We’re able to snag a great table toward the back, next to a small stained-glass window peering out onto the sidewalk.
“What’s good here?” he asks, holding the menu but not opening it.
“Everything. I often get the special cocktail, but I like this rosemary gin martini as well. Starlight Serenade.”
“I like the sound of that,” Ainsley says, setting his menu to the side without taking his eyes off me.
I’m suddenly reminded of exactly why this man is sitting across from me right now. What drew me to him at the bar that night. What caused me to give him my number after knowing him for two hours. What made me tell him that I thought he could be my other boyfriend that day in the bookstore.
It’s the attention.
Ainsley’s focus is complete and undivided, as if I’m the only human on the planet. I haven’t spotted his phone a single time since we sat down, noticeable in a world where almost everyone else has their device on the table next to them—myself included.
I slip my phone into my bag as the server approaches.
Ainsley orders two Starlight Serenades without even asking me, and I’m suddenly so turned on, sitting alone on this hard wooden chair feels like a crime.
As soon as we’re alone again, he leans forward, resting both forearms on the small round table and shines his gaze right into mine once more. “I’ve been dreaming of getting you alone again.”
I bite my lip to hold back a flinch. “Taylor’s not so bad?—”
Ainsley shakes his head quickly. “That came out wrong. That’s not what I meant. He seems like a good guy. It’s just… ”
“You two have some kind of thing going on at work that you didn’t want to talk about the other night. Care to let me in on the secret?”
His smile quirks slightly to the side as he shakes his head slowly. “It’s nothing. He’s just establishing dominance on his turf. Which is well within his rights. He has to live there, after all. I’m just passing through.”
That statement has so many possible layers to unpack, I don’t even know where to start.
Luckily, or unluckily perhaps, Ainsley beats me to itand changes the subject.
“I never got to hear about your program and what your plans are at dinner.”
Back on safer territory, I’m disappointed, but also kind of relieved. “I’m in my last year of the publishing MFA program.”
“Ooh,” he replies. Actually, completely, interested. “Book publishing?”
I nod. “My undergrad was in creative writing, and I thought it would lead to an MFA in the same, but I ended up going for publishing. I want to write and edit, but I also really like the business side of things. I did a graphic design minor as well.”
“You’ll be on the hunt for the next Stephen King?”
I nod and smile. “Something like that.”
“You’re graduating this year.”
“I am. You as well?”
He nods. “I’m finishing my undergrad in Environmental Engineering.”
“Straight into grad school?”
Ainsley finally breaks eye contact as he sits back in his seat and shrugs. I get the feeling this isn’t the first time he’s gotten this question.
“Maybe. More likely I’m going to start an internship over the summer and take a job when it’s offered. I’m happy I landed at this school, and I’ve learned a lot, but I should get to work.”
I decide to let the cocky assumption that he’ll just be offered a job at the end of his internship slide. Hell, he’s probably right to be so confident. “Work doing what?”
I see a flash of something I’d have to call hesitation in his eyes before he answers. “I spent a bit of time traveling in low and middle income countries before I started my degree, and I got really interested in water quality issues. Clean water is such an important infrastructure element for a community, but so many don’t have it. They carry water from sources far away, or rely on bottled water, or both. Water is such a basic thing that we don’t even think about it. I know I never did until I was in a place where you couldn’t drink it or wash anything with it. Then the problem is impossible to ignore. If you can’t water crops, you can’t grow food. If all the drinking water comes from plastic bottles, the garbage piles up. There are so many issues related to climate change that we’re trying to solve here in the States and other high-income countries while so many people in the world are really working against us, out of pure necessity. If we just took the time to help with clean water infrastructure, we could eliminate so much plastic production and waste on our planet.”
The words come out in a long, constant flow that has me both mesmerized and amused. “I didn’t take you for such a hippie.”
That smile again. His deep brown eyes crinkle at the corners as the expression lights up his whole face. I can’t help but smile back.
“Yeah, well. You and my father both.”
“He’s a lawyer right? Did he want you to follow in his footsteps? ”
“Big time. I can tell you exactly how many universities have environmental law programs because I was sent a brochure for each and every one of them over the last few years.”
“But it’s not your thing?”
“I don’t want to sit in an office in New York and argue about these issues. I want to be on the ground, talking with people, and learning about how things really affect their lives. I think that’s the only way to find real solutions.”
The server arrives with two vintage, engraved crystal glasses and sets them on the table. I tap the floating rosemary sprig in mine as I consider his words.
Graduating from college and heading off to some far-off country to help install clean water infrastructure could certainly be interpreted as a new journey.
But I don’t want it to be.
Sorry, children dying of dysentery. I want his new adventure to be me.
I take a long sip of the sweet, strong cocktail to get my nerve back up. “I’m not going to lie, I’ll be a little disappointed if you disappear in four months.”
Ainsley sits forward and leans on the table once more, locking his intense gaze onto mine. “Well, nothing is certain.”
I nod, considering whether that’s what I want to hear or not. “True.”
He sits back and allows his gaze to wander out the window to where the rain is now falling on the cold, dark street. “Let’s just say I started college with a lot of things figured out.”
“And now?”
He shrugs, focusing his attention back on me. “Now that it’s time to make decisions about what comes next…I don’t know. There’s a difference between signing on for a six-week volunteer trip and going to work for a company that’s based overseas. I didn’t really think about what it would mean when I wa s over there a few years back, to actually live in one of those countries. I’d never lived away from home before, away from New York and my father.”
“Now you’ve spent a few years in Seattle.”
He nods. “It’s been pretty lonely. I know I can go back whenever. Hell, I didn’t even need to come here at all. I was all set up to finish the program at Columbia where I started, but it felt so restricting, to be there so close to home. All I wanted was to get away, so I transferred. And it’s taken me until now to really feel like I know my way around. I know people. I feel grounded now. The thought of shaking all that up again has me questioning everything I had planned.”
“You seemed pretty sure of yourself a moment ago, when you told me about your degree and helping people with water access.”
“Part of me is sure. I do want people to have access to clean water. I know I could help them. But the other part of me… Well, the other part of me is still regurgitating that same speech, hell-bent on not having to tell my father he was right.”
My mind is rolling around in a mud bath of selfish glee. “No one would fault you for going straight into a graduate program.”
My answer is clearly something that he’s thought about before, even if he doesn’t look as excited about it as I would hope.I’m preparing myself for more excuses, for having to defend against more reasons why he needs to leave in June. But he surprises me.
“What about you? You’re graduating at the end of the quarter. Surely there’s a more exciting publishing scene somewhere other than Seattle. Most of that stuff happens in New York, right?”
He’s absolutely right, but I’m nervous to say so.As much as I was just badgering Ainsley for answers about his next step, I’m not prepared to offer a final decision on my own.
“I have internship applications out all over the country. New York, Los Angeles, and some in Seattle.”
He smiles at my answer, shaking his head. “I’m too experienced in bullshitting my way through tough questions about the future to believe that.”
My mouth falls open at the accusation. I pull it closed and try to look innocent. “What do you mean?”
“You’ve got a plan you’re scared to tell anyone about.”
I shake my head, rendered speechless by his astute deduction.
“If not a plan, a dream, then. There’s something you want to do, and someone is going to be mad or sad if you do it, so you’re still offering a story about deciding.”
I open my mouth to protest, even though he’s one hundred percent correct, but he holds up a hand to stop me. “It’s okay. I get the need to hold your cards close to your chest. Making decisions for yourself is scary. Especially when they involve other people. I have a helicopter dad, so I understand. And I won’t tell…anyone.”
The meaning of his words slaps me right across the face. “Taylor and I are solid.” My tone is too defensive, I can hear it. I look down at my hands before any other ill planned excuses escape.
“Is he going with you? If you leave?”
I say nothing, fiddling with the rosemary sprig from my drink, expecting Ainsley to claim his victory and hold it over my head.
But he does the opposite. “I’m going to be here, earning your trust, for as long as you’ll have me.”
I look up sharply at his unexpected words and find his eyes shining with honesty.
“And Taylor?” I whisper the words, but he hears them well enough.
“Taylor and I…we have some things to work out. But to be honest, I’ve spent years in team sports and in locker rooms and on scout troops. I have a lot more experience working things out with guys then I do with women. I’m not going to lie and tell you this whole thing doesn’t make me nervous as hell, because it does, but I’m not going to let that fear stand between you and me. I promise you that.”
“He’s got a big heart and the kindest soul.”
I watch Ainsley hold back a laugh and respect his efforts.
“I’ve befriended bigger assholes in my time. He and I will find some common ground. In fact, we already have.”
He reaches across the table and takes both of my hands in his. “When you found me on Christmas, I was on a lonely, uncertain journey that I wasn’t even able to be honest about to myself.”
“And now?”
“And now I’m on a new journey. Less lonely, I hope, although just as uncertain, I suppose. But it feels different. Instead of trudging forward, dreading my future, I feel like I’m wading into some kind of electric darkness. I still don’t know what’s going to happen, just like last week, but I’m excited that I feel like I can leap off that cliff.”
A smile spreads over my face as he starts to use familiar language. “You looked up your card.”
“I looked up a lot of things.”
“And?”
“And whatever spell you’ve put me under, I’m not searching for the antidote.”
Our gazes lock, and the moment is so heated, I’m worried the table might spontaneously combust. This man just told me that he’s in, for whatever happens. He’s going to push through the fear and try us on. It’s more than I hoped for. More than I was brave enough to ask for.And now that he’s mine, I want my hands on his body.
“Do you want to dance?” I ask.
His eyes dart to the small dance floor at the back of the bar and then back to mine. “Definitely.”
He finishes the last of his drink and then stands and holds out his hand for me.
I take a sip of my own and accept.
He starts to pull me away, but I pause and reach for my glass once more, downing the entire thing while the warmth from his hand around mine sends chills through my body.
As soon as I set down the empty glass, Ainsley pulls me in close, the hand holding mine wrapping around my body and holding my back firmly to his chest. “I’m not driving you to drink, am I?”
The slightly teasing words, whispered right into my ear, send another wave of hot and cold through my body.
“No,” I whisper, trying not to melt into his arms. “You just…you just make me want to be more courageous than I think I am.”
He gives a slow pull on my hand, causing my body to spin and face him.
“It’s funny, I’d say the same thing about you.”
There are only a handful of couples swaying to Sadè as Ainsley pulls me to the center of the dance floor, the temperature rising as we enter the shared body heat. He slides one hand down to my hip, keeping my hand clasped in the other and takes the lead, swaying us to the erratic rhythm of the song.
“You’re a good dancer,” I say stupidly, just needing something to say to break up the crystals forming in my chest cavity.
“Thank you,” he answers, stepping back and guiding me on a smooth spin and then back into his arms. “I don’t do much dancing.”
“I imagined you growing up dancing at balls.”
He laughs softly against my chest. The vibrations alter my heartbeat. “You lived at my house. Did you ever see any balls?”
“No,” I whisper, chastising myself for having said something like that. I don’t want to talk about our tragic childhoods, soI press my body closer, and the move has the desired effect. Ainsley holds me tighter and doesn’t speak about the past again.
“I would have done just about anything to get you in my arms,” he murmurs instead.
“A-all you had to do was ask,” I stutter out, the closeness of him, the heart melting statement, it’s all nearly too much.
“I’m still trying to figure out the right question, love. The one that gets me the answer I want.”
The song ends and another one starts, a soft, moody beat that keeps our bodies swaying at the same rhythm.
“Try,” I say.
“Will you come home with me tonight?” he says almost instantaneously.
“No,” I say.
He doesn’t miss a beat, stepping back to spin me once more, pulling me back to his chest, zero sign that my rejection had any effect on him at all.
“But you can come home with me.”
I earn a small smile and another spin for my answer.
“I don’t want to rush you into anything. If you’re not ready, I’m happy to wait,” he tells me.
I stop dancing, and after one awkward beat, Ainsley stops as well. We stand in the center of the dance floor, couples swaying around us, and lock eyes.
“I feel like I’ve been waiting for you for so long,” I whisper. “I’m ready. I’ve been ready.”
Ainsley leans down to whisper in my ear, and nothing could prepare me for what he says next.
“Sorry I kept you waiting, love. I got here as soon as I could.”