Chapter 15 #2
His eyes flick over me, taking in the fact that I’m not in my usual office clothes. Before leaving my apartment, I’d torn through half my wardrobe before settling on a simple sundress.
“You look nice,” he finally says, but the way the words seem to cost him makes it hard not to grin. There’s something about an attractive man so tangled in his own thoughts that he doesn’t realize the effect he has. It’s enough to make me want to lift my dress and forget all the rest.
We head into the kitchen, and right away, he pours me a glass of lemonade.
His kitchen is all clean lines, dark natural stone backsplash arranged in a herringbone design, and white marble countertops with veins of gray that pop beneath the pendant lights.
I plop into a stool while he stirs a pan of mixed vegetables at the stovetop.
“You’re actually cooking,” I comment. “And here I thought you’d be giving me one of your infamous premade chicken and rice meal preps.”
“There’s still a high possibility of that if I fuck this up too much. I’m not much of a cook.”
“Well, no matter what, I’m already impressed.” I take a sip of my drink, glancing around his home.
Nothing, literally not one thing, has moved or changed since I’ve been here last. I’m beginning to wonder if he’s even in this penthouse more than to sleep. “So, what do you usually do on the weekends?”
He looks over his shoulder at me. “You’re not going to like the answer.”
“Theo,” I deadpan.
“Marley,” he says back.
“Why do you work so much?”
He shrugs. “There’s a lot to do. And it’s a good distraction, I guess.”
“A distraction from what exactly?”
I see the discomfort wash over him, and I’m certain he’s not going to bother with an answer, at least not an honest one. I’m the type of person who will keep asking questions, personal or not, until someone tells me to shut the hell up. I’m an open book, and sometimes I forget others are not.
“A distraction from life, I guess. From coming home to an empty apartment.”
I step down from my stool at the counter and walk over to the counter next to where he’s cooking so I’m not staring at his back. I hop up on the marble beside him, taking a seat. “Well, change that then. Get a friend or girlfriend, a dog, or a bird—whatever floats your boat.”
“You make it sound like that’s easy,” he replies, squeezing a cut orange over the top of the vegetables, as they sizzle to life.
“It can be, if you put in the effort.”
He turns to face me directly, putting a hand on either side of me. “For you it is. Not for someone like me.”
“And someone like you is what exactly?” I ask, staring him right in the eyes. We’re close, his hands an inch from my legs, his body caging me in against the counter.
“An introverted asshole that always seems to put their foot in their mouth,” he mutters.
Before I can think twice, my hands are on either side of his face. His stubble is rough against my palms, but I don’t let go. Not when he looks at me like that, like he’s waiting for me to flinch, to agree, to walk away.
“I’m not going to deny that, yeah, sometimes you’re a tiny bit of an asshole,” I say, my thumbs brushing along the sharp lines of his jaw. “But guess what? Everyone is sometimes. And there’s absolutely nothing wrong with being introverted.”
I pause, letting my voice soften. “I think you’re overlooking the best parts of yourself.
You have a good heart, Theo. I’ve seen your expenditures.
I know about the donations you make without drawing attention to them.
The times you’ve sent me home with food so I wouldn’t go hungry.
Paying off the janitorial staff’s child’s hospital bill, because you overheard him worrying.
You work hard, too hard, because you care.
You’ve given up your entire life to make sure everyone in this company is taken care of.
So, while you’re sitting here thinking you’re not good enough, I’m sitting here thinking you’re irreplaceable. ”
As soon as I finish my sentence, I can feel our tension snap like a taut rubber band.
There’s a silence, so heavy and full that it may burst from the seams as he stares at me, searching my face for the truth. He lifts his hand, which smells of oranges, his thumb lazily dragging across my lips, drunk on the sight of me.
“Marley, I’m going to kiss you now,” he rasps.
And he does. He kisses me with everything he’s got, capturing my mouth with his own, a muffled sigh slipping from me and straight into him. It’s like a dam breaking, releasing something that’s been lodged deep inside for years. Decades. Maybe even my entire life.
His hand tangles into my hair, and I kiss him back with a hunger I didn’t realize I had, like I’ve been starved of affection for far too long.
And as I kiss him, I start to wonder if maybe I have been.
Because I’ve never been kissed like this.
So all-consuming, so overwhelming, that every thought in my head gets scrambled and overtaken by the feel of him.
I drop my head back, chin pointing to the ceiling, as his mouth nips a trail along the curve of my neck.
“I can’t fucking stay away from you,” he mumbles against my skin, his teeth biting and turning me alive with every inch further he goes.
I don’t have the means to reply, because I’m too lost in him, in the kiss, in the feel of his hands slipping beneath the fabric of my dress, rough palms grabbing handfuls of my ass.
With his hands on my ass, he pulls me into him.
I can feel him hard against me, and all I can think about is how I need him even closer.
Suddenly, the smoke detector blares. Deafening, loud, insistent, and immediately bursting our bubble. It’s over as soon as it started, both of us pulling back like we’ve suddenly awoken from a case of amnesia, realizing who we are to the other.
The forgotten vegetables on the stove are fully smoked, charred into unrecognizable crisps.
Theo mutters a string of expletives under his breath, spinning to the stove, quickly twisting the knob to turn off the flame.
He grabs the handle, setting the smoking pan into the sink and cranking the water to full blast.
I’m still perched on the counter, lips swollen, panties soaked, wishing I hadn’t been cockblocked by zucchini. I’ve never been this angry at vegetables in my life.
From the sink, Theo looks more frustrated than ever, too, as he scrubs a hand down his face.
When he shuts off the water and walks back over to me, I already know what he’s going to say. I can feel it in the way he moves, the way he always defaults to the practical solution, no matter the situation.
Placing a hand on either side of me again, he leans in. I want to believe he’s changed his mind, that whatever he was about to say seconds ago has somehow changed. But that fragment of hope shatters into a tiny thousand pieces the moment he opens his mouth.
He sighs. “Fuck, Mar. I’m sorry. We can’t do this.”
“I know,” I groan, letting my head fall against his shoulder. “Is it horrible that I really, really wish we could though?”
When I look up, there’s a sad smile on his face. “If things were different … if you weren’t my assistant …”
“I know, Theo. You don’t have to explain it, I know.
” As much as I’m aware of the thousands of reasons why this can’t happen, there’s one feeling that rises above all the rest. That I like him, a lot.
That this tender, aching hole in my heart only seems to be filled when I’m around him.
Like we’re two lonely people who’ve stumbled into each other in the dark and have finally begun to create our own light together.
I don’t want this to be the end of things between us. I don’t want to go back to just having one wild best friend, a small ballet company that performs at a soon-to-be-gone theater, and a business-only relationship with my boss.
What I want is nights out on his balcony, staring at the city lights together. I want to be in his passenger seat, talking about the things we’d never normally share. I want to burn vegetables because we’re so lost in each other, so absorbed in the moment, we forget about everything else.
Most of all, I want whatever the start of this is between us.
Even if it does have to remain platonic.
“Can we at least promise not to go back to how things were in the beginning? I like this version of you,” I say, my voice soft.
He looks right into my eyes, his expression so sincere and believable that it makes me want to trust every single word he says. “I’m not going anywhere, not like that.”
Pushing off the counter, his arms flex with the action in a way that I very much can appreciate. In a totally platonic sort of way, of course.
This is going to be harder than it sounds.
“Since a third of dinner is already off to a very burnt start, how about we ditch that whole idea?”
“Let me guess. Containers of chicken and rice now?”
“I just got a shipment of them in last night. I’ve got something else in mind though.” He nods toward his front door, making it clear the solution lies somewhere outside these four walls.
And honestly, leaving feels like the only right move.
Because whatever this is between us, we can’t be trusted with it in private anymore.
Forty minutes and a god-awful amount of traffic later, we arrive in a quiet neighborhood that looks like something out of a postcard.
House after house made of brick lines the streets, green trees dotting the scene with vibrant pops of color from flowers and plants.
The entire drive here, Theo was secretive about where we were going, only assuring me not to worry, because the food will be great.
This part of town appears to be more residential than city restaurants, which throws me for a loop.
We park, and he leads the way down the street, stopping in front of a tall brownstone with a staircase leading up to its entrance.
Suddenly, I know where we are.
His parents’ home. The one in the picture.