Chapter 11 Scandalized
Bailey
“More blueberries? Really, Bailey?” Mom’s voice has that particular edge to it. The one that sounds like a question but absolutely isn’t.
I freeze with my hand over the bowl. “I was—”
“It’s just that you’ve already had quite a bit.” She smiles, but it doesn’t reach her eyes. “Fruit has so much sugar, you know. Natural sugar, but still.”
I set the serving spoon down, my appetite evaporating.
Dad doesn’t look up from his phone. He never does during these little moments. It’s easier for him to pretend they aren’t happening.
Hunter’s declined coming to lunch with my parents. Smart.
I push a strawberry around my plate with my fork. It’s fruit. It’s literally one of the healthiest things I could eat. But that doesn’t matter. It never matters with Mom. There’s always something—too much of this, not enough of that, have you considered trying . . .
“Oh, honey, is that a banana you packed for the drive?” Mom’s gaze lands on my purse where the yellow curve peeks out from the side pocket. “Those are basically sugar sticks. You might want to grab some almonds instead. Protein, you know.”
“Right.” My voice comes out flat. “Thanks.”
She beams like she’s done me a tremendous favor. Like she’s the helpful mother looking out for her daughter’s best interests, not the woman who’s been monitoring my food intake since I was a kid.
“We just worry about you, sweetie. All alone in the city, all that takeout and restaurant food. It’s so easy to let things slip when you don’t have anyone keeping you accountable.”
I nod. Smile. Play the role I’ve perfected over the years.
Inside, I’m counting down the minutes until I can get in my car and drive away from this house, this town, this suffocating concern that feels like anything but.
“I should probably get going soon,” I say, standing to clear my plate. “Traffic on Sunday afternoons, you know.”
“Of course, of course.” Mom stands too, already moving toward the cabinet where she keeps the containers. “Let me pack you some of the salad for later. And maybe some of that grilled chicken—lean protein is so important.”
I let her fuss. Let her pack her carefully portioned containers of approved foods. Let her pretend this is love.
Twenty minutes later, I’m in my car with a backseat full of food I’ll probably throw away, pointing myself toward the city and the apartment where no one comments on my blueberries.
Where no one calls bananas sugar sticks.
Where I can breathe.
The next afternoon I’m eating a delicious lunch on my work break and reveling in the fact that there’s no one to criticize it when my phone vibrates with a text.
Silas
Whip out your calendar, Bailey Emmaline Price.
You want to bang me out of your system, so let’s do this.
I stare at my phone. He full-named me. In a text. About scheduling sex.
You make me sound so mercenary.
Three dots appear immediately. Of course he was waiting for my response.
Silas
There’s nothing mercenary about the way I’m going to do it.
My stomach does a flip. Damn him and his confidence.
Silas
God you’re so cocky.
Haven’t I earned it? Now come on, when are you free?
He has earned it. That’s the problem.
Silas
Work trip next weekend, then bridal shower for a colleague the next Saturday.
I’ve got an open house that day. And then Sunday Fun Day.
What the hell is Sunday Fun Day?
Come on, Hunter must have told you about our brunches.
He hasn’t. Or if he did, I wasn’t paying attention. I try to remember the last time Hunter talked to me about anything in Here beyond complaining about our parents or the Schaefers.
Silas
Oh right, where you play that game?
Don’t act like you didn’t love Whose Turn is It Anyway? when we were kids.
A memory surfaces—the four of them collapsed in laughter over some ridiculous made-up rules, me watching from the kitchen while Mom was whipping us up some tomato juice that was supposed to increase my metabolism.
Silas
I did. But I’m not really into game nights.
That’s because you’re doing them wrong.
We play with mimosas and waffles.
Hunter’s hosting next week and it’ll be in his backyard.
Sometimes we do it at the summit.
Now you’ve got me off track. When can I come visit? What are you doing during the week?
You want to come on a weekday?
Sure, if you’re free. I wanted to fuck your brains out the whole visit, but if I have to occupy myself while you work, I suppose I can go . . . idk . . . see the Statue of Liberty or something.
What about next Tuesday? I have a meeting Wednesday morning that I can’t skip but I can have my assistant move the rest of the schedule around. I can take the call from my home office.
You have an assistant?
I share her with other VPs, but yeah.
Mmm that’s hot.
I’ll be your personal assistant.
You can boss me around.
You’re ridiculous.
I meet Silas at Penn Station because when I ask him if he can get from the train to my house he says, “There’s a sixty percent chance I’ll get lost,” and honestly, I’ve been looking forward to these orgasms too much to waste time with him wandering around the city.
He spots me coming off the platform and trots over—literally trots, like an overexcited golden retriever—to sweep me into his arms with a kiss that makes my toes curl.
My first thought is oh my god we’re kissing in public and my second is literally no one here knows Silas (or me). The anonymity is freeing in a way I hadn’t expected.
I sink into it, and Silas greedily takes deep draws from my mouth, one hand cupping the back of my head, the other splayed across my lower back.
He tastes like coffee and mint gum. It’s only been ten days since I’ve seen him, but he’s warm and solid and here, and I didn’t realize how much I’d missed him until this exact moment.
By the time he pulls away, he’s pretty much the only thing holding me up.
He’s grinning at me, glasses slightly askew, looking stupidly pleased with himself. “Fucking missed you, temptress.”
“Yeah,” I manage, my brain still offline. “I got that.” I pull back and fix my hair, mussed from his fingers running through it. “Where’s all your stuff?” I ask. He’s just got a backpack.
Silas shrugs. “Don’t need much, do I? Sexfest, remember? I plan to be naked most of the next forty-eight hours.”
“The Statue of Liberty will be scandalized.”
I turn toward the exit and Silas takes my hand, threading his warm fingers through mine like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
It feels weird. Not bad-weird. Just . . . unfamiliar.
When was the last time I held hands with a guy? High school? College? That guy I dated for three months two years ago who turned out to be married?
Oh boy, that’s depressing.
Silas’s thumb strokes across my knuckles—absent, casual, like he’s not even thinking about it. Like we do this all the time.
Like we’re dating.
We’re not dating. This is just sex. Getting it out of our systems, remember?
So why does my chest feel tight?
“I’m not going,” Silas declares. “If it’s okay with you I’ll just chill in your apartment. You won’t even know I’m there. I looked and it’s really, like, a half-day thing and I don’t want to take that much time out.”
I shrug. “Sure.”
We walk the block and a half to the subway under scaffolding and surrounded by the honks of traffic. Silas’s eyes are wide, taking it all in.
“Maybe I should have brought a suitcase to go shopping,” he says as we pass by three shoe stores on the same block.
I rack my brain trying to think of the nearest shoe store to Here. It’s at least an hour. “When was the last time you were in the city?” I ask as we head down into the Herald Square station.
“I think a bunch of us came down when we were seniors.”
“Really? That long?”
He shrugs. “I’m not really a city guy.” There’s a beat of silence. “Or . . . I haven’t been. I could maybe be? People change.”
He’s trying to backtrack. For me? That’s cute.
“I don’t operate under any delusions that you’d move here,” I quickly reassure him.
“What about you? Are you a city girl, never leaving the Big Apple?” he teases.
I hesitate. “I actually thought about moving a few years ago. When my company recommitted to its work-from-home policy. A lot of my colleagues did move, especially the ones that travel a lot. If you’re out of the office more than you’d be in it, it doesn’t make sense to stay, and since most of my colleagues have kids .
. . unless you really love the city, it doesn’t make sense to stay. ”
Our train comes and we board. Silas follows my lead and stands at one of the poles.
“Would you have moved back to Here?”
I can’t help it. My head jerks back in surprise. “No, I would move to the suburbs or something. Somewhere I could still make it in but not so often.”
The train jerks when it leaves the station and Silas loses his balance. He catches himself before he falls onto me and I put a hand on his stomach to steady him. He grins at me and wraps his free arm around my waist, leaning down to kiss me.
When he pulls away, we share this smile that feels different. Like we’re in cahoots together and in our own little bubble. He squeezes me and I lean against him. The next station we pull into he does a better job of balancing himself.
A moment later, he leans down and whispers into my ear. “Don’t look now, but I think that the woman with the Birkin bag has a rat inside it.”
We spend the rest of the trip people-watching and then on the walk to my apartment and the ride in the elevator, Silas quizzes me on how fast I can get to any of the landmarks in New York.
“Central Park?”
“Mmm . . . half an hour, depending on where in the park.”
“Rockefeller Center?”
“Twenty-five minutes. That’s where I work.”
“No shit?”
“It’s not like Thirty Rock.”
I open the door to my apartment and Silas whistles. “This is your place? Wow.”
I get the impression he’s being overly generous. Or he wants to be impressed. My place is pretty small compared to his—a cramped one-bedroom on the fourth floor that unfortunately looks directly out at the building across the street.
My main room is an open galley kitchen with stools at the counter, a decently large couch and a TV, and then at the far side by the window is my office. There’s a nook where my desk sits and a bookshelf opposite it.
To the left is my bedroom, which Silas walks into and sets his backpack on the bed, then comes back out, taking everything in. His eyes linger on my office nook, the bookshelf crammed with business and sci-fi books, the framed photo of me and my college roommates at graduation.
“Where does Hunter sleep when he visits?”
“The couch folds out.”
He eyes the space, and I can see him calculating the logistics. The pullout would basically block the whole room.
“My place is small,” I say, a touch of defensiveness creeping into my voice. “But it’s just me, so why bother with anything bigger?”
“Hey.” Silas crosses to me in two strides and pulls me into his arms. “I like your place. It’s very you.”
“What does that mean?”
“Organized. Efficient. That desk set up by the window is genius—natural light but you’re not staring at a wall.” He grins. “Plus I spotted the Murderbot books on that shelf, so clearly you have excellent taste.”
Despite myself, I laugh. “You noticed the books?”
“I notice everything about you.” He bends down to press a kiss underneath my ear, and it sends a shiver up my spine. “But my favorite thing about your home,” he murmurs against my skin, “is that I’m about to fuck you in it.”