Chapter Thirty-Two #2
We’re both watching for him. “My vote is making sure he doesn’t get anything he wants.”
“So no attention, no audience.”
I jerk my head behind us, and we melt into the stacks. We’ll see Niles when he comes out, but he’ll have to look pretty hard for us.
It’s not long before he emerges. Tally heads straight toward one of the tables to coo over a tea basket, Niles following at a stiff march, head on a swivel. “He’s looking for you.”
She shakes her head. “No, for us. The idea of us is torturing him.”
Same, buddy.
Several minutes go by, and while we watch for any guests who might want help, I’m watching Niles too. When Tally starts browsing a table displaying jewelry, he draws her away, moving toward the bookshelves.
“Retreat?” Ruby asks.
We do, moving down the row until we reach a break and step behind the shelves, putting us at the back of the children’s section.
“I’m not avoiding him,” Ruby says.
“I know. You’re depriving him of an audience.”
But when we lean our heads around opposite sides of the bookshelf to check on the boutique, we both laugh.
It only takes a couple of minutes before Niles is outside of the main boutique area and near the front of the children’s shelves, close enough for us to hear his conversation with Tally even if we weren’t eavesdropping. But we are.
“Why does it matter, honey?” Tally asks.
“Because she always said there was nothing going on with them, and she acted like I was crazy for bringing it up.”
“It only matters if you still care,” Tally says. “Do you? Coming here is weird, and I should have said no.”
Ruby gives me a look that suggests she’s impressed with Tally’s backbone here.
I’d be more impressed if she’d shown it by refusing to come at all, but fine. Tally gets a half point.
“You saw how she is,” Niles says. “All high and mighty like she’s a saint for working in the public library. That’s how she was when I broke up with her too.”
Ruby takes a step out, like she’s about to correct the record, but I grab her arm and hold her in place. “Not worth it,” I whisper. I let go when she nods.
“She acted like I was somehow missing out by dumping her because her friends are better and her family is better.” Niles snorts.
“Yeah, right. Every single person in her life that’s not me is loud and fricking obnoxious.
And now that it’s obvious she was lying the whole time and hooking up with that loser, I’m—”
I miss the next part because I have to grab Ruby again, this time pulling her against me, arms wrapping all the way around her to keep her in place, her back to my chest. “Don’t give him the satisfaction.”
She’s straining against me, but I keep my hold and say quietly, “Breathe. If you run out there mad, he’ll win.”
Ruby stops struggling, but her fists are clenched and she’s breathing hard. Meanwhile, Tally’s voice is closer.
“Why does that mean we have to stalk them in the library? I want to leave.”
They’ve reached the edge of the bookshelves, and it’s easy to hear the distraction in Niles’s answer.
“I’m going to give her a chance to confess how many other times this happened, then we’re out of here.”
Tally starts to put up an argument, but Ruby tenses to lunge again. I turn her to look at me, keeping my hands on her upper arms.
“You know nothing you say will ever convince him, right?”
She glares up at me. “It’s not fair.”
“It’s not, but he has to believe it, or he’ll have to admit that you dumped him for being Niles.”
She doesn’t smile or relax, and I feel her indignation burning against my palms. I realize how this would look to anyone else who saw us right this second.
It gives me an idea, but I hesitate. Would I be offering because I want to help or to get what I want?
Because if it’s the latter, it would be the most dirtbag way to go about it.
The shimmer of gathering tears she can’t hide when we’re this close decides it for me.
This is a specific kind of Ruby tear, the kind she only sheds when she’s furious but feeling helpless to do anything about it.
The last time I saw them was when we went to a library board meeting where the members voted to reduce the funding for a program she’d advocated for.
I couldn’t do anything about that, but I can do something about this.
“Ruby,” I say, squeezing her arms lightly, “do you want to change his mind or punish him for saying it?”
“Punish him.” She doesn’t hesitate, and I smile. That’s my girl, all right.
“I figured. How would you feel about letting him catch us in a kiss? The kind that’ll keep him up at night?”
Her eyes widen, the tears disappearing with a startled blink.
“You don’t have to,” I tell her. “I’m not trying to be creepy.”
“I know.” She looks offended that I’ve explained myself. “But are you . . . I mean, will it . . .”
“I’ll be fine.” I won’t be, but I wasn’t going to be, anyway. “I’ll think of it as a goodbye kiss to my Ruby romance era.”
“But I don’t want to—”
“Niles, this is ridiculous,” Tally says, her voice rising. Not loud enough to be heard by the tea guests, but definitely by us. “I can’t believe I bought into your whole act of coming here to show there’s no hard feelings. This is a revenge plot.”
“Tally, calm down,” Niles says, his voice moving closer.
Ruby looks at me, nods once, and hooks her fingers in my belt loops with an insistent tug.
I slide my hands from her arms to wrap around her, pressing her toward me as our mouths meet.
I am always gentle with Ruby. I am sometimes playful with Ruby.
I’m neither of those things now.
This isn’t gentle or playful. It’s scorching.
The reaction when our lips touch burns every cogent thought out of my head. Where we are, why we’re doing this.
I’m breathing her in through every pore.
I can’t hear anything over the rush of blood in my ears except the hitch of her breath, her lips parting beneath mine.
I take the invitation and deepen the kiss.
She lets go of a belt loop to tangle her fingers in the hair at my nape.
I can’t tell if she’s using the leverage to pull herself up or press me closer, but yes, this—this I want. Her, I want.
The taste of her is a revelation and no surprise at all. Complex honey. Rich sweetness I want to explore forever in this silk glide.
She gives a tiny gasp, and I start to draw back, but her hand in my hair tightens to keep me close. She makes a sound of distress until I take the kiss deep again, and she rewards me with the soft moan she saves for expensive chocolate.
Her other hand slides up to my chest and presses as she pivots us until my back is against the end of the shelves. I give a split second of thanks for the height of her heels that made it possible.
I drag my lips from hers but only to murmur, “More,” as I brush them against the soft skin of her cheek. Her hand trails from my hair to my face, framing it to encourage the exploration with her palm against my jaw, her thumb pressing lightly beneath my cheekbone in a silent command to keep going.
She arches into me, and it causes her to take a small step backward for balance, but I’ve got her. I won’t let her fall.
“So this is why you broke up with me.”
Ruby gasps at the sound of Niles’s voice. I let her go as she spins to face him.
He looks like the guy who gets to tell his doctor “I told you so” because he’s right about being sick with something bad.
I feel sick too as the full weight of what I’ve done looms over me, and I can sense the force of the crash that will come.
I kissed Ruby. I kissed her, and I will never stop paying for it.