Chapter 41
CHAPTER 41
CHARLOTTE
Whenever I’m alone with him, it’s like he occupies all the space in the room. I can’t see past him or the muscles of his forearms, the handsomeness of his face, or the eyes that rarely leave me.
Like I take up just as much space in return.
Aiden is standing by my bed. It’s still made but rumpled from when I was lying on it.
I look down at my laptop. “I wrote the prologue and a chapter about your college years. I also spoke to one of the Board members and now I’m trying to outline that chapter.”
“Damn.” He sets down one of the giant bottles of mineral water on my nightstand and takes off his shoes. This whole thing feels far more intimate than I initially intended.
I sit down on my bed with my back to the large headboard. He does the same, climbing on beside me.
“Okay,” I say.
“Okay,” he echoes. His voice sounds amused, his hand resting between us on top of the covers. “Hit me with it.”
“I can’t believe you’re not sleepy. You’ve been working since… Did you work out this morning, too?”
“Yes.”
“You’re a machine.”
“I’m not,” he says, and when he says it, I know that he’s tired. He could have picked up the banter baton but he chose not to.
I hesitate, my laptop slightly turned toward him. “We don’t have to do this, Aiden.”
He shakes his head. “I won’t be able to sleep anyway. What have you written?”
“This is an attempt at a gripping first chapter.” I’m nervous about it. It’s prologue-style, opening with what the audience knows well. The day his father was arrested by the FBI, and the lens of an entire business world turned on Aiden and on Titan. When speculations ran through newsreels. “It’s short, and compelling. But it cuts right before you enter the… the courthouse. The next chapter flips back to your early life.”
“Gripping,” he mutters. “All right.”
He shifts my laptop, and I look on as he reads, worrying my lower lip between my teeth.
I can’t take it for long. “Which one are you starting with?”
“Reading early life now,” he says. “This part is… interesting.”
“What part?”
“This part.” He moves the cursor over the third paragraph. Lingers over the sentence where I’ve written about how he attended great schools but didn’t necessarily enjoy his studies. That he is someone who sees merit in knowledge but only if there is a clear purpose to it.
“We’ve never spoken about this,” he says.
“Maybe not. But it’s true. Isn’t it?”
“Yes,” he mutters. He scrolls down, cursor resting over another sentence. “‘ The family structure was ordinary only at surface level.’ We haven’t spoken much about my family.”
“No, but I can’t leave them out, can I?” My voice doesn’t waver. It’s confident, calm, and I meet his gaze.
He doesn’t look away. “You’re forcing my hand.”
“If you won’t tell me anything,” I say, “I’m going to have to make things up. Form my narrative based on inferences, clues, and what I’ve gleaned from the media. The way everyone else has.”
“The way everyone loves to,” he mutters.
I pat the comforter between us. “That’s the thing, Hartman. This book will let you control the narrative for once.”
“It will invite strangers into my life. Into the part I don’t like thinking much about myself.”
He’s close, resting on his elbow. My hand flattens against the comforter. “It can be scary.”
“You’re using a therapy voice, Chaos. That’s what’s scary.”
I roll my eyes. “I’m trying to be supportive.”
“Mm-hmm.” His eyes glance back down again, at the screen. They linger there. “It’s well written,” he says. It’s almost begrudging, his praise. “I like your voice. This might work better as a biography than a memoir.”
“I’m good at my job,” I say, “just like you’re good at yours.”
“Clearly, considering you’ve gotten much further in this process than I ever planned to allow.”
I reach for a pillow and fluff it beneath my head. “Were you really planning on just stringing the poor ghostwriter along for months and then nixing the entire project at the final stage?”
The curve of his lips is entirely unashamed.
“Aiden!”
“All is fair,” he says with a one-shouldered shrug. “I didn’t expect the ghostwriter to be an infuriatingly persistent, interesting, distractingly pretty woman I’d already met.”
“Distractingly pretty?”
He runs his free hand through his hair. “You know exactly how beautiful you are, Charlotte. And you wield it like a sword.”
It takes my brain a few moments to process it. Heat races up my neck and makes my chest too tight. He really does think I’m beautiful.
“That’s a compliment,” I whisper.
Him, with the body shaped like an athlete’s, and with a magnetism that draws everyone in a room to his side.
“Yes. But I won’t apologize.” He closes the lid of the laptop between us. “Tell me about your childhood. Your parents. And I’ll tell you all about mine later.”
He’s surrendering. I can tell. And so I scoot down and turn to face him. It feels like I’m sinking through the mattress, being enveloped by softness on all sides.
“Okay,” I say softly. “My parents are… old school. They’re from a small town outside of Cleveland. My mom is a journalist for the local news station, and my dad teaches high school biology.”
“You’re an only child?”
I nod. “Yes. My parents struggled to have kids. It took them almost six years before I came along.”
“I’m sorry,” he says.
“I was surrounded by good friends in my hometown, instead. We all grew up playing together in our cul-de-sac. That part was pretty idyllic, actually.” My eyelids feel heavy, but I’m not about to stop looking at him. At those light-green eyes resting on me.
“Were you a tomboy?” he asks. “Did you prefer to read, to play indoors?”
“I wanted to be where the action was. My curiosity has always been my downfall.”
“Do you miss your hometown?”
I pick at the edge of the comforter. I miss that it used to be a safe place. It’s not anymore. Everyone knows me, knows of The Gamble . Everyone followed the show when it aired. Little Charlotte Richards on TV.
It’s the one place I’ve permanently lost my anonymity. No change of hair color in the world will save me.
“Charlotte.” Aiden’s voice is quiet. “Did something happen?”
“Yes,” I whisper. “And it makes it hard to go back. Even if I miss seeing my parents and my best friend, Esmé. But a gulf opened up between us, and I can’t seem to bridge it.”
His hand settles on top of mine, resting on the bed in the narrow space between us. Warm skin covers mine entirely. He has a firm grip, and I look at that instead of facing him. Focus on the long fingers and slightly rough knuckles.
“What happened?”
“I’d… rather not talk about that.” I avoid his eyes. It would be his right to remind me of our bargain. To force my hand, and tell me that without revealing my shame, he won’t talk about his.
But he doesn’t do that.
“What are your parents like?” he asks instead.
He’s a better person than I am.
A yawn escapes me. I smother it, curling up closer. “My dad makes the most amazing chocolate chip cookies. When I was a kid, the scent would waft out onto our street, and all my friends would line up at the kitchen window. The batch lasted an hour or two tops.”
“That sounds lovely.” His thumb circles over the back of my wrist.
“Did either of your parents bake?”
“No,” he says quietly. “They didn’t.”
“My mom wasn’t very good at it. But she’s always been a fantastic storyteller.” My eyes drift closed. “In the summers, we would… have BBQs in the backyard. Invite my cousins. And Mom would tell stories while we all roasted marshmallows at the firepit.”
“Like you,” he murmurs.
“Hmm?” I can’t keep my eyes open. He’s warm and smells good, and I feel like I’m floating.
“You’re a storyteller.” His hand is comforting around mine. “Sleep, Chaos. I’ve got you.”