Chapter 16
ALEXA
Down below, Nolan’s vineyard grew bigger and bigger, and I squirmed in my seat. I hadn’t wanted to come, not after his last message, but Chase and Jay both told me not to be a chicken and chartered a helicopter.
I’d replied to the “Ruffles?” message with three question marks, and Nolan had sent me a picture of Marielle dressed like a Gold Rush-era hooker.
Was he mad? Hard to tell, so I’d played it sort of safe.
Me
OMG, I love it! Great shoes
Nolan
Well, she does like to be the center of attention.
Huh. I still wasn’t sure if he was angry, but the first message suggested he’d guessed at my involvement. Chase looked over my shoulder.
“Just own it,” he’d said.
“What if Nolan’s fishing? What if he’s trying to trick me into a confession?”
“Granted, I don’t know him the way you do, but he doesn’t strike me as that kind of guy. Nolan’s straightforward. And I’m also not convinced he’s even involved with Marielle, not that way.”
“He was at a party with her last night. The party where she accepted the invite for both of them.”
“I’m just saying.”
“What are you just saying?”
“That he doesn’t look at her the way a man would look at the love of their life.”
“And how is that, exactly?”
“The way Cole looks at Jezebel. The way Marcel looks at Bottega Veneta boots. The way Dusk looks at that hot movie star she used to date before she changes the channel.”
I wanted to believe Chase, I did. But I’d suffered too many disappointments to snatch at his thread of optimism. And whatever, I wanted Marielle out of Nolan’s life. Spending time around a narcissist never left anyone with a happy ending.
Which was why I was currently sitting on the helicopter, my head resting against the vibrating window in the hope it might unscramble my thoughts before we landed.
Because Nolan’s last message had sent me into a tailspin.
It had dropped into my inbox this morning, after I told him we’d be arriving at lunchtime.
One line of “gotcha.”
Nolan
Do you want one room or two?
How did he know? Why would he even suspect Chase and I weren’t a couple? Chase had played his part perfectly, the way he always did.
I hadn’t answered Nolan, obviously.
But I had no idea what to say to him when we landed.
* * *
The chickens ran into their shed, and Nolan walked out of the house followed by Juno as the helicopter settled onto the dirt. The dog hadn’t shown any signs of being vicious, but I still wasn’t getting out while she was that close. Not until Chase picked me up and dumped me onto the ground, anyway.
“Hey!”
“The dog’s just sitting there. If she was dangerous, I’d throw myself into the path of snapping teeth, don’t worry.” Chase picked up two of our bags. “You should try petting her.”
“Ugh, no.”
“You didn’t reply to my message,” Nolan said. “Again.”
“I was busy.”
“No, you weren’t.” Chase flashed him a smile. “Hello, hot stuff.”
Asshole.
Nolan folded his arms. Uh-oh.
“You said Marielle liked being the centre of attention, so what’s the problem?”
“I meant the ‘one room or two’ question.”
Fuck.
“Two,” Chase said.
I gasped. “Traitor! I should fire you for that.”
“You won’t fire me; you adore me. And it’s time to stop skating around the painfully obvious truth that you like Nolan and he likes you. If you need me, I’ll be upstairs checking out Grindr.”
Chase sauntered off, leaving me with Nolan, the dog, a dozen chickens, and a tornado of nausea swirling in my stomach. If I wished hard enough, maybe the ground would open up and swallow me?
“How far are we from the San Andreas Fault?” I asked.
Nolan sucked in a breath. “Not far enough.”
We stared at each other, our gazes locked.
My pulse began racing, and I dug my nails into my palms until they hurt.
What was I supposed to say? In the end, nothing—I shrieked instead when something wet touched my hand.
Nolan caught me as I leapt into his arms, and I glared down at the dog who’d snuck up on me.
“She knows you’re nervous,” Nolan said. “She’s just checking you’re okay.”
Damn Chase for putting me in this position.
“Do I look as if I’m having fun here?” I snapped.
“No, but I am.”
“I hate you.”
“Apparently, you don’t.”
“Chase talks bullshit. Don’t listen to a word he says.”
“No, he doesn’t.” Nolan’s chest rose and fell as he took a deep breath. “He was right about me liking you.”
“Well, great, we’re friends again. Super.”
“No, Alexa. I like you. Fuck knows why,” he added under his breath as I stiffened in his arms.
“Oh.” Oh? Couldn’t I come up with anything better than “oh”? “I don’t really know what to say.”
“There’s a first time for everything, I guess.”
Nolan began walking toward the house, and I hung on tighter, slightly dizzy as my world spun on its axis.
“Where are we going?”
“I’m going to make you lunch, and then we’re going to talk.”
“Or I could just get back on the helicopter?”
“No.”
Double fuck.
In the kitchen, Nolan deposited me onto a stool and headed for the refrigerator. The dog plunked herself onto an oversized cushion, no doubt pleased with herself for scaring me. Wasn’t that what German shepherds were bred to do? Scare people?
“You want water?” Nolan asked. “Juice?”
“How about vodka?”
“Don’t be a little heathen. You’re in wine country now.”
“Fine, then I’ll have wine.”
“Sure, with dinner.” He poured me a glass of club soda, another preference he’d remembered. “We should stay sober for this part.”
“Why are you being like this?”
“Like what?”
Confident. Assertive. Right now, he sounded more like Priest than Nolan.
“Pushy.”
“Because I’m this far”—he pinched his thumb and forefinger together—“from the end of my tether, and I don’t have time to play games.
I already got distracted and lost one tank of wine.
The destemmer broke at a critical time. I wasted an evening at a party where Marielle kept complaining that her corset was pinching.
This morning, a nail went through my tyre, and I’m too tired to keep playing ‘what does Alexa want now?’” He pulled flatbreads, yoghurt, salad, and a tub of falafel out of the refrigerator.
It was me who’d introduced him to the joys of Middle Eastern food.
“Every other word that comes out of your mouth is a lie, and I’m getting whiplash from all the U-turns.
Then I find out Chase is gay?” Nolan gave a hollow laugh. “Damn, Alexa.”
“Who told you?”
“Forget it. I’m not setting him up as your next target for petty revenge.”
“Him? So it was Brax, then.”
“Why would you lie about that? Why?”
I shrugged.
“No more bullshit.”
I didn’t much like the new, bossy Nolan, but at the same time, it was also weirdly…hot? Alarm bells began ringing. Okay, yes, I’d had a crush on him when I was a teenager, but that was because he was kind and gentle, not whatever this was.
“Fine. I don’t like Marielle, and I didn’t want the both of you to think I was a loser because I’m unlovable.”
“You shared a fucking bed with him.”
“So? He doesn’t snore, and why do you even care? You said you liked me, but you’re with Ms. Gullible-in-Ruffles, which is a big ol’ conflict of interest.”
“I’m not in a relationship with Marielle.”
I swallowed down my next lot of bitching.
“What?”
“I let you think I was because I was still angry you lied to me about your age, and I also didn’t want you to think I was an unlovable loser.”
“Oh.”
Nolan spread yoghurt on the flatbreads and added the salad, then tossed balls of falafel into an air fryer on the counter.
“Do you want tomato in this? If so, I’ll have to go and pick one.”
I didn’t care about the tomato, but I did need breathing space. “Tomato sounds good.”
Nolan disappeared out the back door, and I soon realised my mistake when the dog got up to follow, but then stopped right beside me instead of heading outside. I froze.
“Good dog. Just stay there, okay? Don’t move. Please?”
She began salivating.
“I’m not lunch. I probably taste really shitty. Like…like durian fruit, or fermented herring, or candy corn. How about I buy you a steak? A nice filet mignon? Rare, definitely rare. You look like the kind of dog who’d enjoy gnawing on raw flesh.”
“You still hate candy corn, huh?” Nolan said, reappearing behind me. “She only wants a snack.” He reached past me and fished a bone-shaped treat out of a cookie jar on the table, then tossed it to Juno. She caught it with a loud snap and began crunching. “See?”
“I see her teeth.”
“She won’t bite you, I swear.” He scratched the dog’s head. “She showed up outside the gates when she was a puppy, and one of the neighbours said she’d been thrown from a car."
“Did they get the licence plate?”
Nolan shook his head. “Nope. I asked around in case she was stolen, but nobody ever did come forward to claim her. Plus she was walking funny, so I took her to the veterinarian, and it turned out she had a broken leg.”
“That sucks.”
“I got the better end of the deal.” He picked up another treat. “Give her this.”
“I like my fingers, thanks.”
“Just try.”
Gingerly, I held out the treat, and Juno took it without so much as touching me. Huh. Then she drooled on my leg.
“Ick.”
Nolan laughed and wiped away the gloop with the bottom of his T-shirt, giving me a glimpse of tanned abs he definitely hadn’t had in Virginia.
“Okay, where were we?” He pulled a knife from the block and began chopping a couple of ripe tomatoes.
“We were both bitching about being lonely and unlovable.”
“Right. And I was bellyaching about your lies.”
“I didn’t actually tell you I was dating Chase. You assumed.”
“Can’t we just agree to be open and honest with each other? No more evasiveness, no more stonewalling? Yeah, I get that we both have pasts we don’t like to talk about, but there are times when I think you bend the truth out of habit.”
I shrugged again.
“Why do you do it?” he asked.
“Because knowledge is power,” I muttered. “And I hate that people might have leverage over me.”