Chapter 30 #3
I hold her gaze, and there are things I don’t discuss outside this house, professional lines I keep without having to think about it, but she’s looking at me with something that isn’t only surprise.
I find I don’t want to be clinical with her right now, so I nod once.
She starts to nod, too, and I realize she’s doing the same thing I just did, finding the thread that connects things. Her scent has been faintly in Tessa’s room, something I hadn’t thought about. I hadn’t let myself think about it.
My gaze travels from Derek to Lennon’s hand still wrapped in his sleeve.
She follows my movement and lets go.
“Tessa is my best friend,” she starts, and I can hear her shifting into the ramble. “And this is Derek, who is her—”
“I know Derek.” I produce a smile from somewhere and extend my hand. “Hey.”
Derek takes it, his grip steady, his eyes moving between us with the attentiveness of a man who has walked into a room where the air has a history he wasn’t briefed on. “Paul.”
Lennon looks between us. “You know each other?”
“Small town,” I say.
“It is,” Derek agrees.
She looks between us, and I can see her brain working through it. “We wanted to visit Tessa.”
“Right. Now might not be the best time. Her doctor is coming by soon.”
“Oh.” Her expression dims. “Okay.”
Derek clears his throat. “I’ll call Melanie’s grandparents. Tell them I can take her after all.” He steps back out onto the front step, phone already coming out of his pocket, and pulls the door mostly closed behind him.
The hallway settles, our eyes locked on each other. I’m aware that I have approximately thirty seconds before one of us says something that determines the next several days, and I would very much like it to be the right thing.
I open my mouth.
“I’m sorry,” she blurts while her cheeks turn pink. “I’ve been pushing you away.”
“You have,” I agree.
“I got scared.”
“I thought you might.”
She exhales through her nose. “You thought…” She stops. “Of course, you did.”
“I’m a psychologist. Pattern recognition is something of a professional hazard.”
The corner of her mouth moves, almost against her will. “That’s very annoying.”
“I know.”
“I’m still sorry.”
“Don’t be.” I take a breath. “I moved too fast. I know I did. I pushed past several lines I’d set for myself because apparently my self-control has a very specific weakness, and I’d rather have named it than pretended otherwise.”
She looks up at me. “You’re naming me as a weakness.”
“Comprehensively, yes.”
Her face does the thing it does—that small, private negotiation, the one where she’s deciding whether to let herself have something. I’ve watched her do it enough times now that I know to wait, not fill the silence, and let her arrive at it herself.
She takes one step toward me.
I meet her halfway anyway, take her hand, and she comes easily, which is the only data point that matters right now.
I look down at her face and think about two days of silence, her voice at the ceiling and in the mirrors, and that she said she teaches someone lucid dreaming, but I don’t care about all of it, thanks to the relief of her standing here in front of me with her hand in mine.
“This feels weird,” she whispers.
“Doesn’t have to be,” I say quietly. “We can start over. Right here.”
She considers this. “Right here in Nora Vaughn’s hallway.”
“It’s as good a place as any.”
Her mouth curves fully. “You have very low standards for romantic settings.”
“I have very high standards for everything else.” I turn her hand over in mine, press my thumb to her palm, feeling the last of the rough skin that’s almost healed now. “I can wait for you. However long, even if I’d love to ask you to spend your day with me right now.”
She looks down at our hands, then back up at me, and opens her mouth.
“Nevan,” she says. “You know Nevan, right?”
I grind my back teeth together for exactly one second. Let the flash of jealousy move through me and out. “I vaguely remember him,” I say with a smile I mean about half of.
“His birthday is tomorrow, and I have a lot of baking to do, and work tonight, so today is essentially a write-off, but there’s a party at the inn tomorrow. Birthday slash Halloween.” She turns my hand in hers, not quite fidgeting. “And I thought maybe you’d want to come.”
“A Halloween party.”
“It’s not just Nevan’s friends. I mean, it won’t only be young people.
I made sure it’s open to the guests of the inn, too, so we won’t be the oldest there, and there will be food.
I mean, I’m doing the food. I was thinking a proper spread, cakes and finger food, and all of it, but I’d make sure to include something for you if you come and…
” She stops herself and looks up at me. “Sorry. I’m doing the thing. ”
“I know.” I smile. “I don’t mind the thing.”
She holds my gaze for a beat, looking uncertain.
“I’d love to come. Are you asking me as your date?”
Her cheeks go even pinker. “I’m asking you as my…” She pauses, working through it. “As the person I’d like to see there.”
“That’s a date, darling.”
“It might be a date.”
“It’s a date.” I bring my free hand up and let my thumb trace the line of her cheekbone, just once, watching her eyes go soft. “I’ll be there.”