37. Charlotte
The gala was incredible.
Truthfully, I hadn’t been expecting much given the fact this was a small town. I was wrong; Rosehaven went all out. This was clearly the big event of the year. I don’t know how I suddenly got the confidence to ask Elijah to dance, but it just felt right. We had been exchanging stolen touches throughout the night so far, but I didn’t feel like hiding them anymore. I was more than happy to be seen by his side that night. I could feel his nerves when we first started dancing, but we seemed to settle into a rhythm.
His touch was warm and I couldn’t help but study every feature of his face. Nobody would deny that Elijah was attractive, but the way his features softened when he looked at me made my stomach drop. It felt like he was showing me parts of him that were a secret, that I was the only one he was letting in. He made me feel special.
I tried to rationalise in my brain that all of this was fake, that he was putting on a show in case Adam was watching. I’d looked everywhere since we got here and there was no sign of Adam—except a tense moment when I caught Daniel staring at us dancing. Truthfully, though, none of this felt fake. Every moment with Elijah felt completely natural, that this was just a real date.
When he grabbed my hand or touched my leg, it didn’t feel like he was overthinking it. It felt like he was doing it because he wanted to. I knew I was reciprocating because I wanted to, not because I felt like I had to. After a short break, I found myself back on the dance floor with Lucas. You could definitely tell Lucas was the youngest child by the way he behaved, always teasing and laughing.
“I hope my brother is being the perfect gentleman for you?” he asked as he spun me around.
“He is.” I looked over at Elijah, watching us. “He is the perfect gentleman.” My eyes met with Lucas again and he smiled widely at me. He bit his lip and I could tell there was something he wanted to say.
“He’s been a lot happier since you came to town, you know?” He continued dancing independently as he spoke. The classical music had seemingly turned into a DJ set in the latter half of the evening. “He really cares about you.” Lucas kept side eyeing his brother, as if worried we would be overhead.
“I really care about him, too.” Lucas smiled, looking relieved to have gotten that off of his chest as we continued to dance. I felt a sense of relieve admitting that, too.
Before long, Alice and Elijah wandered over to the join us on the dance floor, Elijah taking his place next to me. I don’t know how long we all danced together, but it felt like it was going too quickly. I wanted to live in this moment for hours, to be with these people for hours. My people. I was happy here, I was safe. What I enjoyed the most about the evening was just getting to sit and talk to Elijah, to get to know him better. No topic seemed to be off limits between us. I was disappointed when we had to leave, I didn’t feel ready to go. We walked side by side as we went outside to wait for a cab. We were facing each other and I felt this desire to reach out to him, but I held back.
“I had the best time tonight; I genuinely don’t remember the last time I had that much fun.”
“Me, too,” he responded. “I actually don’t think I’ve ever had that much fun.” His words made my heart soar, it was nice to be on the same page.
“Is it bad I am already excited about next year?” I felt like the question was slightly lame and was worried he would find it needy. Before I could speak again, his hands were on my face and his lips were on mine. I felt myself melt into the kiss. He moved one of his hands to my hips, gripping me tightly. It took me by surprise, but my mouth was soon following his. We stayed locked for a moment before he pulled away and looked behind me. I swung my head round to see what he was looking at and noticed Adam in the other side of the car park.
My heart sank for brief moment. I thought he had been kissing me because he wanted to. Now I realised it was part of the show. Because that’s all that this is, a show. We both watched as Adam turned and stormed away. I couldn’t bring myself to meet Elijah’s gaze again.
I felt foolish for even thinking he wanted me in that way.
“I can’t believe he would even show up here,” Elijah said, shaking his head. Despite the fact we had pulled apart, his hand still lingered on my hip, causing me to shiver. “Are you cold?” He immediately started taking his jacket off and handed it to me. My brain was spinning all over the place as I put his jacket on. One minute I thought he was just doing this to keep Adam away and the next minute I felt like he was doing this because he wanted to. I was struggling to figure out where I stood. Maybe the situation was just too messy for us to move onto anything more. After I put the jacket on, he pulled me into him to keep me warm. Despite my mental turmoil, I didn’t fight it. When this night ended, we were likely no longer going to be fake dating anymore and these moments of closeness would cease to exist. I could still taste him on my lips as I leaned my head into the chest. I heard the cab pull up moments later and went to move away, but he still held onto me.
“Elijah, the cab’s here,” I said, looking up at him.
“I know, I just wanted to hold you close for another minute before this is all over.” There was a sadness in his tone as he relented and let go of me. He opened the door for me to enter the cab. I couldn’t help thinking, if neither of us wanted this to end, where did we go from here?