Chapter 13
13
“ N o.” Simon immediately shut Carlisle down when she asked to see the inside of his house. Another gut reaction that he should be changing. He backed up. “I mean you could, but . . .”
“Is it full of red flags?” she pressed.
It was a question he didn’t want to answer, but it was interesting. Red flags were generally reserved for someone you would date. Should he ask? Then again, he had to admit, “Probably.” Though he didn’t know quite what those would be. She already knew he was fixing the place up.
“What kind of red flags?”
“I don't really have any furniture.” He shrugged.
“Did you live in your apartment without furniture?” She seemed confused by his answer.
“It came furnished. So I have bedsheets and my books and . . .” He tried to think what else he’d bought for the place. But he hadn’t intended to be there long.
“Oh, that makes sense. You've been here for what? Two and a half weeks?”
“Almost a month.” Simon tilted his head at her realizing she'd either missed when her neighbor had moved in next door or she wasn't counting correctly. “Then again, I guess I did come with very little fanfare.”
“That’s right. There was no big truck.”
No friends or movers to help, Simon realized. He'd had none of that. In fact, his only real housewarming gifts had come from his mother and the real estate agent.
“Are you not getting furniture?” Carlisle pushed, clearly finding it a little odd that he would be there that long without it.
“I do have a bed and the table.” He paused. “I have a shower curtain.”
She laughed at him, hopefully a good sign as she pointed out, “You have a grill.”
It had been one indulgence, one housewarming present to himself. “I also have all the pots and pans and kitchen supplies that my mother gave me before moving out. She insisted that I could live without a couch but not without decent food. I think she was worried I would only eat takeout.”
Carlisle looked at him a little askance, but Simon couldn't figure out what it meant so he didn't try. “Your place is great, though.”
“Half of it,” she offered as a correction. “I did the rec room first. Then my bedroom.”
He wanted to see it, but kept his mouth shut. He didn’t want to sound pervy and he didn't want to see it just because it was the bedroom. He wanted to see what color she picked for her most private space.
“I did the bathroom next. Then I got inspired and did the dining room.”
“I like it,” he told her. They sat down at a table big enough to seat her family—or so he expected—painted in a soft dove gray and surrounded by pretty matching chairs. The walls were a darker blue color with a simple but elegant lined wallpaper above the chair rail and wainscoting. He had to ask if she’d done the work herself.
“I got a wild hair and just had to have it.”
The room had no doors, but archways leading into the kitchen and to the living room. He wondered if the kitchen was up next. Though it looked like it definitely needed an update, he was petrified she would say no, she liked it and was going to leave it the way it was . He didn’t dare ask.
Carlisle had looked around with him, as if inspecting her own work. But then her entire expression changed, and she admitted, “Then I had the accident.”
“That changed how you wanted to do your house?”
“No, but it changed everything. I kind of quit. I haven’t done anything else with the place since then.”
That was tough. He hadn’t realized just how much her near-death experience had changed her. After realizing she was the one he’d seen on the news, he’d gotten curious and pulled a few stories. Though he knew it wouldn’t be the whole truth, it would at least give him a starting place, maybe hot button topics to avoid, ways to not put his foot in his mouth with this woman he liked so much.
The stories had sensationalized the accident—or so he’d thought. Maybe it was as traumatic as they’d said. She’d gone into the water and been trapped. Her seatbelt had done its job and locked on impact. The doors and windows wouldn’t open, and she couldn’t escape.
Reporters said, “The young woman knew to try to get out through her trunk, but she wasn’t able to get out of the front seat.” Then they’d commented how she was locked in and scared for her life. Maybe the terror wasn’t just them talking it up.
Carlisle—according to the stories—had emptied the two-liter bottles of punch she’d been bringing for her niece’s party. Then she’d recapped them full of air and breathed from them after the car had filled with water. She’d apparently had no idea if help was coming or not.
Help had come in the form of Ever Halifax. From what Simon had seen, the news stories had blown her life apart. Outing her and making it impossible for her to work. She’d done a good deed and paid for it. Carlisle had mentioned it more than once. But she and Ever were friends now.
Simon realized he was seeing the “after” version of Carlisle and he wondered what the “before” Carlisle might have been like.
“How are you sleeping?” Since she’d brought up the accident and how it had changed her, he went ahead and decided he could ask. Plus, she hadn't woken him up on any of the previous nights.
“A little better, but . . .” She paused again, both of them a little on edge about what they might reveal and what they might not.
Maybe he could tell her everything. She seemed almost as damaged as he was. He wasn’t there yet. He pushed a little, wondering if she would follow. “But?”
“I shifted my sleep schedule around. I don't want to wake the neighbors up at night.”
She shouldn’t . “Trust me, the number of times I've been woken up in the middle of the night by something that required my immediate attention is too high. You aren't even close.”
Looking at him as if she couldn’t quite make heads or tails of that, she added, “There are other neighbors too. And I have no idea if they heard me before you moved in?—”
“None of them showed up on your doorstep in their underwear and a coat?” He shouldn’t have said that! At least she laughed, her grin bright and her cheeks round. She was beautiful, and when her eyes shone it pushed a button in him, one he hadn’t felt trigger in a long time.
“No, they didn’t. But I wish they would have! I’d rather know if I was bothering people. ”
“You think it's getting better?”
“I do.” Then she added, “I hope so,” as if she didn’t quite want to commit.
When that put a pause into the conversation, he decided to change the subject. “I scraped the popcorn ceiling the other day.”
Her eyes grew wide. “All of it?”
“You look like you know what I’m talking about.”
“Oh, yes. Do you recognize my ceilings?”
Why would he recognize her ceilings?
Catching onto his confusion she added, “I'm assuming that you're still following Emma Kate.”
“Oh my God!” He did recognize her ceilings! Looking up, he stood from his seat and walked around the living room. “Did you have it in the whole house?”
“Every damn inch.”
“Me too. I guess that makes sense. The houses must have been built all together.”
The video he'd watched about how to remove his own popcorn ceiling had been filmed in this house. He remembered a detail. “You had different glitter in yours?”
“Small glitter.” She nodded. “Which was why Emma Kate knew to talk about the glitters: because we had to research it. Mine was just on the edge but luckily too late for the asbestos craze.”
“I remember her pointing that out in the video.” He came back to the table and sat down and laughed.
Carlisle had told him not to bring anything for dinner, but he couldn't help it. He’d arrived with a bottle of wine. Though they'd put down their forks quite a while ago, both of them had refilled their one glass with a half pour. That was enough. No one was finishing the bottle here.
He liked that about her. She seemed to understand that it might not be the best thing. He was still getting used to the idea that he could drink. That he wouldn’t get called away at a moment’s notice and regret if he wasn’t fully sober.
“We should really change the bandage on your stitches.” Her words ruined his peace.
He didn't want this. He didn't want her looking and being reminded of what an idiot he was. Didn't want her seeing that he'd been changing it himself—just like he’d told her he would—and poorly. She’d probably seen this in her job, but it sure wasn't sexy.
“Not yet,” he protested softly.
“Fine. So tell me,” she leaned over, elbows on the table, arms crossed. This time she looked interested in whatever she was asking. “Why the old house? No furniture, but a very expensive sports car.”
There it was. The tone she’d had about the car before. At least she was flat out asking and he was willing to answer. But her reaction to his answer would tell him everything.