8. Taylor
Taylor
My cell phone buzzes as I’m drying off from a shower.
The personal ringtone makes me hesitate.
Celeste and I have known each other since high school, and we’ve never argued like we did last night.
I’m not in the mood for a repeat of that awful conversation, but knowing her, she won’t give up until I answer.
Tossing the towel on the bed, I grab the device and greet her with a weary, “Hey.”
“Don’t ‘hey’ me,” Celeste hisses, a door closing in the background. “How dare you hang up on me last night?”
“You refused to listen—“
“Because you left the city—the state—without a word,” she throws back, her voice barely above a whisper. “How could you do this to me?”
This is going to be a repeat of last night’s conversation; I can already tell. “I’ll come home after the election, CC.” Fingers crossed. I hope they solve the case of Noel’s mysterious death by then. Even more, I’m praying they don’t find anything that connects us.
“That’s three entire months. What am I going to do without you until then?”
“You could come clean. Tell your parents you’re in love with Malik, not me. Then you can date him as freely as you want.”
Celeste scoffs. “Right. I can see that conversation with my parents turning out so well. ‘Mom, Dad, I’ve been lying to you for the last four months. Taylor and I aren’t dating.
My boyfriend is in a motorcycle club, and he works in a tattoo shop.
And oh—he still lives with his parents. But I promise, he’s the perfect gentleman. ’”
“You won’t know the outcome unless you try.”
“Don’t be a hypocrite, Taylor. I can’t tell my parents for the same reason you were secretly sleeping with men. We have too much to lose.”
My stomach dips at her last words. I’m not so worried about what I could lose. It’s Mom’s career that concerns me. Her main sponsors are televangelists who won’t take the news of my being gay too kindly. “There’s nothing I can do, CC.”
“You can come home.”
“I can’t.” I bite my lip, contemplating how much to tell her. Celeste has been my ride-or-die for seven years. She’s the only person who knows I’m gay. I can trust her with the information, but I’m not sure if I want to burden her with it.
“Please, Taylor… I’m literally begging you. You know I don’t beg.”
Sighing, I open the underwear drawer. “Do you remember Noel Holland?”
“The hedge fund manager?”
“Yes.”
“Don’t tell me that prick has been trying to contact you again.”
“Not even close. A housekeeper found him unresponsive at the Sovereign Suites two weeks ago.”
Celeste gasps. “Oh my God, Taylor. That’s awful.”
“Tell me about it. The fucked up thing is that I was in the area around the same time,” I reply. It was a fundraising event for Mom’s campaign in another hotel half a block away. Close enough to make me nervous about the contents of his phone.
Another gasp from Celeste. “Wait a minute. Is that why you left San Francisco? Do the authorities think you were involved in his death?”
“I don’t know what they think, but I had nothing to do with what happened,” I reply. “Noel liked to keep souvenirs that reminded him of me. Photos, videos, underwear...”
It freaks me out to even imagine the cops getting hold of my DNA. At best, everyone will find out I had an affair with another man—a married man. Worse, they might want to connect me to his death somehow.
“I’m not sure if he destroyed them after we broke up.” After the blogger caught us leaving the secret apartment he’d rented. “Mom thought it would be best if I stayed somewhere remote for a while until things blow over.”
“Jeez, this is crazy,” Celeste mutters as I pull out a pair of boxers and close the drawer. “But now I understand. Don’t worry about Malik and me. I’ll figure out something.”
As I open my mouth to reply, the bedroom door slides open. Roman stands in the doorway, a stack of fresh linen in his hands.
“Sorry, thought you were still in the shower,” he mumbles.
His apology sounds automatic. For one strange, suspended heartbeat, he stares at me.
Celeste’s voice fades in the background as something invisible stretches taut between us.
Roman’s grumpy frown disappears, replaced by an expression I can’t quite decipher.
His dark eyes travel over me— not crudely—but with an intensity that sends heat crawling up my neck.
Something flickers across his face. It softens his usually rigid features, exposing an emotion so naked it steals the air from the room.
Then it’s gone.
Roman blinks hard, as though waking from a dream. “Sorry,” he mutters again, this time sounding genuinely flustered. Without another glance, he spins on his heels, nearly clipping the doorframe with his shoulder, and disappears into the hallway. The bedroom door clicks shut behind him.
“Taylor? Are you there?” Celeste calls.
I return to the phone call, but my gaze keeps going back to the door.
What... was that?