Chapter 37
Note to self:
Never forget the healing power of pie…
and the blabbering power of pie-themed cocktails.
Theo hardly spoke on the drive back to the motel. It was a thoughtful silence, and I guessed after you met the brother you didn’t know existed for the first time, you’d need time to process. But enough was enough.
“We need pie,” I announced. “There’s a place called Pie in the Sky a block from the hotel. Open twenty-four hours.”
“Pie?”
I nodded firmly. “Yes. Pie. You’re thinking too hard right now.”
“I am not.”
“Yes, you are. You’re going to hurt yourself. To pie, my good man.”
We decided to park at the motel and walk. Pie in the Sky was as if a hipster bar and a fifties diner had a baby. The décor was all shiny chrome and red faux leather with black and white squared flooring. There were matching red and chrome booths. But instead of a lunch counter, there was a tall, wooden bar and instead of milkshakes, they served pie-inspired cocktails like apple pie on the rocks or a key lime pie martini.
There was also actual pie. Several tall, spinning, glass display cases with oversize pieces full of crusty, sugary goodness.
“This place is Heaven.” I eyed a slice of lemon meringue pie like it was the new love of my life. “It has to be.”
“Clearly.” Theo placed his hand low on my back and directed me to an open booth in the corner. “I’m going to run to the bathroom.”
“Sure, sure,” I mumbled, head already buried in the menu. The options were endless. I could splurge a little and have a drink or two. I was a lightweight because my anti-seizure meds interacted with alcohol in funny ways, one of them being it metabolized quickly and hit me hard.
A server arrived within seconds, dressed in a modern twist on fifties style with a flirty above-the-knee poodle skirt and a black shirt with off-the-shoulder sleeves. “Hiya, what can I get you?”
“All of it.” I grinned. “But maybe just water until my friend comes back.”
“No problem.”
For a pie-themed bar (or maybe because of) it was a busy place. Most people seemed to land in the thirty to forty age range with some outliers, just for fun. The bar was packed and the two bartenders, dressed as modern-day soda jerks with red suspenders, matching bowtie and no shirts, were likely pulling in some very nice tips.
At the end of the bar sat a guy with dark hair, glasses, a sweater vest and a nice smile, radiating hot professor energy. He made eye contact with me, his smile widened, and he lifted his drink in my direction. I gave him a little nod in what I hoped was polite disinterest and swung my gaze back to our table and the menu.
Yes, the guy was hot, but he had nothing on Theo. I’d take dreamy blue eyes and small, secret smiles all day long.
Several minutes later, a glass slid onto the table.
“A Boston crème pie martini for you.”
I looked at the drink and then the server. “I didn’t order this.”
“Sure didn’t.” She grinned and pointed with the tray in her hand right to Sexy Prof. “He did.”
“Oh, um.” My face heated. “I’m flattered.”
Theo slid across from me into the booth. “Did you order something already?”
“Not exactly.”
The server smirked. “The lady has an admirer. Maybe he didn’t see your boyfriend when you came in.”
“Okay. Wait.” I pointed at Theo. “He’s not…”
Theo crossed his arms and leaned back in the seat.
“I mean, we’re not…”
Smirking, he arched an eyebrow.
“I can’t accept this,” I blurted, pushing the drink toward the server. “Could you tell him thanks but no, thanks.”
“No problem.” She winked at us and whisked the drink away. “I’ll be back to get your orders in a few.”
Face burning, I couldn’t stop myself from mouthing I’m sorry to the guy at the bar.
Theo frowned. “You know, if you’re interested, you could go over there. Us, just being friends and all.” He glanced over at his shoulder. “I mean, he seems like the kind of guy you’d be into.”
“What does that mean?”
“Reminds me of Alec.”
“He does not.”
But my eyes swung back to the Sexy Prof who was now chatting it up with a tall blonde. He did have that slicked-back, put-together, finance bro feel. Less professor if I thought about it, more money talk. Which described Alec a lot. Not when we first started dating, but the longer he’d worked at that job in Dallas, the more he became the suit-and-tie, cocktail-party-attender schmoozer he was today.
Don’t get me wrong. I love a man in a suit. I was looking forward to seeing Theo in his groomsman get-up at the wedding. I liked dressing up for a cocktail party every now and then, not that Two Harts gave many opportunities for that. But all the time? It just wasn’t how I wanted to spend every Friday night.
“Fine.” I sighed. “Maybe he does.”
The server returned. I ordered an apple pie sangria and Theo went with a chocolate cream pie made with vodka, Rum Chata, chocolate liquor, and chocolate syrup. After some deliberation, we decided to split a piece of key lime pie.
“Can I ask you something?” Theo asked after the server left.
“Sure.”
He tilted his head, his eyes fixed on my face. “What did you see in Alec? I never got it, the two of you.”
“Oh.” I swallowed. It was on the tip of my tongue to give a flippant answer about how handsome he was, or how he treated me well, or any number of things. I could admit, at least to myself, that Alec hadn’t been all bad. Sure, he’d broken up with me in an epic asshat move but we’d had good times too.
But I went with the truth instead. “He was safe.”
Theo stayed quiet, waiting me out. Damn him.
“There wasn’t any real chance of us working out. I think some part of me knew that. His life is in Dallas, mine is in Two Harts. Neither one of us wanted to compromise on that. But it was easy too. We liked each other as people. We got along. Relationships have been built on less, you know.” I traced the edge of the table with my thumbnail. “But I guess the real reason he was safe is because I wasn’t ever in any danger of falling in love with him. Not the way a person should love their partner.”
“Why?” Theo’s voice was low, deep, and it rumbled across my skin.
“Mainly because my heart wasn’t mine to begin with.” I raised my head and looked him in the eye. “It’s always belonged to someone else, I guess.”
“Who?” he asked, his eyes soft.
You, dummy. You.
The server arrived with our drinks and the biggest, thickest wedge of pie I’d ever seen. A piece of pie I would be forever grateful for since it saved me from saying something stupid. I’d already made a fool of myself a long time ago over Theo; I wasn’t about to do it again.
Thank God for pie. I should put that on my tombstone, too.
After consuming drink number two—a frozen French silk pie cocktail—and announcing I loved it so much, I wanted to marry it, Theo wisely paid our tab, and we headed back to the hotel. We’d spent two hours not talking about a single serious thing including: 1) my confession about Alec; 2) Theo’s newfound family; or 3) the weird tension between us that had been growing steadily.
Sure, I tried to bring up the scene today at his father’s house, but he wasn’t interested in talking about it. I hoped he opened up about it later. But Theo was also a thinker. Never knew exactly what was going on in his head. Unless you were sixteen, showed up at his dorm room on a random Thursday morning, confessed your undying love, and tried to kiss him.
Then he told you exactly what he thought.
I giggled. I’d put him in an awful predicament, and he’d been kind about it, sweet even. Not that I recognized that at the time. I was a kid; he was in college. I was stalker-level intense about my feelings; he was sensible.
“Maybe this is the alcohol talking,” I announced halfway back to our hotel. “But remember that time I came to your dorm room and told you I was in love with you?”
“I remember, trust me.” His eyes crinkled in the corners.
“I’m sorry I did that. It was a dumb idea.”
“It was definitely memorable.”
“And embarrassing.”
He shrugged, a corner of his mouth inching up. “I don’t know. It was kind of sweet.”
“Sweet?”
“Well, sure. And brave.”
I wrinkled my nose. “I used to be brave.”
“Telling someone you’re in love with them and you’re not sure how they feel takes a lot of guts.” He stepped a tiny bit closer. A streetlight hit his eyes just right, making them look dark and liquid. “I’m not brave enough to do it now.”
Carefully—I didn’t want to poke him in the eyeball in my current state—I traced the lines at the corners of his eyes with my fingers. “I love these. They give you away sometimes.”
Theo held himself very, very still. “What do they give away?”
“That you’re thinking very hard. Or you have something important to say. Or you’re amused. ’Cause I amuse you.” Grinning, I threw my arms out, and spun in a circle. My stomach didn’t like that. Also, I was pretty sure I’d stopped and yet the ground was still moving. Was it getting closer? Was I?—
“Whoa, there,” Theo said, his voice close to my ear. He’d hooked an arm around my waist and pulled me against his chest.
“I don’t think I should have had that second drink, Theodore.”
He snorted and turned me gently. “Think you might be right about that.”
I blinked at him. “You look like an angel.”
“That’s the streetlight.”
I shook my head and patted his chest where his heart was. Or should be, I thought. Not a doctor. “Nope. You’re my angel. I’m sure of it.”
His eyes did the crinkle thing again and then dropped to my mouth. My breath caught, my stomach clenched in anticipation and then…he slowly let go, his hands hovering around my shoulders just in case I tried to tip over.
I frowned. “I thought you were going to kiss me.”
“Do you want me to?”
“So much, Theo. I want you to, so much. I have dreams about it,” I whispered. “Do you want to kiss me?”
The moment stretched before he gave me a small, crooked smile. “What I want is to get you back to the hotel, safe and sound.”
My whole body drooped in disappointment. “So, no?”
“I didn’t say that, did I?” He took my hand and tugged so I’d start walking again.
“So, you do?”
With a long-suffering sigh I’d heard my father use with my mother on many, many occasions, he shook his head. “I think I am losing my mind.”
“Don’t do that. I like your mind.” There were other things I liked about Theo. I should tell him. “And your hair. I want to run my fingers through it so badly. You have that one piece that falls in your eyes, and I have to sit on my hands sometimes, so I don’t reach over and fix it. So, it’s probably best you wear your baseball cap around me unless you’d like to be mauled one day. Oh, except don’t wear it backwards, okay?”
Theo shot me a bewildered look. “Why?”
“I love it when you wear your hat backwards. It’s hot. You’re hot enough without trying to tempt me. It’s not fair.”
He made a funny, strangled sound. “Got it. No backwards hat.”
“Well, not unless you want me to do something about it.” I hip-bumped him. “If you know what I mean.”
Theo huffed a laugh.
“I like your hands, too. How they’re big and gentle, and I love when you make that little circle with your thumb when you hold my hand. I dream about that sometimes, too.” I slapped a hand on my mouth and mumbled out, “I shouldn’t tell you that, huh?”
“Please go on. I’m enjoying this.”
I pulled my hand down. “Alright. I like that your tummy’s a little soft because it makes for such great cuddling. I mean, I imagine it does. We’ve never cuddled. At least on purpose, I guess. But I want you to know I am available to give it a try.” I grinned proudly like I’d just volunteered to serve my country.
“That’s good to know.”
“Ellie says you don’t look like you eat caveman food or deadlift cars and that’s a good thing because it means you’d rather spend time with people and that’s hot.” I paused for a breath. “’Cause you’re hot.”
“You mentioned that.”
“It bears repeating.” I stopped and frowned, sure I’d seen that same garbage can in front of that same store front already. “Are we lost?”
“No, we’ve walked around the block about three times now. You seemed like you wanted to talk.”
“Oh. Good.” We started walking again, his hand still wrapped around mine. “I like how you’re always kind and…and whenever I need you, you come. You don’t ask questions. You don’t make me feel like I’m broken. Mom, Dad, everyone, even the boys sometimes, always seem like they’re waiting for me to have a breakdown. I mean, sure, I have epilepsy. Guess what? It’s not a death sentence. Lots of people live with epilepsy and have active, normal lives. I know they care but it’s suffocating sometimes. I hate that I make them worry.”
“It’s hard to see someone you love go through hard things,” Theo said quietly. “We want to protect them, keep them safe.”
“Yeah, I guess.” I sighed and then tried to hide a yawn.
“You tired?”
I leaned my head against his arm as we walked, loving the feel of his skin on my cheek. “I guess so.”
We were back at the motel in two minutes. Theo held my hand all the way to our neighboring rooms.
I turned to him. “Mostly, I think something inside me recognizes something inside you, and when I’m with you, there’s excitement, sure, but there’s this feeling of…” I shook my head, frowning. “I don’t know, home? Like you’re home, a safe place to land. You’re my comfort person.”
Those blue eyes stared at me so intensely, it felt like a caress. He cupped my cheeks and tilted my head. My heart dipped to my toes.
“Are you going to kiss me now?” I asked.
“No.”
“I would really like you to.”
“I really want to.”
And my heart climbed back up…to my throat. “Okay.”
“But not now. You’re a little drunk and I don’t want to take advantage.”
“Oh my gosh, Theo, stop being such a good guy. Please take advantage of me.”
He touched his lips to my forehead in the sweetest, gentlest gesture. Now my heart was in a puddle. “Go to bed, Alicia.”
“Fine.” I tried to get the key card in the slot at least three times before Theo took it from me and did it himself. Then something in my less than sober brain clicked, and I gasped. “Alicia. A.N. Is the A for Alicia?”
Theo winked. “I’ll see you in the morning. Get some sleep.”