Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
The late afternoon air carried a chill as Debra sat down on a worn wooden bench overlooking the Thames.
She shivered, watching the tide push itself against the embankment wall.
She’d always loved this spot and the calm it offered, but lately it had started to feel like a mirror.
The longer she stared at it, the more she saw herself.
Constant movement. No real direction.
What now?
It was a question she’d been asking a lot lately.
She was fifty-two, divorced, and for the first time since her twenties, entirely untethered.
No house to run or children to take care of, no husband to cook for and no one to account for except for herself.
She had money—the divorce had seen to that—but not purpose.
Right now, she would take purpose over wealth.
One without the other just seemed pointless.
Maeve had told her that freedom was meant to feel thrilling, but it didn’t. Not to Debra. It felt like she was standing in a room she used to live in, knowing she no longer belonged there.
She brushed a tear that had found its way down her cheek and sighed. It wasn’t just the loneliness that was bothering her today. It was the question that wouldn’t leave her alone. What didn’t Billie see in her?
Debra had spent her whole married life being told she was too much or not enough. Too opinionated for her ex-husband, but too quiet for his friends. Too polished, too proper, too predictable. And then Billie had looked at her, touched her, and spoken to her like she was none of those things.
And then she’d pulled away.
Debra had tried to remind herself that it didn’t matter, that Billie probably did that with everyone, but she couldn’t shake the feeling it had left her with. Like she’d been opened up, then discarded…half-finished.
She sniffled and wiped at her cheek again, forcing out a breath that should have calmed her but didn’t. She didn’t even know why she was sitting here today. The view and the rush of London life around her did nothing to help with the way she was feeling.
“Debra.”
The voice came from behind her, unmistakable in its tone, and as she turned…Debra’s breath caught.
Billie stood there, her hands in the pockets of an expensive overcoat, that dark hair styled in an effortless way that Debra had come to think about far too often. God, she was the most handsome woman Debra had ever laid eyes on. “Billie,” Debra said, clearing her throat. “H-hi.”
“I was taking a walk. I didn’t expect to see you here.”
“It’s one of my spots.” Debra regarded her with a faint smile. “It helps me think.”
Billie nodded towards the empty half of the bench. “Mind if I sit?”
“No, of course not.”
The space between them was small but significant. Billie sat, her posture immaculate even in rest. The wind caught the edge of her coat and tugged it slightly, revealing a dark suit beneath.
Debra chose not to fill the silence with pointless conversation, she knew where she stood with Billie now, but as she watched the water against the stone wall, she wished her pulse would slow down.
“You look different outside of the shop.” Debra kept her focus ahead of her, not trusting herself to meet Billie’s eyes. She was already struggling to get them out of her head whenever she slid into bed at night. “A little less terrifying, anyway.”
“That’s progress, depending on who sees it.”
Debra did glance at Billie this time. “Are you always like that? Controlled, I mean.”
Billie’s jaw tensed before she answered. “Mostly. Control keeps things manageable.”
“Manageable?”
Billie’s gaze drifted to the water. “Life doesn’t always give you choices. So when you find something you can control, you hold onto it.”
The words were matter of fact, but they hit Debra with force. She wanted to ask more, but the set of Billie’s mouth told her that door would only open so far. Still, she tried. “Must be a lonely way to live.”
Billie lifted a shoulder. “Sometimes, but it’s something you learn to accept.”
It was the first hint of real honesty Debra had heard from Billie that wasn’t wrapped up in something resembling a neat bow. It softened the atmosphere between them. “Do you ever think about letting go?”
“Letting go of what?”
Debra turned on the bench a little. “The need to manage and control everything.”
“That’s a dangerous game to play when you don’t know what the outcome will be.”
“You know…” Debra sighed as she propped her head in her hand. “I do see hints of the real you behind the mask when you think you’re holding yourself together. Last week in the fitting room, for example. Whatever happened in that room, you wanted it just as much as I did.”
Billie turned her head and met Debra’s eyes. “You noticed that.”
“I notice everything about you, Billie,” Debra said, a faint edge of mischief cutting through her softness. She couldn’t help but flirt with Billie Brown, even if she knew it was a waste of time. “It’s becoming a bit of a problem for me.”
A flash of heat flickered behind Billie’s expression, but she quickly buried it. “You make me sound like a temptation.”
“Perhaps you are.”
Billie regarded Debra with a rueful smile. “You shouldn’t flirt with someone who’s no good at pretending she doesn’t notice.”
“And there I was…thinking you were very good at pretending.”
Billie’s gaze lingered on her, the intensity of it sending a shiver through Debra. “Maybe not with you.”
Billie may have tried to sound cool and collected as she said that, but Debra saw through it. That hint of truth Billie hadn’t meant to share. “Then why hold back?”
Billie looked away and pulled her coat around her. “Because I know what happens when I don’t.”
And there it was. A trace of something raw beneath all the polish.
Debra didn’t want to push, she didn’t know Billie well enough to do so, but she wasn’t sure she’d get the chance again. “Someone hurt you.”
Billie’s hand flexed once against her thigh before stilling. “We all have our history.”
Debra wanted to reach out, to touch her hand and tell her she wasn’t whatever her past had made her believe, but there was something in Billie’s posture that told her it would be too much.
Instead, she shifted a little closer and said, “You don’t have to protect me from you, you know…”
Billie scoffed. “You have no idea what you’re getting yourself into, Debra.”
“Maybe not.” Debra slowly rose to her feet and looked down at Billie. “But I would have liked to know you a little more, given what’s already transpired between us.”
Billie rose too. Just when Debra thought she was going to walk away, she lifted a hand and held Debra’s chin in her palm. “Forget about me. I’m not worth knowing.”
As Debra watched her turn to leave, her pulse rapidly picking up, she felt a mixture of hope and warning hold firm in her chest.
“Hey, Billie?”
Billie glanced over her shoulder, a brow lifted.
“I think I’m going to stop by the shop in the next few days. I could do with a nice shirt to go with my suit.” That wasn’t true, she had plenty to choose from already, but it gave her the perfect excuse to see Billie again.
Billie scuffed her boot against the ground and shoved her hands in the pockets of her overcoat. “Please, don’t make me want this.” And then she turned and walked away, leaving Debra stunned on the banks of the Thames.
By the time Billie had reached her flat, the storm that had been brewing throughout the day had finally broken.
Rain struck the windows of her apartment, lashing with fury, and her first thought was whether Debra had made it home safe.
She was sure she had, they’d parted some two hours ago now, but she wished she could reach out to check.
Just another thing to add to the growing list of things you wouldn’t usually do!
She dropped her keys on the counter and shrugged out of her coat.
She hadn’t expected to bump into the very woman she ached to know on a deeper level, but in some ways, she was glad.
She’d only meant to go for a short walk, something to help clear her head, but she’d ended up by the river…
and in turn, ended up sitting on a bench next to Debra Allen.
She was just there, sitting alone, as though the universe had decided to cruelly toy with Billie’s temptation levels.
She shouldn’t have stopped and said hello. She shouldn’t have said a word. But she had, and now she was paying for it.
The conversation had been nothing, really. On the surface, nothing more than harmless words. Two people talking about life, loss, and control. But it wasn’t nothing. Not when Debra looked at her in that curious way, unafraid of what she could unearth if she kept digging.
Billie pressed her palms against the counter and tried to control her breathing. She’d spent years building walls around herself, brick by brick, until only a select few were allowed even a glimpse over the top. And one of those few was Ella.
The thought must have summoned her because the intercom buzzed.
When she answered, Ella’s voice came through the speaker. “Are you planning to stand me up, or can I come up?”
Billie sighed as she ran a hand through her hair. She wasn’t sure she had the brain capacity for this tonight. “I forgot we’d arranged tonight.”
“Of course you did,” Ella said dryly. “You’ve probably been holed up in there with your self-loathing since the last time I spoke to you.”
Billie pressed the button to let her in. “Nobody else would get away with that.”
“I know, but you love me.”
A few minutes later, Ella breezed into her apartment, carrying two bottles of wine and wearing the kind of grin that had gotten her out of trouble most of her life.
On paper, they couldn’t have been more different.
She was loud where Billie was quiet, and easy where Billie was precise.
And still, as always, the only person who never seemed to flinch under her scrutiny.
“God, it’s freezing.” Ella set the wine bottles down and rubbed her hands together, her boots kicked off by the door. “You’d think with all the money you have, you could afford to put the heating on.”
“You could always stay at home.” Billie gestured to the couch. “I’ve only just walked in. Give it twenty and your cold princess hands will be nice and warm.”
“I’m sure I’ll live.” Ella dropped onto the couch and patted the seat beside her. “Sit. Tell me what’s got you looking so glum.”
Billie gave her a look but sat down anyway, pouring wine into two glasses. “Do you always have to be so observant?”
“Someone has to.” Ella accepted a glass, her eyes narrowing as she studied Billie. “All right, talk. What happened?”
Billie stared down at her own glass of wine. “I saw her.”
“And?” Ella didn’t have to ask who. “Don’t leave me hanging.”
“She was sitting by the river.” God, Billie hated seeing someone like Debra sitting alone. More so because she knew how Debra felt after their last fitting with one another. It just made the guilt eat away at her far quicker than she wanted it to. “Alone.”
“Did you talk to her?”
Billie sighed. “Yes.”
“And?”
“And nothing. We talked about…whatever. Nothing of any substance.” Billie sipped her wine, aware that she’d just lied through her teeth. “It was fine.”
Ella leaned back and arched a brow. “It was fine?”
“Yes.”
“Billie, I’ve known you for seventeen years. Your ‘fine’ voice means you’re currently considering leaving the city and starting over where nobody knows you. Try again.”
Billie shot her a look. “You just don’t let up, do you?”
“Not when I can see you unravelling.”
Fine. If she was doing this, she was doing it properly. She unbuttoned her waistcoat and made herself comfortable on the couch. “She makes me feel things I don’t want to feel, Ella.”
“That’s not a crime. It’s also not something you should be terribly worried about.”
“It is when you’ve spent years making sure you never fall for another woman again.”
Ella sighed as she studied Bille. “You know, for someone who claims they hate being understood, you make it remarkably easy for the right person.”
“Yeah, and that’s the problem. She saw through me. Completely. And I…I let her.”
Ella tilted her head. “Maybe you wanted to be seen.”
Billie laughed under her breath. “I wanted control. That’s all.”
“Billie.”
Clenching her jaw, Billie felt her frustration beginning to rise. “What?”
“You’ve been hiding behind that word for years. Control.” Ella set her glass down and took Billie’s hand. She couldn’t recall the last time anyone had done that. “You can’t build a life around denial and expect it not to collapse when something real comes along.”
Billie didn’t answer. She didn’t know how to. She’d never been into people reading her, and Ella was no different.
“She’s not the same as the others, is she?”
Billie swallowed and closed her eyes. It was true.
Debra was nothing like the others. She had one of those smiles that not only made you instantly smile back, but one that instantly relaxed you.
It took a lot for Billie to feel that from someone.
In fact, she didn’t know the last time a woman’s smile had captured her quite like Debra’s had. “No. She’s not.”
“Then maybe stop treating her like she is.”
“That’s exactly why I have to treat her the same as the rest.” Billie wasn’t a cold, heartless bitch.
If that was the way she came across, then it wasn’t always intentional.
Knowing Debra thought that of her, or some variation of it anyway, made her body ache terribly. “It’s just easier. For her, more so.”
Ella exhaled a frustrated sigh. “Do you ever get tired of fighting yourself?”
“Every day, Ella. Every fucking day.” Billie ran a hand down her face.
Most nights, she struggled to sleep. Most nights, she lay on the couch, wondering if or when she would ever come out of the nightmare she’d lived in for so long.
Ella didn’t know that, nobody did, and it wasn’t something she planned to share.
“I don’t even know what I’m doing anymore. ”
“Oh, I think you know what you’re doing now more than you have in a long time.” Ella nudged her knee. “You’re trying not to fall.”
Billie looked up, her lips parted and her hands clammy. “And what if I’ve already started to?”
Ella reached out a hand and squeezed Billie’s knee. “Maybe, for once, you should let yourself land and see what happens.”
Yeah, that wasn’t going to happen. Because if Billie did let Debra in, she would soon see how damaged she was. Billie couldn’t risk that kind of heartache. She wouldn’t survive it. “I can’t.”
Ella nodded slowly as she withdrew her hand. “Then you’ll stay miserable, babe. Just make sure that when the day comes to meet your maker, you can say it was worth it.”