Chapter 4 Gideon
Gideon
I flash the bartender a hundred-dollar bill between my fingers, and we receive our drinks immediately. Thank God, because I need to cool the fuck down.
Three songs. That’s all it took to make me wish Torres and I were alone, instead of in a crowded club. To make me wish we were different people with a less complicated past.
It started out innocently enough, but with her soft breasts pressed to my chest and her tight butt filling my palms, I got hard and couldn’t hide it. She didn’t seem to mind, though. If anything, she pressed closer, her dark eyes glued to mine with desire simmering in their depths.
Or maybe that’s just wishful thinking on my part.
There’s a small seating area separate from the dance floor, and it’s blessedly devoid of strobe lights and humans. We carry our drinks to a vacant table in the corner with two battered wooden café chairs.
Torres perches on one and crosses her legs. My eyes follow the line of her boot up to her bare knee. I imagine tugging down the zipper and sliding her boot off, closing my fingers around her delicate ankle, spreading her thighs, and—
Fuck, I need to get a grip.
She eyes me over the rim of her vodka cranberry as she toys with the tiny straw. “So is this where we sit and reminisce about the good old days?”
And with that, my arousal plummets.
“Shit.” I take a slow sip of my whiskey. “Nothing good about them.”
She raises her eyebrows, like she’s surprised by my answer. “No?”
I shake my head and change the subject. “What have you been up to?”
We’re both lawyers, it turns out, which gives us something easy to talk about. But whereas I’m working in finance, she’s an environmental lawyer.
As we chat, I recall the last time I teased her.
We were around fourteen. I came across her in the school library, sitting alone at a table with a laptop open in front of her, surrounded by books and papers.
I can’t remember what I said, probably something tired and trite.
She didn’t even look up from her notebook as she declared, “Go fuck yourself, Noble. I’m busy.
” Her dismissive tone struck me and made me realize—for the first time, I’m ashamed to admit—that I was the asshole in this situation.
After that, I might’ve tried to talk to her a few more times, innocuous comments about class or homework, but she’d responded with the same bored indifference she used when I’d been mocking her, and my fragile teenage ego couldn’t handle it.
I barely talked to her through the rest of high school.
There was one moment of weakness at graduation, and then . .. nothing.
Until now.
She’s telling me about a project involving the Clean Water Act, when a crowd of scantily clad North Pole elves piles into the room.
Torres is forced to scoot her chair closer to mine, and I get a clearer whiff of the sweet citrus scent that so tantalized me on the dance floor.
I lean in for a deeper inhale and pitch my voice over the raucous laughter coming from Santa’s helpers.
“What are you doing here, anyway?” I ask, bringing the conversation back to the present moment. “Doesn’t seem like your scene.”
Her lips purse. “No?”
“Not unless they’re hiding the Beauty and the Beast library in the basement.”
She tilts her head back to chuckle, and I stare longingly at the line of her throat.
Blinking, I drag my gaze upward to her face.
She’s stirring her drink with a rueful smile. “Fern invited me, and I like to dance, so here I am.”
A tendril of dread unfurls in my gut. “Fern ... Mulholland?”
“You think I managed to find another friend named Fern ?”
It takes all my effort not to wince. I remember the Mulhollands, of course. Specifically the brother. Man, we hated each other back at Carlton. He was disruptive in class and always doing dangerous shit on his Rollerblades for attention.
But Torres ... I glance at her left hand. There’s a thin silver band on her pointer, but nothing on the ring finger.
I take a sip to clear my throat. “And you?”
“And me . . . what?”
“Not . . . Mulholland?”
“Oh! Um, no.” She busies herself stirring the ice. “Still Torres. Everett and I broke up earlier this year.”
“I’m ... sorry?” It’s a question. I’m obviously not sorry.
But I don’t know what else to say. We’re getting into dangerous territory here.
It was easier on the dance floor, where we could let our bodies do the talking.
But it’s impossible to act like we’re two people who just met, who don’t have the history we share.
She drains the last of her vodka cranberry and passes me the empty glass. “I need another drink if we’re going to continue this conversation.”
I leave to get us another round. But by the time I return, the moment has passed, and I don’t know how to get it back.
“This doesn’t seem like your scene, either,” she says after I sidestep a sexy Krampus and take my seat.
“You don’t like my costume?” I gesture at my wilted button-down shirt and tie. “I’m Corporate Businessman #2, here to turn the local Christmas tree farm into a strip mall.”
Torres huffs out a genuine laugh, then gives the lights strung around her neck a light tug. “Well, in that case, it’s better than my half-assed attempt to fit in.”
Because I’m aching to tell her how fucking pretty she looks, I backtrack instead. “So why isn’t this my scene? Because it’s a club?”
She gives me a searching look. “Because it’s a gay club.”
She puts a slight emphasis on gay . Might as well tell her.
“It’s not my first. I’m bi, Torres.”
“Wait, really? Me too!” Her face lights up, and I’m relieved, but then her expression turns thoughtful.
“Actually, I lean toward identifying as pansexual. It fits me better. I just didn’t know you were.
Not that I needed to know!” She holds up her hands, like she’s worried she’s offended me.
“I mean, we haven’t seen each other since high school, and obviously it’s not the kind of thing you need to broadcast. And I shouldn’t have assumed that you were . ..”
“Straight? It’s okay. I was kind of quiet about it until this year. Thanks to, ah, therapy.”
“You’re in therapy?” I expect her to sound shocked, but she sounds more intrigued.
I shrug. “After my father died, it turned out I had a lot of shit to unpack.”
She grabs my hand and her remorse is obvious. “I’m so sorry, Noble. I hadn’t heard. And I shouldn’t have said it that way. You’ve clearly worked on yourself, and you don’t deserve to have it thrown in your face.”
“You’d be justified in throwing a lot more in my face, Torres, starting with that drink. I was fucking awful to you.”
I can’t suppress the bitterness in my tone, and her eyes shutter. She lets go of my hand, leaning back in her chair as if putting space between us. “I don’t think I’m ready to go there yet.”
Inside, I’m cringing. Whatever was building between us, I’ve just ruined it. But I swallow down the words I owe her and hang on to the one suspended in the air between us.
Yet.
We aren’t there yet .
At some point, maybe there will be enough easiness between us, enough trust, for me to apologize. To explain.
We’re already closer to that point than I ever thought we’d be.
I hear a song come on in the main club and set down my half-finished drink. Rising to my feet, I take her hand.
“What are you doing?” Her eyes are shiny when she looks up at me, but she doesn’t pull her hand away.
I keep my tone even. “ I like this song.”
She doesn’t say anything, but I catch the ripple of her gorgeous throat as she swallows. Then she nods and lets me help her to her feet.
Back on the dance floor, it’s so packed we can barely do more than sway against each other, but any awkwardness that came up has dissipated.
Torres’s ass is pressed tight to my crotch, and I’ve got my arms wrapped around her waist, almost possessively.
I half expect her to push me away, but one of her hands grips my wrist, as if holding me in place.
I duck my head, closing my eyes as I inhale the scent of her hair, like sweet coconut and tart lime. I can’t get enough. It’s going to haunt my dreams. In that red dress, she’s like living fire in my arms, and I don’t care that I’m going to get burned.
When the next song begins, she turns to face me and shouts over the music. “It’s too crowded in here. I think it’s time to go.”
Go? My pulse trips, spurring me to act. I ignore the churning in my gut and lean down, my lips brushing her ear as I speak. “Can I take you home? It’s late.”
Even though hundreds of people are pressed in around us, it’s like we’re alone. She stares at me for a long moment, the lights reflecting off the disco ball overhead and glittering in her eyes like twinkling stars. No, like a whole goddamn galaxy.
Then, to my surprise, she says, “Sure. We could, um, finish that conversation.”
I nod like it’s no big deal. “All right.”
Inside, my heart fucking soars.