Chapter 26
Chapter
I’m back home, scrolling through the document filled with places to initial and sign. My eyes scan the numbered sections and subsections, but it’s hard to focus.
Maybe I should have a lawyer look at this. But where would I find one? Yelp? And that has to be out of my budget.
A text slides down from the top of my screen:
Greg:
did you leave?
I swipe it away without replying. He really pissed me off tonight—bringing up Owen, second-guessing my choices, gaslighting me about what happened in high school!
And I’m even angrier at myself for not being able to accept reality as it is.
It’s my own fault I haven’t moved on. I just need to try harder.
“Relationships can be dissolved in person (see clause nine, subsection two) by either party at will at any time, but clauses one, four, and five remain binding,” I read out loud.
Mom always told me to define the relationship early, but this is ridiculous.
I jiggle my leg, full of nervous energy. Part of me wants to run screaming into the night.
When I’m agitated, it’s soothing to review the evidence:
This might be the key to freeing Mom from Slack.
This could help me move past my immature fixation on Greg, so I can actually ease into our friendship again.
I can’t deny I’m attracted to Mark Winterson.
Maybe I’m resistant to it because he’s the kind of guy Mom would want me to date, and I’m contrary like that. Because I think that means he can’t really like me, by definition. But he’s only given me signs that he does—and shouldn’t that feel good?
This is the best thing for everyone. Win-win-win-win-win.
I tap through all the fields and sign. And then I call him.
“Okay, well,” I say when he picks up on the third ring. “Guess you can explain rugby to me now.”
Mark Winterson’s booming laugh feels like the biggest compliment. “Best phone call I’ve gotten in ages.”
His voice sounds lower on the phone than in person, raspier. I wonder what he’s doing—if he’s sitting on the couch in sweats, or lying in bed talking to me. The mental image makes my internal temperature rise.
“How are you spending the rest of your evening?” he asks.
I glance around my living room, at the dark TV and faded floral wallpaper and excessive amount of TKMART throw pillows on the couch. “No particular plans.”
“Come over,” he says, voice deep and smooth, and it sends a ripple of anticipation through me.
For a second, I try to weigh the consequences—but it’s so quiet and lonely in this house, and the spontaneity excites me.
“I’ll send a car for you,” he adds. So I tell him the address.
The car glides through the night along the freeway, near-full moon hanging over the buildings of the West Side. It deposits me in front of a condo by the beach, a shiny modernist box in concrete and glass.
Mark Winterson opens the door, leaning one arm casually against the frame, and a smile spreads over his face.
“Come in,” he says, taking a few steps back.
I slip off my sandals to be polite, even though he’s still wearing his dress shoes. He’s ditched his suit jacket, standing there in his shirt sleeves, yellow tie under his collar.
This condo is unreal. A full wall of windows that must have an ocean view when the shades are up. Living room furniture that looks like something out of an interior design magazine. An open-plan kitchen a chef would love.
He gestures expansively. “Mi casa es su casa,” he says. “You want anything to drink?”
“I’m good.” I cross my arms and take a lap around the large space. Everything is sleek and shiny—polished floors, marble counters, brushed-metal fridge. There aren’t many personal touches anywhere. It’s hotel-like that way, and there’s a faint new-car smell.
Nerves prickle up and down my spine as I navigate around his leather sofa and dark wood coffee table. I can hear waves crashing, and I lift the edge of the shade a touch, revealing a glimpse of dark ocean outside.
“You had me sweating there for a second,” he says. I turn on my heel and he’s standing closer than I expected, holding a glass of whiskey in one hand. He stares into it and swirls the liquid around. “Thought I’d scared you off.”
My heart jumps as he steps closer, and I will my mind not to slide back to that shitty movie theater from ten years ago. Don’t compare it like you always do. Let it be its own thing.
“Well, here I am,” I say, head tilted up to hold his gaze.
He sets his glass on the table, and I can practically feel the barrier of restraint that was between us trembling, about to come down.
“Here you are,” he echoes, brushing my cheek with the backs of his fingers. Petting me, almost. Gazing at me possessively, like I’m his new favorite toy.
I catch his wrist, and his dark brows lift in amusement as I kiss the thin skin there, holding eye contact the whole time. His warmth beneath my mouth sends a thrill through me, like unwrapping a present I’ve been staring at for weeks.
He laughs as I let go of his wrist and pulls me closer by the hips. “You’re full of surprises.”
See? He wants you here.
I press my lips into the five o’clock shadow on his impressive jaw, inhaling that cologne smell I can’t quite name. Something sharp and something soft. Tobacco and amber? Smoke and sandalwood? Whatever it is, it smells expensive.
Then he claims my mouth, and I can taste the bite of his whiskey with an undertone of acidic mint, like he gargled mouthwash when I was on the way over.
His lips change position like they’re on a timer, and a feeling nags at me, in the corner of my mind—it’s too smooth, like he is, in general.
Too studied, somehow, a routine he’s gone through many times.
Something about this kiss is like a (very nice) form letter.
You’re overthinking it! Self-sabotaging again!
I pull back, trying to reset, and give him a flirty smile to cover my nerves. He brings out my pushiest self, and he seems to like it. Maybe I’ll lean into that tonight.
I reach for his tie right below the knot, and his throat bobs as I tug him toward me and walk slowly backward. He catches up and slides his arms around my waist, kissing my neck until my legs hit the cold leather and I plop down onto the cushion.
“Tell me what you want,” he whispers, leaning over me, hands on the back of the couch. “Order me around.”
I’m always watching life with vague longing from behind glass, looking but not touching. Trying not to demand too much or be too difficult, never reaching out and grabbing. But somehow this bizarre situation makes me feel like I could be a different person.
I push on his chest so he leans back. “Get on your knees,” I demand, and until this moment I would never have guessed I was the kind of person who would say that.
Who’d feel something confusing and electric spark through me when he does what I told him, holding my gaze while he pushes up my tasteful midi skirt and strokes my thighs with the back of his hand.
Who’d feel powerful for a second as he nuzzles me there with his nose, as he looks up and asks permission, tugging down my lacy black underwear.
But then his mouth is on me, and it turns out he can do some things that distinctly do not feel like a form letter.
Where his kiss was impersonal, this feels like he has something to prove, heat-seeking, demanding.
Every stroke of his tongue seems to say mine mine mine.
A riptide carries me out to sea and I can’t remember anything—how I got here, what I agreed to, what I was trying to accomplish, even my own name.
And when he murmurs Ruby a little while later, I wonder distantly, Who is that?