Your Place Or Ours? (Coming Into The Light #4)

Prologue

It started with a hand on Becca's arm.

Ellie came out of the restroom weaving her way between people, wiping her hands on the back of her jeans because the dryer was broken, already rehearsing in her head the complaint she was going to make to Becca about the state of the bathroom because it was precisely the sort of thing that would make Becca laugh... and then she stopped.

Becca was stood near the edge of the dance floor, not on it but close enough that the coloured lights caught her from time to time, and she was talking to a woman.

A woman Ellie didn't recognise, dark-haired, cute… cute in a way that you’d notice across a room and then look back again.

Seriously cute. The woman was stood close to Becca, closer than a stranger would normally stand, and as Ellie watched she saw the woman’s hand reach out and touch Becca’s forearm.

Not a brief touch, either… a lingering one, fingers trailing along the inside of Becca’s wrist before pulling away again.

Becca didn’t move back, didn’t avoid the contact, but then that was Becca through and through…

she was warm with everyone, open, and could talk to anyone about anything and make them feel like they were the most interesting person in the room.

It was what made her good at her job and it was one of the many things that Ellie loved about her.

So, seeing her laugh at something this woman said, a genuine laugh where her head tilted back and her shoulders dropped, that was just Becca being Becca.

That’s what Ellie told herself.

But then she kept watching, and Ellie felt something stir inside.

The woman's body language was unmistakable: she wasn't just being friendly, she was flirting, openly and confidently, and Becca didn't seem to mind.

Ellie's stomach twisted and there was a hot, constricting feeling in her chest, like someone had reached inside her ribcage and squeezed.

Her face felt warm. Jealousy, she thought.

Obviously jealousy, what else would it be, watching some random woman openly hit on your wife in a bar while you were in the bathroom dealing with a broken hand dryer.

But still, Ellie didn't move.

What she should have done was one of two things… one, she could have walked over, slipped her arm around Becca’s waist, and smiled at the woman in the universal way of saying she’s mine, she’s claimed. Or two, go back over to their friends, get chatting, and ignore it.

Instead, she did neither. Ellie found a spot where she could see them clearly but they couldn't easily see her, half-hidden behind a group of friends-of-friends who were deep into an animated debate about whether Austin's food truck scene had peaked. She stood there and she watched.

The woman was good at flirting. Confident without being aggressive, leaning in when Becca spoke as if whatever Becca was saying was the most interesting thing she'd heard all night.

Her hand found Becca's arm again, this time higher, just above the elbow, and stayed there while she said something that made Becca's smile widen.

Ellie knew her wife's body language better than her own.

She could read Becca across a crowded room, could tell from thirty feet away whether she was having a good time or counting the minutes until she could leave.

And right now what Ellie could read was this: Becca was enjoying herself.

Being friendly, being Becca, but also, and this was the part that made Ellie's breath catch, not entirely averse to being on the receiving end of the attention.

Then Becca pushed her hair back behind her ear.

It was a tiny gesture… anyone else would have missed it.

Anyone but Ellie. Ellie knew that gesture the way she knew the sound of Becca's feet coming through their front door.

It was Becca's tell, the thing she did without realising when she was attracted to someone, when she was feeling a pull that she probably hadn’t even realised.

Ellie had seen it directed at her a thousand times, had seen her do it with others too, just playfully, but tonight it seemed different… it seemed genuine.

Becca didn't even know she'd done it, Ellie was sure of that.

It was involuntary, unconscious, the body betraying something the mind hadn't caught up with yet.

And the sight of it, of her wife, who was friendly as can be but never seriously flirted with anyone, who had never given Ellie a single moment's doubt, doing that for a genuinely cute dark-haired stranger, hit Ellie somewhere she didn't have a name for.

The woman noticed it too. She smiled, a slow, knowing smile, and moved closer still, and now they were in each other's space properly, the proximity that only existed between people who wanted to be that close.

Ellie realised that her hands were shaking. Not a lot, just a faint tremor that she could feel more than see. Her heart was beating hard in her chest, a rhythm that didn't match the music coming from the dance floor. She was breathing faster than she should be.

Jealousy. That's what this was. She was jealous and she should go over there right now and…

Except it wasn't jealousy. Or rather, it was, but it was also something else, something that sat beneath the jealousy like a current beneath still water, and it was that something else that was making her hands shake and her breathing go ragged and her skin feel like it was running a fever.

She couldn't name it, couldn’t get close to knowing what it was. All she knew was that watching this woman desire her wife, watching Becca respond to being wanted, watching her come alive under someone else's attention, was doing something to Ellie that she didn’t understand and couldn’t control.

The woman said something and leaned in close to Becca's ear, close enough that her lips must have been almost touching Becca's skin, and Becca went still for just a second, the kind of stillness that meant she was really listening, absorbing what was being said.

Then she laughed again but differently this time, more eye contact, and Ellie felt her whole body go hot.

She forced herself to move then, back to their group of friends, back to the table where their drinks were still sat half-full.

She picked hers up, took a long sip, and tried to join a conversation about someone's weekend plans.

She nodded in the right places, made the right noises, and all the while her eyes kept drifting back across the room to where Becca was still talking to the dark-haired woman.

She watched Becca's hand come up to touch her own collarbone, fingers grazing the thin gold chain of the necklace she always wore.

Becca touched it the way she always did when she was thinking, an unconscious habit, and something about that small gesture, her wife's fingers on that necklace while another woman stood inches away, made Ellie's chest ache with something she couldn't understand.

Want. It might have been want. But want for what? For Becca to stop? For Becca to come back to her? For Becca to keep going?

She didn't know. She genuinely, honestly didn't know, and that was the most unsettling part of all of it.

And then, as if she'd sensed something, Becca looked up.

Across the bar, past the dancers, through the gaps between bodies, her eyes found Ellie's and held her gaze.

Just a second, barely that, but in it was the reassuring look, the one that said don't worry, I'm yours, I'm right here, I chose you, this is nothing.

A small, sure smile to go with it, a warmth to her eyes.

Then the dark-haired woman said something and Becca turned back to her, the moment gone.

It had always been enough before. Every time, without exception, that look had been enough.

This time, it made whatever the feeling she had worse. No, not worse she realised… stronger.

Ellie didn't understand why, couldn't have articulated it if she'd tried, but something about Becca reassuring her, confirming that she was Ellie's even while another woman's hand was on her arm, sent a thrilling shiver through her that had nothing to do with jealousy and everything to do with something she didn't have a word for yet.

***

A few minutes later Becca appeared back at the table, sliding into the seat next to Ellie, her thigh pressing against Ellie's.

"I’m back," Becca said, leaning over to kiss Ellie on the cheek, casual and affectionate.

"Who was that?" Ellie asked, keeping her voice deliberately light, like it didn't matter.

"Oh… she's a friend of one of my colleagues from the practice. We'd been introduced before apparently but I didn't remember." Becca picked up her drink and took a sip, her eyes smiling over the rim of the glass. "She was definitely hitting on me though. Like, not even subtle about it."

Ellie felt a wash of relief so strong it almost made her dizzy.

A colleague's friend. Just someone being friendly who happened to be flirting.

Becca hadn't sought it out, hadn't encouraged it, it hadn’t been a stranger…

it was just Becca being Becca, warm, open, and this woman had read it as something more.

"You ok?" Becca asked, and Ellie realised she'd been quiet a few moments too long.

"Yeah, fine." Ellie smiled. It was a little forced, but only a little. "Bathroom's disgusting by the way. The hand dryer's broken."

Becca wrinkled her nose. "Charming." She settled back into Ellie, her body familiar and reassuring, and turned to join the wider conversation.

And that should have been it. Relief, and then forgotten. Just another Friday night out, a minor moment, a colleague's friend being a bit too forward, the kind of thing that happens and gets laughed about over brunch the next day.

Except the relief wasn't sitting right. It was there, on the surface, but underneath it something else was still there, quiet and persistent, the echoes of whatever that had been.

Ellie had her explanation now, had the reassurance, had Becca warm against her side…

and it should have been enough to close the book on whatever that feeling had been.

But it wasn't, and she didn't understand why.

Ellie took another drink and stared at the table, trying very hard and failing spectacularly not to think about the way Becca had pushed her hair back behind her ear.