Chapter Sixteen
Seven years ago
I’m at the St. Regis again.
Sometime after returning to my apartment and trying to drown myself in the shower, I decided I couldn’t leave things with Parker the way I had. Sometimes, when I shut my brain off long enough, my body takes the wheel, and so far, it’s led me to this exact lobby twice.
I pace back and forth for a good ten minutes before I whip out my phone.
Me: Where are you?
Parker: Out.
Me: I’m at the St. Regis.
It takes another ten minutes before I see Parker emerge from the revolving doors, still wearing those cursed sweatpants.
He takes heavy steps toward me, and suddenly, I’m very conscious that this might not have been a good idea.
I can’t tell if he’s annoyed that I’m here, but the stiffness in his face doesn’t suggest he’s pleased to see me.
“What part of our conversation did you take as an invitation to stake out my hotel?”
“Where did you go?”
“I went for a walk.”
“You go on walks?”
He rolls his eyes. “Yes, Dani, I go on walks.” As he speaks, a drove of tourists cuts in from the elevators, wheeling suitcases between us. “Can we not do this here?”
Parker leads me to a corridor with less foot traffic. He extends a hand behind my back to herd me over, but I jerk away, careful to maintain distance.
“What are you doing here? Do you have another multiverse theory to run by me?”
“Actually, one might argue that alternate timelines aren’t the same as the multiverse, since multiple timelines can exist within one universe and—”
“I’m going to my suite.” Parker turns on his heel.
“Wait, Parker!” I reach out and grab his arm, and then I realize what I’ve done. This is the first time we’ve touched since last night. I feel the way Parker tenses under my hand, and I immediately let go. “Can you just hear me out?”
He shifts to face me again. When I glance up at him, he’s still frowning. And in the absence of his smile, I recall just how great it is.
My hands clench into fists at my sides. I’m nervous, and I can’t tell if I’m shaking, because I can’t really feel my legs anymore.
“I’m sorry I said you had an angle. I don’t actually think that.
And I know I’ve had my guard up, but it’s been nice, seeing you again.
After this week, I don’t want us to go back to being strangers. ”
Then, a shred of hope: “I don’t want that either.”
“I’m not sure if we fucked this up by, you know, sleeping together. But it’s not like we can pretend it never happened—”
“Dani, if, for some reason, you’re having regrets now—”
“No, that’s not it,” I clarify, hastily adding, “I don’t regret it.”
“Okay,” he says, and his face softens just a bit. “Neither do I.”
I let out a deep-rooted sigh. When I arrived at the hotel, it wasn’t as if I’d come prepared with a quick fix. I just wanted to let Parker know I was trying. “How do we move on from this?”
He’s quiet, letting my words settle. I see the way his face strains with concentration.
“To be honest, I don’t have an answer for you. I’m still trying to figure this out too. I thought that finally talking to you again would clear the air, but I feel like having sex made things infinitely more complicated. We’d just barely scratched the surface of being friends again.”
“Right? It might be even worse if we dated.”
I don’t mean it as a dig—I’m just laying out the facts.
Parker doesn’t have any interest in relationships, and if our conversation at the café is any indication, we’re not compatible enough to make it work.
We would never be on similar wavelengths, given our history.
In fact, the only time I’ve felt like we were in sync with one another again was when we were having sex.
I run a distressed hand through my hair. “I hate to say it, but last night was really fucking good.”
Parker coughs out a chuckle, then quickly smothers it behind his hand.
“Stop laughing. It’s not funny.”
“Dani, I’m not going to lie. I’m at a loss right now. You tell me we’re in the darkest timeline, and then you say the sex was good.” He’s still trying to hold in his laugh. “I don’t know what you want from me.”
I don’t need to see my face to know it’s bright red. “I don’t want a relationship.”
“I know.”
“And I’m sure for you it was just like any other fling—”
“It wasn’t.” He says it so sternly, the humor of the moment dies instantly. His heated gaze drops to my mouth, then to my chest. “It was . . . really fucking good for me too. And if it were up to me, that wouldn’t be the last time.”
My breath catches in my throat, and I break eye contact. How can he drop a line like that and expect me not to react? Like every instinct in my body isn’t telling me to jump in his arms and wrap my legs around him?
“See? It’s already happening. I don’t think we can ever be normal around each other again.”
“Still better than when we didn’t talk.”
“Is it? At least then I wasn’t picturing you naked all the time.” I clamp my hand to my mouth as soon as I say it. Why do I do this? Why do I let my intrusive thoughts win every time?
Mortified, I look up, expecting Parker to laugh again, but he doesn’t. His jaw ticks, and I catch the twitch of his brow, the subtle bite of his lip. “Hm, I guess I’m not the only one then.”
It’s my turn to laugh, because the whole thing is just so bizarre.
This is the same boy who couldn’t finish an ice cream cone without getting half of it on his face—I’d have to hose him off in my backyard to get the sticky chocolate off.
And now all I can think about is pressing that gorgeous face to mine.
“So? What now?” He leans against the wall and folds his arms. Those heart-stopping brown eyes wait expectantly for my answer.
There’s a brightness to them that’s hard to miss, but when it’s just the two of us, and he’s taking my clothes off, they’re dark with an intensity that makes me throw my inhibitions away.
My gaze moves to his lips—lips I’d been kissing less than twenty-four hours ago, that had been on my body, taking me so skillfully to the best orgasms of my life—and I swallow.
Whatever happens from this point on will be no more than a blip in the timeline.
I’ll be fine.
It’ll all be fine.
“Give me a key card,” I say. A rush surges through my chest.
“What?”
“Give me your spare key card so I don’t have to wait in the lobby next time.”
I can see the way my words are bouncing around in his head.
A part of me relishes the fact that I’m the one making Parker Tran lose his cool.
He pushes away from the wall and straightens to his full height.
Then he speaks, and it sends my heart into a flurry that I can’t ignore any longer. “Do you want to come up now?”
Yes. “Yes.”
We take the elevator up to his suite. Parker doesn’t have anything more to say.
I don’t either, and it seems to be working in our favor.
Once he closes the door behind us, he pulls me in by the waist and kisses me hard.
His hands are quick to remove my coat, fingertips warm as they slide under my shirt.
I tug the hoodie off him, throwing it to the carpet before he covers my mouth with his again.
“I still think you’re a dick,” I say between kisses.
“And I still find you insufferable,” he counters, but I can feel him smiling against my lips.
We don’t cuddle or kiss when it’s over. That evening, once I’ve regained sensation in my legs, I lift myself from the bed to get dressed. Parker comes out of the bathroom at the same time, wearing a robe that’s barely tied. What a prick.
He walks to the dresser and fetches a key card. Before he hands it over, he studies me with caution. A corner of his mouth turns downward, and his eyes narrow just the slightest.
“I’ve done casual before; this isn’t new for me. But are you going to be okay with this?”
He’s giving me a chance to back out. He doesn’t think I’m capable of having a casual relationship without getting hurt. To him, I’m still that timid girl from next door who’s never stepped out of her bubble long enough to do something as wild as this.
“You’re not the only one who’s changed, Parker.”
I take the key card and leave the suite.