CHAPTER 36
Lacey
“I can’t do tonight, no,” she said, and she didn’t have to check her calendar to know that she was unavailable for a late appointment that evening.
“Oh, okay. I understand. What about tomorrow after five? I’m sorry; I know it’s probably inconvenient for you, but I’m in meetings all day, every day, and you were referred to me by a friend who said you do late appointments.”
“I do sometimes. I just don’t usually do them the same day. And I can’t tomorrow,” she said, checking her calendar for her next after-five-o’clock opening. “What about Thursday?”
“I can’t Thursday. I have a dinner.”
“Well, I can send you a booking link where you can find an opening that could work for you. I’m actually on the road right now, and I’m not supposed to be using my phone.”
“Yeah, send me the link,” the woman replied. “I’ll find something. I’ve got a bad back. I should mention that to you, right?”
“Yes. That applies to any areas you need me to avoid or pay attention to. You can put that all in the form when you book your appointment as well,” Lacey told her.
“It’s from a car accident about five years ago. I tried a chiropractor, but he was useless. They said it was whiplash after the accident, but physical therapy didn’t help, so I was hoping a more traditional massage might work. It’s my neck, too.”
Lacey shook her head as she tried to focus on the traffic she was sitting in while she was trying to get this woman off the phone.
“I’ll pay double if you can do six tonight,” the woman added. “I’ve been in a lot of pain recently.”
“I’m sorry; I really can’t. I’m not even in town tonight. And while massage can offer pain relief, I can’t promise that I’ll be able to–”
“Oh, I know,” the woman interjected. “Did you send me the link already? I don’t have it in my messages.”
“No, I’m driving, so you’re on my Bluetooth. I was going to send it to you when I get to where I’m going in about thirty minutes or so.”
“And you offer late appointments?”
Lacey wanted to throw the phone she wasn’t even holding out the window.
“Yes, I do. Some nights. It’s first come, first served.”
“Okay. Well, I’ll wait for that link and hope no one else takes the slot I want.”
“I’m sure they won’t, and thank you for calling,” Lacey said.
“I’ll send you a text confirmation for your appointment after it’s booked.
For late appointments, I do require a small deposit, so I hope that’s okay.
It’s because those are the appointments that get canceled the most at the last minute, and I can’t book anything else. ”
“No problem,” the woman said. “I’ll book as soon as I get the link. Thirty minutes, you said?”
“Yes. About that,” she replied.
“Great.”
When the woman hung up without even saying goodbye to her, Lacey breathed a sigh of relief that she’d at least managed to get her off the phone after over fifteen minutes of her rambling about one thing or another.
She did not want to give that woman a massage in the slightest, but it was money, so if the woman was willing to book online and pay the deposit, it wouldn’t matter if she canceled later.
Lacey could also put up with a talkative client if it meant a nice tip for her, and this woman seemed like she’d be a good tipper as long as Lacey let her ramble for an hour.
Lacey was tired. She’d done four massages today, driven from one part of town to the other to do so, and she was now on her way to pick Cameron up for their third date, having insisted on going to LA this time since Cameron had gone to Anaheim twice already.
She’d regretted suggesting that since because the traffic was awful, and she was exhausted.
On top of that, she’d only managed to change in a client’s lobby bathroom, so she still smelled like lavender and probably a mix of her other lotions and oils.
She wished she’d had time to take a shower and do her hair, but time had not been on her side today, and she didn’t want to be late.
She pulled up to the gate and suddenly felt very strange.
This was Kennedy’s house with Cameron, but she was about to pick Cameron up to go on a date with her.
It was too late to back out now, but she’d packed a bag and had moved all her morning appointments tomorrow so that she could stay over.
She hadn’t asked Cameron if she could; she just wanted to be prepared in case it happened, but she’d packed without even thinking about the fact that they would be sleeping here.
Yes, Cameron had slept over at Lacey’s, but this felt different.
That was a rented apartment and a bed that Lacey had had for years, and while she hadn’t had many relationships, she hadn’t been a virgin when she’d met River, so she’d slept with more than one woman in that bed.
She didn’t think it was a big deal. It wasn’t like people bought a new bed every time they had a new partner.
Yet, she didn’t know that she could sleep in the same bed that Cameron and Kennedy had probably bought together, or even in a guest room bed that Kennedy had picked out.
Lacey pressed the button, and the buzzer went off.
The gate moved aside to let her in, and she drove up, half-expecting Kennedy to be pulling out of the garage, given what had happened the last time she’d been here, but when the garage door didn’t open, she got out of the car and walked toward Cameron’s door.
“Hey,” Cameron greeted her with a wide smile.
“Hi,” Lacey said. “Hey, any chance you could drive tonight? I’m exhausted, and all my massage stuff is in my car. I’d rather not park it by the restaurant if I can help it.”
“Yeah, sure. Are you okay? Come in.”
“I’d rather not, if that’s okay. I made a reservation at this place I looked up online. I hope it’s good. Mexican food.”
“I like Mexican. Lace, are you really okay?”
“It just took me way too long to get here, and I had a prospective client call me, and– It doesn’t matter. Sorry.”
“You don’t have to apologize. You can vent if you want. I need to get my car out of the garage, but you can pull yours into it. It’s a three-car garage, and mine’s the only one in there, so there’s plenty of space. Give me a second if you don’t want to come in.”
“I’m good out here.”
Cameron nodded before she walked inside, and Lacey waited for her outside. This was the strangest beginning to a date she had ever had, and she knew it was her fault, but she didn’t know what to do about it.
“I should’ve canceled,” she said once she was in Cameron’s car.
“What? Why?”
“You don’t deserve me being in this mood.”
“Babe, we’re dating. That’s kind of how this works. Tell me about your day. Also, tell me where we’re going.”
Cameron reached for Lacey’s hand and pulled it into her lap as she backed them out of her driveway.
“Cam, I brought a bag. Should I not have?”
“No, you absolutely should have. I want you to stay.”
“I… can’t stay in that house. I didn’t even think about it until right before I got here.”
“Oh,” Cameron said. “I figured there was a reason you didn’t want to go inside.”
“It’s your house with her.”
“I know. But it’s not forever, and it won’t be for long.
I’m working on it. I can get us a hotel room tonight, if you want.
I can order us fancy room service breakfast, and we can eat it in bed.
” She lifted Lacey’s hand to her lips and kissed it.
“Shit. You probably have to leave super early. I should’ve just gone to you, Lace. I don’t mind.”
“You’ve gone twice already.”
“So? I don’t care. I’m not working right now, and I want to spend time with you,” Cameron told her as Lacey pulled up the restaurant’s address on her phone and held it out for Cameron to see before she got them on the main road. “Oh, I go there all the time. Cool.”
“What? You do?” Lacey asked.
“Yeah. It’s great.”
“I was trying to take you someplace you’d never been.”
“It’s, like, ten minutes away from my house, Lace.”
“You’ve been there with Kennedy?”
“No, actually. She’s not a fan of Mexican food. I go there with friends or just by myself to pick it up on the way home from work or something. It’s one of my favorite places.”
“Cam, is this too soon?”
Cameron pulled up to a red light and turned to her.
“Not to me. Is it to you?”
“I don’t want to go into your house because of the ghost of your ex-girlfriend.”
“And I didn’t want to sleep in the same bed where you’d had sex with River. I think that’s pretty normal, Lacey.”
“I know, but you shouldn’t have to get us a hotel room.”
“I don’t mind. Hotels around here are nice. And I like spoiling you, remember? Are you worried that we’re jumping into things too fast?”
“I’m worried that I live there, and you live here. I had to cancel morning appointments and skip a late one tonight to get here.”
“Why did you cancel your morning appointments?”
“Because I wanted to stay over. If I hadn’t, I’d have to leave by, like, six to miss some of the traffic, and I didn’t want to do that.”
The light changed, so Cameron turned back to the road.
“Babe, I know you have a business and that you need to work. I really don’t mind coming to you.”
“For how long?”
“What do you mean?”
“How long will you make the drive?”
“However long I need to. Honestly, if I get sick of it, I’ll just get a car and have someone else drive me there. I want to have as much time with you as possible, and I liked waking up next to you the other morning.”
Lacey smiled and said, “I liked it, too.”
“And I’m working on the other stuff as well,” Cameron said. “Kennedy and I are over, so I’m going to figure out my living situation so that if you do come, it won’t be in a place that we used to share.”
“I can’t promise the same. I have a lease I have to keep.”
“I know that. I’m not asking you to move.” Cameron chuckled and turned right at the next light. “Is it wrong that I really do want to buy you a new bed, though? Not just because of you and River, but because you said it’s old and it hurts your back.”