Chapter Thirty #2
“Dinner?” Juliette said, looking to Charlie expectantly.
This was his chance to take an out, to claim some emergency surgery or patient freak-out or whatever and bail.
She couldn’t even blame him if he did. Sure, he hadn’t bothered to call, but neither had she.
Maybe it was better that they went their separate ways, went back to being Doctor Dud and the Ice Queen.
Whatever was brewing between them felt like it might have the power to derail her life entirely.
“I’d love to,” Charlie said, quiet but sure. “What about you, Juliette?”
What about her? What did she want? She knew what she needed—she needed to get back to work, get back to finding the missing manuscript, get back to putting everything to right that had gone so wrong lately.
But whenever she looked at Charlie, she couldn’t focus on things like revenge, or success, or old grudges and new problems. Weirdly enough, when she looked at Charlie, she couldn’t focus on much of anything except Charlie.
And while she knew she should leave, her rule-breaking rebellious self wanted nothing more than to stay and find out where things could go with Charlie Hawkins, given the chance.
“Dinner smells amazing,” Juliette said, holding the bone behind her back.
And for the first time in so long Juliette couldn’t remember the last time, she spent the evening having fun.
Not worrying about the state of business affairs at Simon Says; not hate-scrolling Instagram and obsessively deep-diving Juniper’s stories from a burner account; not obsessively googling ten-year-old golf tournaments, European supermodels, and society-page blind items related to undeserving heirs of local business scions.
They talked books, of course—Kate’s newest series was developing at a promising rate, though not fast enough to save the publisher if Juliette didn’t get her hands on Warren’s missing memoir.
But Juliette couldn’t say so, and for one night alone she didn’t let herself worry about it.
The investigation would still be there tomorrow, and even Juliette Winters deserved a night off.
“I end up upside down, all my delicate bits hanging in the breeze, while this arsehole makes the jump and leaves me hanging!” Jake said, pointing at his brother with a mock scowl. “Took me twenty minutes to get untangled from that vine, and it left a nasty rash I don’t need to mention where.”
“You did already mention your delicate bits,” Kate reminded him with a gentle pat on his hand.
“Though I’m glad they made a full recovery.
But when you told me this story for the third Wandering Australian book, you conveniently left out the part where you were naked, which begs the question where you were keeping the pocketknife you used to cut yourself down. ”
“We all have our secrets,” Jake said.
“In my defense,” Charlie said, holding up a hand, “I told you that plant was poisonous before you insisted on swinging out on it.”
“A good older brother would risk poisonous moth vine to save his little brother,” Jake charged.
“A good little brother would listen when his older brother told him not to touch the stuff in the first place,” Charlie said primly, looking every inch the know-it-all.
But there was a touch of playful humor to his expression, something Juliette hadn’t noticed before.
Was he … teasing? Was Charlie Hawkins capable of such an action?
She found it oddly adorable and compelling.
Juliette leaned closer to Kate. “Is this a weird sibling rivalry thing between them? Because I’m an only child and I don’t understand sibling dynamics.”
“I actually think this is their love language,” Kate murmured back as the brothers continued arguing the true mark of a good brother.
Juliette eyed them. “If this ends in a friendly bout of wrestling, I’m not helping you clean up.”
“Charlie would never,” Kate said, though Juliette noted she left Jake out.
“I’m just so glad they’re talking. Everything Jake has ever told me about their dad has been an absolute nightmare.
He not only encouraged the sibling rivalry, he engineered it.
Charlie was always his favorite, always doing what their dad wanted.
Never pushing back. Jake hasn’t met an authority figure he hasn’t wanted to thumb his nose at.
It really drove a wedge between them for years, until they moved here and got away from him. ”
“That explains the obsessive rule following,” Juliette murmured, watching Charlie animatedly recount a cave diving experience the brothers had back in Australia.
He was always so serious and self-controlled, which Juliette normally found hot in a guy.
But this version of Charlie—more relaxed, smiling and even daring to laugh, one arm trailing along the back of his chair and his fingers absently drumming against the table as he talked—this Charlie was a far more dangerous creature.
This Charlie, she had the capacity to actually like.
“Good thing I had that emergency, huh?” Kate said, as if she could read the trending nature of Juliette’s increasingly intimate thoughts. She really had to stop staring at his hands.
“I will be blocking your number on my phone,” Juliette said, still watching the mesmerizing tattoo Charlie’s fingers made against the wooden tabletop.
“Oh, I agree, Juliette,” Kate said, raising her voice. “It is getting late. Look at the time!”
“Babe, it’s nine thirty,” Jake said.
Kate faked a yawn, stretching her arms out wide for extra emphasis in case anyone missed it. “And I am totally beat. All that tray carrying took it right out of me. But this was fun! We should definitely do it again. Charlie, you can give Juliette a ride home, right?”
“I’m good, thanks,” Juliette said quickly.
“Nonsense,” Kate said, moving at a rapid pace to clear plates and drinks after having just claimed to be totally beat. “Juliette’s apartment is on your way home anyway, Charlie.”
“It is not,” Juliette protested, even though she wasn’t entirely sure where Charlie lived. She narrowed her gaze at Kate. “I see what you’re doing, and it’s not necessary.”
“What? Keeping you safe?” Kate made big eyes at her.
“No, trying to make us—”
“I’ll take you,” Charlie said, cutting their conversation short. The look he gave Juliette was steady and unfathomable. “Really, I don’t mind.”
“Saves you being murdered by a psychotic driver,” Kate said sagely, as if that happened every time a single woman took a rideshare.
“You need professional counseling,” Juliette said to her, matter-of-fact. “Which is saying a lot, coming from me. Really, Charlie, it’s okay. You don’t—”
“I’d like to,” he said, quiet but firm.
“Okay,” she found herself saying. It was that damn tone of his, the one that sounded like a command even when he spoke so softly. She found herself wondering what else he could make her do, if he used that tone. “Thanks.”
Kate bundled them up and sent them off in record time, making very suggestive eyes as she wished them sweet dreams. They rode to Juliette’s apartment in relative silence, not uncomfortable, but still charged.
As if they were each waiting for the other one to break.
The languid effects of the cocktails and the pleasant evening made Juliette’s head feel fuzzy and bright.
Or maybe that was being in such a small space with Charlie Hawkins.
“How does a man over six feet tall drive a compact?” she asked finally, when it felt like something would explode out of her if one of them didn’t say speak.
Charlie quirked a half smile at her. “It makes getting around the city easier.”
“So does a moped, but you don’t see me Roman Holiday–ing it around town,” Juliette said.
“I like it,” Charlie said simply. “It’s convenient.”
“Is it?” Juliette challenged, thinking of Kate’s comments about their homelife. “Or were you just taught to fit yourself into small spaces?”
Charlie gave her a long-side eye. “Really? We’re psychoanalyzing me now?”
“No,” she said, miffed because she’d been doing exactly that. Old habits died hard, no matter how many times she tried to kill them. “I just think we don’t have to make ourselves small so other people can feel big. We’re allowed to take up the space we need.”
“Are we still talking about me?” Charlie asked.
“I’m talking about anyone who’s ever been made to feel small,” Juliette said with a wave that could have encompassed the entire world.
“You seem like a decent guy who had an enormous amount of pressure put on you since birth. You let that asshole Rajiv shit-talk you to your face, and your ex is a controlling, manipulative nightmare. You don’t have to be so nice to everyone all the time. Be a little mean. It’s hot.”
Charlie sighed. “My relationship with Katarina was complicated.”
“You mean because she triggered your people-pleasing tendencies created by an overly demanding father who constantly projected his own insecurities onto you?”
Charlie blinked. “I more meant that it was difficult to divide our things after we broke up, but I suppose you might have a point. A very specific, sharp-edged point.”
Juliette pursed her lips. “You know what? Your dad and your ex aren’t worth talking about.
What we should talk about is you walking me up to my apartment.
In case there are any unscrupulous rideshare drivers lurking in my stairwell.
You should probably check out the interior of my apartment as well, in case they’ve snuck inside.
Wouldn’t you feel bad if you drove me all this way only to see my beautiful mug on the ten o’clock news?
Although I would make a great missing person. ”
Charlie gave her a long, searching look, his emotions too tightly controlled to reveal anything on his face.
But there was something in his eyes, the way they lingered, the tension in his hand against the gearshift.
She hadn’t realized he’d stopped drumming.
Somehow, somewhere along the way, she’d become attuned to his frequencies, and now he was radiating tension.
No. Not tension. Anticipation.
“I should go,” he said, with a strong undercurrent of convince me not to. Juliette shifted sideways in her seat, crossing the center line of the center console.
“Wouldn’t you rather … come?”
“Jesus, Juliette,” Charlie muttered on a sharp exhale. “I’m trying to do the right thing.”
“Yes, I know. I thought you were obsessed with rules, but I was wrong. You’re obsessed with being a good little boy.
Doing everything right, all the time, by everyone.
But I don’t care about doing the right thing, Charlie.
Being good all the time makes you a side character in someone else’s story.
Or worse, it makes you the hero, which is boring as shit.
I am giving you my explicit permission to do very, very bad things to me, Charlie Hawkins.
And I’m very, very good at them. It doesn’t have to be anything more than that. ”
Charlie didn’t answer—or couldn’t, perhaps, considering how tight every muscle in his body must have been right then—but he didn’t break her gaze, either. She’d strip naked and have her way with him right there on the street if he so much as touched her with his pinkie finger, but he didn’t answer.
“You’ve been so good for so long,” Juliette said, caressing the air between them with the low vibrations of her voice. “Don’t you want to be bad?”
“I’ll come,” Charlie said, his voice a croak. “Up, I mean. I’ll come up.”
Juliette smirked. “Yes, you will.”