Chapter 22
The movie ended.
Credits rolled. Lights came up slowly. People stood, stretched, and gathered their things around us.
Andrew’s arm slid off my shoulders as he stood, and I immediately felt the absence of it.
I sat there for a second too long, my brain still trying to process the last two hours.
Ben on screen—beautiful, talented, performing like he always did.
Like the camera loved him because it did, like everyone loved him because they did.
I didn’t know what any of it meant. Couldn’t reconcile the man on screen with the memory of who he’d been to me, couldn’t reconcile the man beside me with the professional boundaries that were supposed to exist.
My chest felt tight. Too much input, too many emotions I didn’t have names for.
“You coming or what?” Andrew looked down at me, eyebrow raised.
I stood quickly. Followed him out.
We walked through the lobby, past families and couples and teenagers taking selfies. Andrew moved through them easily, nodding at a few people who recognized him but not stopping. He looked—
Happy.
Relaxed in a way I’d never seen him. His shoulders loose, a half-smile playing at his mouth like he’d actually enjoyed himself.
Meanwhile, my brain was screaming.
What just happened? What does this mean?
It felt like a date. His arm was around me for two hours.
Two hours. While I watched my ex-boyfriend pretend to solve crimes on screen.
What is my life? What am I doing? This is my boss.
This is Andrew Knox. I need this job. Angelica needs me to keep this job.
Why is he smiling like that? Why does he look so—
“That movie was fucking terrible,” Andrew said, grinning.
“What?”
Outside, the air was cold. Sharp. I breathed it in, tried to clear my head.
It didn’t help.
“Terrible. The plot made no sense. Guy’s supposed to be a detective but misses obvious clues for two hours? And that twist?” He laughed, actually laughed. “I saw it coming from the first scene.”
“I—yeah. The movie wasn’t great.”
“Wasn’t great? It was dogshit.” He looked at me, still grinning, blue eyes bright. “But you.” He pointed at me. “You telling off those kids? That was fucking awesome.”
My face heated. “I didn’t—”
“‘If you want to talk, leave,’” Andrew mimicked, his voice mockingly serious but clearly delighted. “Very professional, Quinn. Very calm and collected.”
“They were kicking our seats.”
“For like thirty seconds.”
“It was disruptive.”
“You were ready to throw them out of the theater.” He was still grinning, looking at me like I’d done something entertaining. “I thought you were going to get up and drag them out yourself.”
“I was trying to watch the movie.”
“Yeah right. You hate that actor.” Andrew’s grin turned knowing. “You were white-knuckling it through every scene he was in.”
My stomach dropped. “I wasn’t—”
“Matthew. You looked like you were about to combust.” He stepped closer, voice lower but still amused.
I couldn’t breathe.
He was happy. Genuinely happy. Relaxed and smiling and looking at me like—like this had been fun. Like this had been easy.
And I was falling apart.
“I should get home,” I said. Too fast. Too abrupt.
Andrew’s smile faded slightly. “You okay?”
“Yeah. Just tired.”
He studied me for a long moment. I couldn’t tell what he saw.
“Okay,” he said finally. “I’ll drive you.”
“You don’t have to—”
“I’m driving you, Quinn.” Not a question. Not a suggestion. Just Andrew being Andrew.
We walked to his car in silence.
He was still relaxed. Still in a good mood.
I was still spiraling.
Did he notice I was tense? Did he notice I couldn’t stop thinking about Ben on screen and him beside me and how fucked up all of this is?
Andrew unlocked the car.
“You really hated that movie, huh?” he said as we got in.
“It was fine.”
“Liar.” He was smiling, and I couldn’t ignore the way that made me feel no matter how much I tried. “You got so tense I thought you were gonna turn around and throttle those kids.”
“I was not going to—”
“The mom apologized so fast. She thought you were gonna call security.”
“I would never—”
“You looked like a principal. A very angry principal.”
I glared at him. “Are you done?”
“No.” He laughed, low and genuine. “That was the best part of the whole movie. Watching you lose it on a ten-year-old.”
“I didn’t lose it.”
“You absolutely did.”
“I was trying to help,” I muttered.
“You did help. They shut the fuck up.” Andrew started the engine, pulled out of the parking spot. “The intimidation thing.” He glanced at me. “It was hot.”
My brain stopped working.
Every synapse fired at once then immediately flatlined. Hot. He said hot. Andrew Knox just called me hot for yelling at children in a movie theater.
What was the appropriate response to that? Was there an appropriate response? Should I laugh? Deflect? Pretend I didn’t hear it?
“Hot?”
The word came out strangled. Barely functional.
“Yeah.” He said it like it was obvious. Like commenting on the weather. Like he hadn’t just detonated a bomb in the enclosed space of his very expensive car.
I stared at him. He focused on the road, completely unbothered, one hand on the wheel, the other resting on the gearshift.
I could feel the heat spreading down my neck, across my chest. My hands didn’t know what to do. I pressed them against my thighs, then moved them to my knees, then gave up and shoved them under my legs.
“You can’t just—”
“What?” He glanced at me again, smirking now. Actually smirking. “Tell you you’re hot when you’re bossy? Pretty sure I can.”
Oh my god.
He was doing this on purpose. He knew exactly what he was doing—the same way he’d known what he was doing when he sat directly next to me instead of leaving space, when he’d draped his arm over my shoulders, when he’d squeezed and traced circles with his thumb.
And I had no idea how to exist in the same enclosed space as this information.
My pulse was too fast. My breathing shallow. The car suddenly felt smaller, the air thicker. I needed to say something. Anything. A normal human response.
Nothing came out.
I didn’t know what to say to that.
Couldn’t form a coherent thought beyond: Andrew Knox thinks I’m hot. Andrew Knox said it out loud. Andrew Knox is sitting two feet away from me and he just called me hot and he’s SMIRKING about it.
We drove in silence for a few blocks. Not uncomfortable, exactly. Just... loaded. Heavy with everything unsaid.
Well. Not everything unsaid. He’d said plenty.
I stared out the window, watching Boston blur past, trying to regulate my nervous system back to baseline.
It wasn’t working.
“The detective guy was supposed to be charming,” Andrew said eventually. “Didn’t work.”
“Benjamin Harroway,” I said before I could stop myself.
“That his name?”
“Yeah.” I looked out the window. “The movie was bad.”
“Fucking terrible.”
The car purred beneath us, engine smooth, expensive. I was still too keyed up to relax, too busy replaying the last two hours. The arm around my shoulders. The thumb tracing circles. It was hot.
What did any of it mean?
What was I supposed to do with it?
Andrew shifted gears and merged onto the highway. I didn’t notice we’d taken the wrong exit until we were already pulling into the underground garage.
I blinked, looked around. “This isn’t—”
“My place,” Andrew finished. He pulled into his spot, killed the engine.
The garage was quiet. Empty except for a few other high-end cars parked in their designated spaces. Concrete and fluorescent lights and the echo of the engine ticking as it cooled.
My heart rate spiked.
“Why are we—”
“Because I live here.” He turned to face me, one arm draped over the steering wheel. “And I didn’t feel like driving you home yet.”
I stared at him.
He stared back.
The air in the car felt impossible. Thick. Charged with everything we weren’t saying.
“Andrew—”
“I’m trying to do the right thing here, Quinn.” He shifted closer, just slightly. Enough that I could see the tension in his jaw, the way his eyes tracked my face like he was memorizing it.
We sat there, engine off, garage silent, streetlight from the entrance casting shadows across his face. His eyes were dark, intense, locked on mine.
The right thing would be to get out of the car. To say goodnight. To go home and process this like a rational adult.
I didn’t move.
Neither did he.
“Fuck it,” Andrew muttered.
And then he leaned across the center console and kissed me.