Chapter Twenty-Seven
I stood behind him as he unlocked the door and breathed in his now familiar scent. The cologne he’d put on in the morning
was long gone, so what I was greedily inhaling was all Ben. He opened the door abruptly and turned around.
“After you.”
Crossing the threshold into his room felt momentous. We were about to be alone alone without the potential for witnesses, for the first time since that night in Switzerland. The door clicking shut behind
him sounded like a starter pistol.
I wasn’t sure where to go once I was inside, because the desk and only chair were claimed by equipment. His room looked smaller
than mine because of the sloped ceiling by the window. It seemed like the bed with the bright white bedspread filled the entire
space.
“Are you hungry?” Ben asked. “Because I have apples.”
“I just had two slices, which is more pizza than I’ve eaten in”—I tried to calculate my last forbidden dinner—“A long time.
I’m good.”
Normally I’d be stressing out about the deviation from my meal planning, especially with the countdown clock at full speed. Being with Ben lately had forced me to act like a normal civilian who didn’t equate enjoying food with guilt.
“Sorry I don’t have many seating options.” He jutted his chin at the sole chair in the small room.
“I can stand.”
He smiled. “Now you’re the one not giving Neil enough credit.”
I felt my cheeks go hot, because sex jokes landed differently in a room with a bed. I moved toward it and gingerly sat on
the edge.
“I want to say make yourself comfortable but that sounds like bad seventies porn,” he said as he perched on the opposite corner.
“Are you implying that there’s good seventies porn?” I asked.
“I mean . . .” He shrugged. “That era introduced a bunch of the scenarios still in use today, so good or bad, it’s got staying
power.”
“You’re an expert in vintage porn?”
He threw his head back and cackled. “Oh, god no. But everyone knows the tropes.”
“I sure don’t.”
“You’re telling me you don’t know the pizza-delivery-guy scenario,” Ben asked, incredulous.
“Oh, that,” I nodded sagely. “Yeah, of course.”
“And the porn stache, and sax music,” he added.
“Okay, maybe I know more than I realized,” I laughed.
It was odd that talking about antique dirty movies finally made me feel comfortable being alone with him. It put some distance
between us and the Very Big Possibility looming in front of us. Or between us, since we were now both stretched out on opposite sides of his bed.
But laughing about sex made it feel like whatever was simmering between us was our own trope. Two people who didn’t want to admit how badly they wanted each other, alone in a hotel room with nothing to do, ha-ha, let the bom-chicka-wow-wow commence.
And then there was the almost-kiss just a few hours before that we were both trying to ignore.
“Hotel bedspreads are gross,” Ben said. “We should take it off.”
I narrowed my eyes at him. “That sounds like something someone would say in a porn.”
“Oh? So you think I’m trying to seduce you by mentioning dirty linens?”
“Are you trying to seduce me?”
I blurted it out before I could stop myself, and my body went numb from the tidal wave of embarrassment.
“Yes,” he replied. “I mean, no. But only because of—”
“The agreement,” we finished in unison.
But . . . we were in the liminal space of a hotel room, during a snowstorm. A break in real life before I was back to regimented
daily sameness. Maybe the rules didn’t apply here? I took a deep breath as an insane idea infiltrated my good girl brain.
I sat up and leaned against the headboard. “Is it possible to amend the agreement?”
Ben tipped his head. “Depends.”
It was out of character for me to even think it let alone say the words out loud, so I forced myself to keep going.
“Let’s call it the Blizzard Clause.” I prepared for mortification and pushed on. “One night. You and me. Then we never discuss
it again.”
Ben sat up slowly, his eyes wide from disbelief. “Quinn, hold on. We can’t—”
“Why not?” I demanded.
I was so desperate for him that I didn’t care that I was verging on begging him to sleep with me.
Ben looked adorably flummoxed. “Well, for all the reasons we’ve talked about. Focus. Distraction. Goals.”
“Okay,” I said, feeling like I was an attorney about to give my closing argument. I crossed my legs on the bed. “I hear you.
However, we already have an agreement in place that we’re doing a fine job honoring. True or false?”
“True, I guess?” Ben answered slowly.
“Exactly. Which means that if we were to introduce an amendment to it we wouldn’t have a problem honoring it as well.”
He frowned at me. “That’s sort of a leap of logic. And there’s no way I want to put anything in jeopardy, Quinn.”
“Oh my god, Ben!” I smacked the bed. “Don’t gatekeep sex!”
He laughed at me, which made me even more determined to prove my point.
“I’m serious. We agree to the Blizzard Clause, we get it out of our system, then the minute we leave Connecticut we forget it happened.
Because I need you to know that this all-important ‘focus’ of mine that you keep mentioning? It’s completely consumed by you.”
His eyes settled on me with any levity gone. I continued with my closing appeal.
“You’d be doing me a favor,” I insisted.
“By sleeping with you,” he replied, incredulous.
“Yes, exactly. It would help me recapture my focus. One-time offer, only good for tonight,” I insisted, even though I wasn’t sure I agreed with that part.
I watched his profile as he grappled with what it could mean to both of us. Ben was obviously perfectly equipped to fuck and run based on his dating history, so I was sure that he was considering how guilty he’d feel if I choked in Italy due to our one glorious night.
Which, hello ego.
“I’m sure it’s an exceptional penis,” I assured Ben. “But it ain’t magical. I’ll be fine, I promise.”
After a few seconds of silence Ben finally stood up slowly and walked around to my side of the bed.
He held his hand out to me. “I’d like to formally ratify the Blizzard Clause.”