Chapter 25
There’s a knock on the door while I’m starting dinner. I pause chopping and walk over, not sure who to expect since hardly anyone knows I’m living here.
I peek through the peephole, then swing the door open. “Fancy running into you here.”
“Right back at ya.” Wren strides past me without waiting for an invitation to enter. “Where’s Rory?”
“Work.” I shut the door. “She should be home soon.”
I check the clock, which I’ve done repeatedly for the twenty minutes I’ve been home.
I left the office on time, taking some files home to review later, so I would beat Rory and have time to make a special dinner.
I wasn’t expecting her sister to show up, and this is a rare time when I’m not thrilled to see Wren.
Her being here equals me not being alone with Rory, and being alone with Rory is basically all I’ve thought about all day.
“You’re cooking?” Wren casts a surprised, impressed look over her shoulder as she wanders deeper into the apartment. “Smells good.”
“One of my many talents,” I tell her, walking back over to the cutting board. “Can I get you anything to drink?”
“Does Rory have any wine?”
“I don’t think so. You can have some of my scotch.” I nod toward the bar cart beside the bookcase, empty aside from one bottle.
“Wait, is that a litter box? Did Rory get a cat?”
Shit, I forgot to feed Finch. She never meows or begs the way a pet typically does.
Wren watches me spoon some wet food out of the can and into Finch’s bowl. Finch appears a few seconds later, hearing the spoon tap against the metal bowl, tail flicking as she sniffs at the contents.
“Oh my God,” Wren whispers, crouching down to peer at Finch. “Is it a boy? Girl? What’s its name?”
“She’s a girl. Her name is Finch.”
Wren beams. “Like the bird?”
“Like the—” I smell the smoke a second before the alarm starts going off. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”
Finch sprints down the hall toward the bedrooms with a high-pitched yowl. Probably to hide under my bed.
Wren straightens, covering her ears with her hands, shouting, “Shut it off!”
“I wasn’t exactly planning to keep listening,” I yell back, although my first priority is shutting off the burner beneath the burned rice that I was planning to serve with the halibut.
Once that’s taken care of, I turn the vent hood up to its highest setting. Then I drag one of the stools under the alarm and hold the button that shuts it off until blissful silence replaces the screeching.
“I think I have permanent hearing damage,” Wren says.
I huff a laugh as I climb back down. “More importantly, dinner is ruined.”
Wren sticks her tongue out at me. “I will take that drink.”
“Coming right up.” I grab the scotch and two glasses off the bar cart, carrying them over to the island counter.
Wren has taken a seat on one of the stools. “You keep a lot of stuff here,” she comments, eyes darting from the bottle to the Yankees cap by the door to the stack of folders beside her elbow with my firm’s name printed on the cover.
“I live here.”
Her wandering gaze flies back to me. “You live here?”
“Uh-huh.” I pour a glass and slide it toward her.
“Since when?”
I think. “Almost a month.”
“Ho-ly sh-it.” She exaggerates each syllable. “That’s very adult.”
“We are adults.”
“Rory? Yes. You?” Wren smirks. “Debatable.”
“Things change.” I lift my glass, tilting it toward her. “Like you drinking legally.”
“I’ll cheers to that.”
Our glasses tap.
After we’ve both swallowed a sip, she asks, “Have you lived with a girlfriend before?”
“Uh, no.” I glance at the clock again.
“Rory’s never lived with a boyfriend before.”
“I know.”
“That’s a big step for her, especially after what happened with Carson.”
“I know,” I repeat.
“If you hurt her, I’m never talking to you again. I don’t care how long you and Kit have been friends for.”
“Good,” I state. “I’d deserve it.”
I’ve seen Rory support her sister dozens of times.
But this is the first time I’ve witnessed a clear reversal of their roles, and it makes me happy.
It’s the loyalty Rory deserves. From everyone, but especially from those she always shows up for.
I witnessed her comfort Wren’s heartbreak during one of the many occasions Carson proved how little he deserved her.
I’m only realizing in retrospect how selfless that moment was.
I’m not sure Wren has. It’s easy to take someone for granted when generosity is all you’ve ever received from them.
“You would,” Wren agrees. “That being said, I think you’re good for her. Good together. You push her, and she lets you. That’s rare.” She smiles, but it falls quickly, one of her fingers circling the rim of the glass.
It occurs to me that Wren showing up here, randomly, might be an indication something is wrong. I’m not sure if it’s my place to ask since I’m not actually dating her sister and I’m not a member of her family, no matter how many times they’ve included me, but I do anyway.
“Everything okay?”
Wren sighs. “I got into a fight with Sawyer.”
“What sort of fight?”
“A bad one. I bought him a watch. He hated it.”
“He said that?”
“He said that I was trying to turn him into someone else. And to not buy him anything that costs more than a hundred dollars. That leaves, like, nothing.”
I squash a smile. “Did he say he wanted a watch?”
“Well, no. But I thought it was a thing for guys. You’re wearing a fancy one.
” She nods at my wrist. “Crew and Scarlett gifted Kit and Bash watches when they graduated high school. Sawyer and I weren’t together then.
But now … I thought he could wear it to presentations or job interviews or to Lili’s wedding. It’s practical.”
“Practical to you. My guess is, the guys Sawyer hangs out with don’t wear watches worth more than most cars.”
“It was a gift. Who cares how much it costs?”
“He does, Wren. And he should. You don’t want to be with a guy who treats you like a bank.”
Wren sniffs. “I don’t want to be with a guy too proud to accept a Rolex either.”
I smile. “Yeah, you do. I was there, on New Year’s Eve, remember?
After seeing that, I swear I’d be telling you to ditch his ass if I hadn’t seen how ridiculously happy he’s made you since then.
You guys didn’t magically become different people when you started dating.
You are different. You really thought he wouldn’t care if you spent a ton of money on him? ”
“I thought it’d be easier now. I love Sawyer exactly how he is. I’m not trying to change him. I just … I was trying to make him more comfortable at events he comes to with me, where guys do wear watches worth more than most cars.”
“Did you tell him that?”
A sheepish smile appears. “I told him there were a lot of hot guys in Montreal who know how to properly appreciate a gift.”
“Nice de-escalating, Wren.”
“Yeah.” She releases a long breath. “Things have been going so well between us. It’s been a perfect summer. I’m about to go back to school, and I’m … I’m scared to do long distance. I’m worried everything will fall apart again as soon as we’re apart.”
I study the contents of my glass. I’m the last person Wren should be coming to for dating advice. My love life has been a series of failed relationships, and my current one isn’t even real. “That would have been another good thing to mention to Sawyer.”
Wren sighs again, raising her glass and draining it. “I know. Saying it is harder than knowing you should say it.”
“Knowing you should say it is a good first step.”
We’re both silent, thinking, so I hear the key slide into the lock. I glance at the door right as it opens. Rory enters, balancing two binders and the travel mug she transports her morning coffee in.
I’ve seen Rory Kensington, sporadically, for almost twenty years. But this is the first time she’s appeared and been all that I see.
I barely register her surprised exclamation of her sister’s name or Wren’s ensuing explanation of the spat with Sawyer, causing her to return to Manhattan earlier than planned for Lili’s bachelorette party this weekend.
I watch Rory set her keys in the ceramic bowl by the door, kick off her heels, and approach the island, her attention on Wren as she continues listening to the story.
“I’ll take those,” I say, reaching for the binders.
“Oh, uh, thanks.” She releases her hold, eyes quickly meeting mine.
I kiss her. Hasty, with no tongue, because Wren is sitting only a few feet away, but I tug the end of her ponytail, too, before carrying the papers over to the kitchen table, where we normally work in the evenings.
When I turn back around, Wren has stood. “Okay then. I’m out of here.”
“I thought you were staying for dinner,” I say, walking back into the kitchen.
Wren glances at the pot of burned rice. “No, thanks. If I leave now, I’ll make it back to the Hamptons by ten.” She hugs Rory. “See you Friday.” Then she walks over and hugs me too. “Thanks for the talk.”
“Anytime. Say hi to Sawyer.”
“I will.” Wren walks away, calling, “Bye, Finch,” over her shoulder before the door slams shut behind her.
Rory sets her mug on the counter with a clank. “Sounds like you guys had quite the—”
My mouth covers hers before she has a chance to finish that sentence. Rory hums, rising up on her tiptoes and looping her arms around my shoulders. I run my hands down her back, palming her ass and pulling her flush against my growing erection.
I leave her lips and kiss a line along her jaw. “How was your day?”
“Good,” she gasps. “Busy. You?”
“Long.” I grind my aching dick against her. “Hard.”
Her eyelids flutter, her breathing choppy and uneven. “You’re home early.”
“So are you.”
Rory’s hands slide down my chest, stopping at my belt. She begins working on the buckle, not bothering to pull the leather free from the loops before she unbuttons and unzips my suit pants. My dick is literally weeping with relief when she pulls it free from the fabric prison.
“Why does it smell like smoke in here?”
“I …” My hips thrust deeper into her grip as she fists my swollen cock. “I burned dinner.”
“Did the alarm go off?”