Chapter 19
March
Five Weeks Until The Wedding
“So, how is this going to work again?” Trip stands with his hands on his hips while I sit cross-legged on my living room floor, shuffling a deck of cards. I put on a comfy pair of sweatpants and a T-shirt post-bath. He was decent enough to wait in the living room while I got dressed.
“Strip Honesty War.” The cards make a satisfying shuffling sound as I let go of the bridge. “Basically, the card game War, but every time you lose a card, you have to answer a question of the other person’s choosing. Oh—and you remove a piece of clothing.”
“And the stripping element is relevant how?”
“Because it’s fun.” I grin at him. “Plus, it ups the stakes. We used to play it in college and let’s just say I can get a tad competitive.”
The reality that I haven’t played this in nearly a decade sinks in and settles in my gut. When’s the last time I was this vulnerable—this naked—with someone? I rally against my churning stomach. Screw fear. I’m sick of hiding.
Trip sighs and takes a seat on the floor across from me. “Could’ve fooled me with the whole Guess Who game.” He starts to shrug off his cashmere quarter-zip.
I cough. “You might want to leave that on. Could come in handy in a few minutes.”
He pauses and frowns but pushes his arms back through the sweater.
“Alright, Coldwell. Let’s start.” I deal our hands and arrange them in two neat stacks.
He places his fingertips around the edge of his deck. His knuckles flex and he looks up at me. “No turning back now.”
My throat catches. His meaning is clear. We’re on the precipice of something new here, uncharted territory. “Nothing good back there anyway.”
“Logistically, I won’t be able to pull my own cards.”
“That’s why I chose War. It’s pure chance. There’s no way for me to cheat if I flip your cards for you.”
“Reassuring.” His voice is an engine on a gravel road.
“Ready? One, two, three.”
On the third count, I flip a card from each of our stacks. Four of spades for me, two of clubs for Trip.
“Aha! Sweet victory.” I wiggle my fingers together like a maniacal villain.
Trip glowers.
I stretch my hand out, opening and closing my fist. “Gimme. That sweater’s all mine.”
He reaches behind his shoulders and pulls the fabric of the sweater up and over his head.
Regret hits me when I see that under the cashmere, he wears nothing but a thin white T-shirt that clings to every inch of his torso.
No turning back now. Trip tosses the sweater to me, but it dissolves in midair, no longer attached to his spirit or this world.
“How does the clothes thing work, exactly?”
“You’re going to waste your question on this?”
“Something tells me I’ll get more questions.”
He rolls his eyes. “I don’t know exactly. I basically visualize an outfit and it appears. It must be connected to my mind because I can change with just a thought. Or like what just happened. I remove it and it disappears.”
“So, you could visualize a clown suit and, poof, be in it? A Canadian tuxedo?”
“Nice try.” He looks at me through lowered brows.
“I should’ve had different rules for this game.”
“Too late. Rules are rules.”
“Jeez, someone’s stiff.”
“You have no idea.” His smile is fit for the devil, all my greatest temptations wrapped up in one pair of perfect lips.
I clear my throat. “I think this calls for a little wine. Be right back.” I pad barefoot into my kitchen and take an open bottle of red off the shelf.
There are only a couple of inches left, but I pour it into a glass all the same and brace my hands against the kitchen counter.
What am I doing? The circumstances between Trip and me have always been anything but normal, but the pace at which my feelings are growing is something I’ve experienced only with Carter, and only at age thirteen.
Is it even possible to develop feelings for someone when you’ve spent half of your life in love with someone else?
This is new territory, but I can’t resist seeing where it will lead.
I retrieve my glass from the counter and sit back down at my spot across from Trip in the living room.
He raises a brow. “You good?”
“Yeah.” I take a sip. “Sorry, by the way. That you can’t partake.” I tilt the wineglass toward him.
“No sweat. It’s not my preferred vintage anyway.”
I snort. “Okay, snob. Let’s draw.”
I flip our cards again. This time I have a jack and Trip has a ten.
He whistles as he lets out a breath. “Close one.”
“Hand those pants over, Mr. Coldwell.”
He stares at me, mouth agape. “You’re wicked.”
Trip strips off his chinos, and, poof, they disappear into oblivion. He’s left in only a black pair of boxer briefs, socks, and the unbearable white T-shirt.
“Good thing you visualized some underwear onto yourself today.”
“Good thing.” He mirrors my position on the floor, crossing his legs and resting his forearms on his knees.
“Who has the key to the Carmichael chest?” I blurt.
“Jumping right in, I see.” Trip runs a broad hand through his hair. Somehow his disheveled appearance—his scruff and unkempt hair—paired with the casual ensemble he’s currently wearing make him look more divine than ever. He sighs. “Sabrina has it.”
My hands still in my lap and electric shock runs through my chest. The emotions swarm me before my mind can catch up. Am I having this reaction because Trip knows something personal about Sabrina or because Sabrina is better at keeping secrets from me than I thought?
“Oh.” It’s all I can manage.
“What just happened?” He leans over and points to the spot between my eyebrows. “In there.”
“Nothing.”
“The deal was complete honesty, Elz.”
“It’s not your turn for questions.”
Trip rolls his eyes.
“How do you know she has it?” I take a sip of wine.
“Oh, so you get two questions now?”
“I need to confirm your sources.”
“Fine. But only because I’m feeling generous.” He leans back on his elbows—shirt straining against his biceps—and stretches his legs in front of him. His body practically takes up the entire area of my small living room. “I saw it on her. She wears it on a small chain around her neck.”
“But how recently? They rotate family members, so what are the chances she still has it?”
“Someone’s been doing her homework.” He gives a lazy grin, but it straightens into a flat line. “As recently as three days ago.”
“Have you been…following her?”
He shrugs. “A bit. Figured I couldn’t let you do all the heavy lifting on this quest. Thought maybe she’d lead me to some clues. I first spotted the key around her neck a little over a week ago.”
I nod and swallow the knot in my throat, digging my nails into my palms. Not today, jealousy.
I bite back any kind of retort. My mind swims with visions of Trip following his former love—a montage of him looking at her fondly while she goes about her daily life.
Did he watch her get dressed to see her slip the key around her neck?
I can’t go there. We’ve already had that argument.
I force a smile. “Easy enough, then. She’s certainly the Carmichael we have the most access to.”
“Mhmm.” His brow furrows, but if he means to say something, he lets it go.
“Okay. Again.” I place my hands on top of the decks and flip over the cards at the same time.
I get the six of hearts, Trip the ace of spades. He lets out a boisterous laugh and sits up, rubbing his palms together.
“Would you like to do the honors?” His eyes dance in the low light. The sun is setting outside, and the city lights illuminate the windows.
I groan. “Fine.” I shove my hands into the waistband of my sweatpants and pull them down. My boy-short underwear isn’t all that revealing, so joke’s on him. We’re basically twins in T-shirts and boxer briefs—mirrored versions of each other on opposite sides of the floor.
His eyes follow the line of my legs, all the way from my pink-painted toenails to the hem of my underwear. The whir of the radiator is audible in the silence.
I clear my throat. “Trip.”
“What?” His eyes shoot to mine.
“Your question.”
“Oh. Um.” He scratches his jaw, and his eyes soften. “What makes you happiest?”
“Seriously? That’s what you’re going to ask me?”
“If it makes you feel better, my motives are purely selfish.” There’s hunger in his eyes, an animal nature to his smile. None of that restrained manicured version of him tonight. His edges are rough. Want, want, want. It radiates off his body. Or is it my own?
I look at the floor. It’s hard to think in this room.
What makes me happiest? When’s the last time someone’s even asked me that?
I scan my memories. Dinners with Babcia, study sessions with Yesenia, maybe even Central Park in the fall.
But no, it’s none of those things, because my heart knew the moment he asked the question.
“The ocean,” I say. “I used to go to the shore with my grandmother and my mom. Nothing makes me happier than floating, than diving into the waves.” They would crash into me, over and over. I never wanted to leave.
“When’s the last time you went?” His eyes are kind, curious. The scent of salt water and ocean air fills my senses. His scent. That day at Ruby’s.
I shiver and shrug my shoulders to hide it. “Not in at least ten years. No time.”
He murmurs something I don’t catch.
“Next question?” I reach for the cards.
Trip comes out on top again.
I nip any sort of anticipation in the bud. My fingers skirt the hem of my T-shirt and I lift it up over my head. I glance down at my black cotton bralette—all that’s left covering my top. I adjust the cups so I’m not spilling out of them.
When I look back, Trip’s eyes are dark with an intense focus. He rolls his bottom lip over his teeth.
“Elz,” he croaks. His hands flex on the floor at his sides.
My body is electric, like someone is shooting lightning bolts into my lower abdomen and extremities. No one has ever looked at my body with so much want, so much need.
Trip’s eyes are glazed. “Can I take you to the ocean?”
“Wha—?”
“That’s my question. When all this is over, please let me take you to the ocean.”
“Sure, I—”