Chapter 17
Chapter Seventeen
Blaire
The evening air is crisp and smells faintly of rain.
When rain is on the horizon in Chicago, the city takes on the odor of a rich stew saturated with gasoline. But here, in a cozy section of Savannah, it’s different. The air hints of the earth and sea. It’s evocative.
Closing my eyes, I take a deep lungful of air and am whisked back to summers on Lake Michigan with my family. I can almost hear my family’s laughter and smell the barbecue pit that Dad tended with the care of a surgeon.
“I’m glad you’re still here.”
I whirl around at the sound of Holt’s voice.
He tugs at his tie, his forehead wrinkled as he approaches me on the sidewalk in front of The Carriage House.
He looks divinely handsome in his tailored suit and freshly shaven face.
The air of sophistication mixed with the razor-cut jaw and wide, strong shoulders make me forget about everything but him.
“A horse-drawn carriage?” I lift a brow. “I wasn’t about to miss my chance at being a princess.”
He grins. “You being a princess is an interesting concept.”
“And why is that?”
Holt stops in front of me. His tie is slightly askew, and it’s all I can do not to reach out and straighten it. I grip my sweater harder to keep myself from running my fingers through his rumpled hair.
“Which princess would you be?” he asks. “The one who waits for a knight in shining armor to rescue her from a tower? Or the one who needs a kiss from a prince to awaken?”
I half-laugh. “How about the one who rescues herself?”
“My point.”
He narrows his eyes, and I can see the stress he’s trying to hide with his slow smile.
It’s the aftermath of a day of battling at work.
I’d imagine his body aches and his brain feels like a pan of scrambled eggs too.
And suddenly, I wish he wouldn’t have offered to bring me here and would’ve gone home instead.
“I didn’t think you were coming,” I say. “I was about to leave.”
“Of course, I was coming,” he says, his eyes searching mine. “I’m sorry about earlier and for making you wait now. Things got a bit hectic at the office.”
“You don’t have to entertain me, you know. You didn’t have to do this.”
His grin is beautiful, even if tired. “I never do anything I don’t want to do.”
He allows his smile to speak for him. It lingers my way for a few long seconds. The hesitation I felt before melts away, and I realize how happy and relieved I am that he showed up.
And how even happier I am that I believe he wants to be here too.
“Hello, Cassius,” Holt says, dragging his eyes away from me. “Thank you for helping me out tonight.”
“Absolutely, Mr. Mason. It’s my pleasure.”
Cassius, the man who introduced himself to me when I arrived, shakes Holt’s hand. He leads us to a shiny black carriage with oversized, white-walled wheels. The grandest horse I’ve ever laid eyes on stands in command in the front.
Holt’s hand presses lightly against the small of my back as he guides me toward the carriage. I ignore the zip of his touch and climb inside.
The interior is lined with a pristine red velvet. The seats are covered with a matte black material, and when I sit, I feel like royalty.
Holt exchanges a few quiet words with Cassius before climbing in next to me.
Our shoulders brush together as he gets situated. His knee bumps mine in the slightest way. Even so, it feels like a fire is lit in the bottom of my core.
Rolling up the sleeves of his shirt, he exposes his thick, muscled forearms.
I look away.
“If you have any questions as we continue, please don’t hesitate to ask,” Cassius says over his shoulder. “Otherwise, I will leave the two of you to enjoy your own company.”
“Thank you,” Holt says.
The carriage pulls forward and the clip-clop of the horse’s shoes against the street soothes the nugget of nerves building in my stomach. It’s an odd anxiety—one not from uncertainty or an unwelcome advance. It’s from anticipation.
As I look at Holt sitting next to me, watching me with dark, inquisitive eyes, I wonder if he knows this and is doing it on purpose.
I clear my throat and look at the sky. “It’s so beautiful here. Everything from the painted sunset to the foliage. I wish it were more peaceful like this in Chicago.”
“I’ve never been there.”
“It’s nothing like this,” I say, taking in a small building with stained glass windows. “It’s all skyscrapers and people and hustle.”
“Do you like it there?”
The question catches me off guard for some reason. I look at him.
“I like that I’m close to my family. I like that I can walk to most places, but I can have a car too. And our pizza is the best,” I say, adding the last bit on but internally cringing as soon as it’s out of my mouth.
He fights a smile. “Pizza, huh?”
“What? I like pizza.”
He stretches his arm out behind me and rests it along the back of the seat. Every cell in my body is hyper-aware of his proximity, and it takes all my strength to ignore it.
“I miss Savannah when I’m not here,” he says.
“I can see why.”
The horse neighs as our procession slows. Holt and I are bumped toward each other. Our eyes snap together but neither one of us mentions it with anything more than a grin.
He twists his lips together and readjusts in his seat.
“Do you see that building over there?” He motions to his right with his index finger toward a brick building. A blue-and-white striped awning hangs overhead and advertises a discount store. “That is where my great-grandfather started the first Mason company.”
“Really?”
He nods triumphantly. “It was a landscape company, to be exact.” He looks at me as we slip past the storefront. “He met my great-grandmother at a potluck dinner. She made the best oatmeal pie he’d ever eaten, and he asked her to marry him on the spot.”
“He did not,” I say with a laugh.
“That’s how the story goes.” His eyes sparkle. “He said he actually knew he was going to propose as soon as she walked in, but he needed an excuse to seem sane.”
“Well, if he thought that marrying someone because they baked a great pie is sane, then okay.”
Holt’s chuckle is low and deep. “I know. It’s crazy to me too.”
The horse marches along the street in a leisurely yet steady pace. The rhythm steadies my heartbeat, and I relax for the first time since Holt left for work this morning.
I turn my head to see him. “Have you ever been married?”
“Me? No. What kind of question is that?”
“A completely logical one. Most people our age have been married once or twice by now.”
“Well, okay. No, I haven’t been married. I’ve never been engaged either.”
“That surprises me.”
He chuckles. “It surprises my mother too.”
I return his smile. “Do you think you’ll get married someday? I can see you sitting in your living room by the fireplace with a horde of children at your feet.”
“Oh …” He winces. “I don’t know. Does it make me a terrible person to admit I’m not sure I want kids?”
“No, not at all.”
“With my office hours and travel schedule, it would be impossible to have a life like that. And I think, to do either well, you have to choose. I’m already pretty good at one, and it’s important to me. So why take a chance by adding the other?”
I nod. “Makes perfect sense.”
He angles his body so that he can face me more head-on. “Have you been married?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“What kind of question is that?” I force a swallow as I repeat his question. “I got ice cream from there today,” I say, pointing at the parlor across from Xavier Park. “It was really good.”
When I look back at him, he’s still looking at me. The intensity and curiosity make me squirm.
“Why not?” he repeats.
Because I thought I was going to get married once, and I’ll never go through that again.
The clip-clop of the horse’s hooves doesn’t even begin to drown out the sound of blood pouring across my ears. I mentally smack myself for bringing this up in the first place.
I feel pressured to tell him the truth—mostly because I know he would be open with me. But if I do that, if I spill my guts all over this beautiful velvet carriage, the picture that I paint won’t match the Blaire he thinks he knows. And I’ll have a hell of a time getting out of that mental space.
Jack is intrinsically tied to that time in my life. I cannot uncouple the two. I’ve tried for years.
I clear my throat and avoid his piercing gaze.
What would Holt say if I told him that Jack left me because I almost got kicked out of law school?
Would he think less of me, of my family, that I was going to Linton to bail Machlan out of jail at least once a month after our parents died?
Would he think I’m an irresponsible disaster if he knew all of the financial holes I found myself in back then?
Some of which I’m still digging myself out of now?
“Blaire …”
“I’ve not found the right person, I suppose.”
“Are you looking for him?”
My laugh is silent, but my body moves with the force of holding it back.
Holt’s brows furrow. “What does that mean?”
“It means I’m not looking for him.”
My response is clipped and to the point, and I hope Holt takes it at face value. But when I glance at him across my shoulder, I see that he doesn’t.
His gaze challenges me. The look he wields my way tries to worm its way inside me and extract all the ugly things I don’t want him to know.
I do my best mirror of his expression—a trick I learned in law school, but he doesn’t bite.
“Why do you do this?” he asks.
“What am I doing?”
He fights a grin. “You’re trying to redirect this conversation.”
“I answered your question.”
A breeze shoots through the carriage and ruffles the end of my sweater. I pull it tighter to my body as we take a slow, wide turn next to a stately fountain. Kids stand around it and toss coins into the water.
When I look back at Holt, he’s still watching me.
“I heard from Yancy today—my assistant,” I clarify. “She said that we should be back in the building this week.”
“Oh.”
“I’ll be out of your hair soon.”