9. Darcy
CHAPTER NINE
darcy
Outside, Boston is doing that weird early-March thing where the sun lies to your face.
The sky is bright, the sidewalks are dry, and the second you crack a window the wind reminds you winter still has both hands around the city’s throat. Inside, though, my apartment is warm.
A pile of mismatched throw pillows now takes up a good amount of real estate on my velvet couch, and the cream waffle-knit throw I’ve fallen asleep under more nights than I’ll admit is permanently drafted across the top.
The plush ivory rug underneath my feet is ridiculous in the best way—thick enough that crossing the living room feels like walking through a warm cloud.
A white sage candle burns low on the coffee table, throwing soft light over the half-drunk mug of green tea beside it. My laptop sits open but neglected, Illustrator abandoned in favor of Lucy and Stephen ruining each other’s lives for the second time on my TV.
Tell Me Lies has become my comfort watch, which probably says something mildly concerning about my taste in escapism.
Still, there’s something deeply satisfying about watching fictional people make questionable decisions while I sit on a couch I picked out myself, wrapped in a blanket I definitely didn’t need, in a space that’s already starting to feel like home.
I’m curled into the corner of the couch in white tube socks, black leggings, and a pink cropped sweatshirt that has ridden up enough to expose a strip of skin every time I shift beneath the throw—comfortable and completely unbothered.
At least until my phone buzzes.
Bex has a supernatural ability to know exactly when I’m spiraling, nesting, or overthinking myself into a corner.
Bex
What are we doing tonight?
I glance at my laptop.
Darcy
Working.
Bex
Liar.
I laugh under my breath and tuck the blanket tighter around my legs.
Darcy
Rude.
Bex
You’ve been in Boston a month and your hottest relationship is with a candle.
I look at the flickering white sage on the table.
Darcy
It’s a very nice candle.
Bex
Okay. Real question…
Bex
When’s the last time someone made you forget your own name or scream theirs?
I actually choke on my tea. I cough, laughing despite myself, and set the mug down before I spill it all over the blanket.
Darcy
Jesus Christ.
Bex
That is not an answer, and if it is, it’s worse than I thought.
I stare at the screen.
She’s not wrong. It’s been long enough that even thinking about answering makes me feel faintly pathetic. It’s not that I miss having a boyfriend or that I’m lonely. I like being on my own.
I miss attraction that didn’t come attached to expectations or negotiations or the feeling that I was somehow getting it wrong. Good sex—sex that doesn’t feel like a performance or a compromise—has become such a distant memory it almost feels theoretical.
Darcy
I’m not having this conversation with you.
Bex
Which just further confirms that it’s been WAY too long…
I drop my head back against the couch cushion.
Darcy
Please get a hobby.
Bex
This is my hobby.
Bex
Also, if you’re not going to hook up with one of the hot brothers downstairs, or literally anyone else, you need to stop hiding in your apartment.
Darcy
I’m not hiding, I’m nesting.
Bex
You bought a rug, a throw blanket, and a white sage candle in the same week and haven’t left your apartment unless it’s to change up the scenery for work purposes.
I look around my apartment—the candle, the rug, the throw, the little ceramic bowl by the door that I bought for my keys because it felt like something a stable person would own—and wince. Fine. Maybe I could touch grass.
Darcy
That’s called healing.
Bex
That’s called foreplay for becoming a hermit.
I giggle to myself. Bex has always been the person who knows when I’m disappearing into myself and refuses to let me stay there.
Darcy
I signed up for Pilates.
Bex
Oh, so now we’re healing and getting hotter out of spite?
Darcy
That’s not why.
Bex
Sure.
Darcy
Mostly not why.
Darcy
I hate that you’re making me sound shallow.
Bex
If the Lululemon fits…
My smile softens despite itself. I’d reluctantly told Bex about Mack—Mason—a few nights ago.
About opening my bathroom door to six-foot-something of dark-haired, broad-shouldered irritation crouched under my sink like some kind of walking wet dream.
The tattoo running up his bicep. The deep, low grumble of his voice that I may or may not have replayed in my head while I clenched around my magic wand later that night.
The way he’d looked at me when I pushed back. That part had lingered longer than it should have, and I wasn’t in a position to start asking questions I didn’t want to know the answers to.
Bex
Sunshine AND Broody living downstairs?
Bex
Yeah, I’d fold like a lawn chair too.
Darcy
Nobody is folding, Bex.
I’ve just started typing when a knock lands on my door. I frown. Another knock, then Tyler’s voice sounds through the wood.
“Before you tell me to go away, I should warn you I’m armed with carbs.”
I freeze. My stomach, apparently loyal to no one, gives a soft growl.
My phone vibrates again.
Bex is going to have a lot of opinions about this.
Darcy
I g2g, Tyler comes bearing carbs.
Bex
DARCY REED! That better not be all the comes ton—
I lock my phone and toss it onto the couch before standing before I finish reading the text.
The blanket slides into a soft heap at my feet when I stand, and suddenly I’m aware of the strip of bare skin above my leggings, the fact that I never put a bra back on after showering, and the way my sweatshirt rides up every time I move.
For one ridiculous second, I consider changing. Then annoyance flares.
No.
This is my apartment, my body, my comfort. I’m not letting old habits sneak in and make me feel self-conscious in my own space just because Tyler MacAllister happens to be the hot-boy-next-door type.
I cross the room and open the door.
Tyler is standing there in black gym shorts, a fitted white T-shirt stretched across his chest, and a backward Red Sox baseball cap that somehow makes him look even more unfairly good-looking.
One muscular thigh is braced against the hall runner as he balances a stock pot and a small tray in one arm and a bottle of white wine in the other.
His light brown hair is still damp at the edges.
I bite my lower lip on instinct, as if it will stop me from saying something stupid out loud.
He looks like he smells good. Which is just rude and feels like entrapment at this point.
Tyler takes one look at me and smiles. His gaze dips once—quick, appreciative, impossible to mistake—before returning to mine, and heat blooms low in my chest before I can do a damn thing about it.
“Catch you at a bad time?”
Before I can answer, a breathy moan floats from the television behind me. Both of us freeze. Of course Lucy and Stephen choose that exact moment to get dramatically naked.
Tyler’s eyes slide over my shoulder toward the TV before returning to me, the corner of his mouth already tipping upward.
“Should I come back?” he asks mildly. “Feels like I’m interrupting something.”
Another moan echoes from the living room.
“Are you watching porn?” he asks full amused.
I stare at him horrified.
“It’s not porn—”
He leans slightly to look past me again.
“Feels like a gray area.”
“It’s prestige television.”
“Sure it is.”
Tyler just smiles and ducks his head as he steps inside, his clean warm scent hitting me. He sets the stock pot carefully on the counter, then holds up the bottle of wine like supporting evidence.
“I made enough pasta to feed a small army,” he says. “Mack’s over at the station for a few hours helping Marco with something.”
I lean against the counter.
“You cooked?”
He looks personally offended.
“Don’t insult me.”
“I barely know you. You could be lying.”
Tyler twists the cap off the wine and reaches for two glasses like he’s been here before.
“You think I’d show up with a stock pot and cheap Sauvignon just to scam you? What kind of guy do you take me for?”
“You tell me.”
“Guy who learned from his grandmother.”
He says it casually, reaching for the cabinet above my sink.
“Left side?”
I nod.
“Your grandma taught you to cook?”
“Nonna would’ve considered it a failure if any of her grandkids made it to adulthood unable to feed themselves.”
I laugh.
“Was she a good cook?”
Tyler pauses halfway through pulling out a bowl and gives me a look.
“Darcy.”
“Right. Stupid question.”
“She once made enough lasagna for a wake, a christening, and Sunday dinner in the same weekend.”
“Did everybody cook?”
“Pretty much.” He sets the bowls on the counter. “Mom’s side always treated feeding people like a competitive sport.”
“That explains the stock pot.”
I smile while he finishes scooping pasta into the bowls, steam and the smell of shallots and tomatoes filling the apartment.
“What about you? You cook?”
“Yeah.”
Tyler looks surprised at that.
“Yeah?”
“Wow. Okay.”
I narrow my eyes.
“Why does everybody keep acting shocked by that?”
“Probably because you own three dishes and a candle.”
“Four dishes, thank you very much.”
“My apologies. No judgement here.”
He hands me a bowl, sets a stemless wine glass on the counter in front of me, and pours before grabbing his own. Then he jerks his chin toward the living room, already heading for the couch instead of the little dining nook tucked against the window.
“I actually like cooking,” I admit, following him.
The words come out before I really think about them, but they’re true.
Or at least they used to be. Before takeout became easier and every trip to the grocery store somehow turned into a negotiation.
Somewhere along the way, cooking stopped feeling like something I enjoyed and started feeling like one more thing to manage.
“I learned out of necessity though, not heritage,” I continue as I set my wine down on the coffee table.
“Nobody passed down sacred family recipes. I just got tired of eating cereal for dinner and developed a concerning dependency on Pinterest.”
Tyler laughs.
“That’s not cooking, that’s gambling,” he teases.