24. Darcy #2
“Nope,” I feel my cheeks warm. “I’m great.”
“You seem jumpy.”
“Just excited to get home. I mean…”
His smirk widens by a fraction.
“Not enjoying the company?”
“No. I mean…yes…”
I huff out an exasperated breath.
“Do you always do that?”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“That.” I point vaguely in his direction. “You make me say things out loud that you already know the answer to.”
He glances at me.
“Maybe I like hearing you say it.”
My pulse jumps.
We roll to a stop at a red light, and for the first time since we left the bar, he angles toward me in his seat.
I look up to meet his green-eyed gaze.
“Do you?” I ask. “Or do you just like proving a point?”
He leans toward me just an inch, but it feels like gravity pulling me in.
Which feels like a dangerous realization to have while trapped in a moving vehicle.
“Why can’t it be both?”
I press my lips together, trying unsuccessfully to contain the fact that I’m smiling, and shift again in my seat.
He doesn’t say anything else. He just holds my gaze, making no attempt to rescue me from the silence. Then, because self-preservation has apparently left my body somewhere back at the bar:
“You like being in control.”
The light turns green. The car rolls forward.
“Most people do,” he says.
“Not like you.”
“What’s that mean?”
“It means,” I say slowly, “you don’t ask twice.”
He glances at me from the side before looking back at the road.
“I usually don’t need to.”
He cuts me a sideways look.
“You were…an adjustment.”
I bite back a smile, wanting to see how far I can push against my better judgment.
“So everyone just falls in line the second you open your mouth?”
He chuffs.
“Most of the time.”
“Now that’s just being cocky.”
“It’s being prepared.”
“Prepared enough to assume you’ll be right?”
“If I’m asking, I’ve already made the decision. Somebody has to make the call.”
“And if it’s the wrong one?”
“Then it’s on me.”
I frown.
“You say that like that’s better.”
“I’d rather be wrong because of a call I made than one I let somebody else make for me.”
“Sounds like you don’t trust many people.”
His jaw ticks.
“I trust people to be exactly who they are.”
I just look at him, no longer pretending that I’m not.
“I just don’t like being surprised.”
“That sounds…exhausting.”
He doesn’t answer right away.
“Nobody said it wasn’t.”
Silence settles between us again.
The brownstone comes into view at the end of the block, familiar now in a way that stopped feeling neutral somewhere between the pool table and the drive home. Mack eases the Buick to the curb, the engine cutting with a soft finality that leaves the quiet between us feel thicker.
Neither of us reaches for the door. We just sit there in the dark, both of us fully aware of where this could go and neither one of us pretending otherwise anymore.
“Well,” I start, because apparently I have no survival instincts left, “that was…”
I trail off, mostly because every word that comes to mind feels either wildly insufficient or far too honest to say out loud.
Mack nods toward the front door.
“I’ll walk you up.”
Heat pools low in my belly. Walking me upstairs feels dangerously close to continuing this, and at some point tonight, I stopped pretending I didn’t care if that happened.
I glance at him for half a second, already knowing I’m not going to say no.
“Okay,” I say.
The front door closes behind us with a soft click that echoes more than it should. I head toward the stairs automatically, keys already in-hand, the awareness that started back in the bar still crackling between us.
Mack falls into step behind me, close enough that I can feel the heat of him at my back every time the stairwell narrows.
His boots land a beat behind mine, slow and unhurried, and every few steps I catch myself easing back just enough to shorten the distance before remembering I’m the one doing it.
My pulse kicks harder as I slow near my door without fully stopping, and the distance between us shortens naturally until I can feel his broad chest against my shoulders. My keys brush against the lock before I pause and look over my shoulder.
“Mack…”
“Yeah, Darcy?”
“...have you talked to Tyler today?”
“I did.”
“So…he told you then?”
“Told me what, exactly?”
I swallow.
“I…I went to see Tyler last night. At the firehouse.”
The silence stretches between us, and for a moment I’m terrified I just ruined everything.
“I know.”
“You…what?”
“I know, Darcy. He told me.”
“You knew the whole time?”
Mack doesn’t hesitate.
“Yeah.”
Of course.
I meet his eyes then, really looking, searching automatically for hesitation or guilt or literally anything that would make him easier to categorize.
“And you didn’t say anything?”
“You had a lot on your mind.”
He says it like it isn’t up for debate.
I smile despite myself.
“Bold of you to assume I wasn’t spiraling internally about that, too.”
Mack’s gaze moves over my face slowly.
“You handled it.”
“So tonight was…” I start, my voice trailing just slightly.
“Mine,” Mack says. “Tonight was mine.”
The word lands like a grenade. Mack just keeps looking at me like he hasn’t said anything remotely capable of rearranging my internal organs.
Right…cool. I’m going to need to unpack that later.
Or never. Probably never.
I lean back just enough for my shoulder to brush the door behind me, grounding myself in something solid.
“That doesn’t sound very…collaborative,” I say, tilting my head up.
“Wasn’t meant to.”
He closes the distance between us until only a few inches remain.
“For guys who share,” I say, my voice light but pointed, “you don’t seem very good at the sharing part.”
Mack’s expression changes just slightly when I say it, and I feel the shift the way you feel the air change before a storm finally breaks.
“Depends what I’m sharing.”
Oh.
I turn back toward the door, but my hand lingers on the key while I glance at him once more over my shoulder, my pulse climbing steadily as the lock clicks beneath my fingers.
The door swings inward. My hand finds his wrist before my brain has any opportunity to object, and I pull him inside with me.