Chapter Four #2
I smile briefly, as hard and weird as this day has been, I got something back I never would’ve expected to see again: another friend. I respond with a quick yes, and glance up at where Becca is standing on the other side of the window.
I do a double take when I realize Becca is standing with another person. And I freeze.
“What the fuck?” I whisper to myself and duck down behind the side of my desk.
Becca has on a flirty smile and the guy standing next to her is well over six feet tall, with a dark brown beard trimmed short and a black bomber jacket over an untucked, collared green button-down shirt.
The top buttons are open, and his dark blue jeans hug muscular legs.
As he points down the street, his jacket and shirt ride up just a little to reveal a sliver of tanned skin.
His hair is darker brown than it was seven years ago, but every curl is still perfectly in place.
He’s a ghost.
I’d say he doesn’t look a day older than the last time I saw him, but it’d be a lie.
His features are sharper, his face is full of expression as he talks to Becca, his eyes have deeper lines where they always crinkled at the edges, and he’s even more beautiful than I remember.
And my mind won’t slow down while I catalog every detail.
“Who is that?” Debbie’s voice coming from above me makes me jump up.
“Oh, Jesus, Debbie, you scared me, good God.” I put my hand on my chest and shove my phone in my pocket. “That… is someone I haven’t seen in a long time.”
“You know that beefcake of a man? He’s gotta be like six-five and could probably lift you and me up over his head at the same time. Not that I’d want to share him,” she wags her eyebrows at me and slowly walks back over to her desk.
I look from her back to the window and see Becca alone. I almost trip running out of the office, kicking the doorstop out of the door, letting it slam, and stomping out on the sidewalk.
“What the fuck was that?” I point down the street and there is absolutely no man on the sidewalk whatsoever, near Becca or down the sidewalk. “Am I hallucinating? Weren’t you just talking to someone?”
“Yes, oh man, he was hot, wasn’t he?” She is dramatically fanning her face as she talks and hands my laptop back to me.
“He asked if I knew where he could find a good place to get a drink after work, so I was telling him he should go to Wildhorse. He said he wasn’t sure where people our age would be on a Friday night.
I may have said there would be at least two hot girls about our age there tonight.
I was hoping you’d come out before he got in his car, but he said he just moved into the building at the end of the…
” her voice trails off as she points, and she connects the dots herself.
“Oh, he works at Ellison. Oh! Do you know him?”
I just keep staring down the street. The bell from the door behind us dings again, and I brace myself.
“Ah, Max, I see we are already running into each other in this quaint little town.” Richard walks up beside Becca and stretches his hand out to introduce himself. “Hi there, Richard Ellison, pleasure to meet you.”
Becca takes his hand carefully, shooting a look at me. “Rebecca Montgomery, the pleasure is all yours.”
He tilts his head to me with a chuckle and releases her hand.
“Pleasure is indeed all mine, Rebecca.” He clasps his hands in front of his body and rocks a bit on his heels and continues in a whisper, “Max, I really meant what I said. You know where to find me, you’re welcome at E for him to reassure me that I’m making the right choice. But I know better.
Callan will never agree with anything that has to do with Patrick. He once told me that the only reason Patrick was graduating is because Richard Ellison donated an entire new wing to the law school.
He pulls his lips across his face in a straight line, nods, and with a deep breath he looks down at me. His hand reaches up and moves the tassel from one side of the cap to the other. “Congratulations, Sims.”
I beam at him, shoving down the feelings of regret about the law school decision.
His thumb runs softly down the side of my cheek and stops along my jaw.
He holds my face there between his fingers.
I fight back the shivers that zing from where his skin meets mine down to my toes.
His fingers feel soft and warm. They linger for what is absolutely an inappropriate amount of time, but as soon as the thought about his touch feeling good, feeling right somehow, crosses my mind, his hand is falling away.
My eyes follow that hand back down to his back pocket, feeling the absence of his skin on mine, and then I glance back up at him.
“You, too, Cal.” I whisper the words between us, but they fall flat, right there on the concrete between our matching shoes.
“I guess this is it.” His eyes trail down my face and then look around us, at the campus that holds countless memories.