Chapter 37
Kelsi
Dylan dragged over the armchair that was a mandatory addition to every hotel room so that the two of them could sit side by side and look over the documents.
She thought she’d been prepared to be alone with him again, but as soon as they walked into the room, Kelsi gulped.
Loudly. This was the first time they had been in a bedroom together, alone, since he’d given her the tour of Pembrooke.
She wiped her suddenly sweaty palms on her skirt, struggling to tear her eyes from the bed while simultaneously wanting to look anywhere else.
Dylan caught her eye, following her gaze to the hotel bed then back to her again. His lip twitched briefly, like he wanted to smile, but his expression turned serious before he angled his body to face Kelsi. “Want to run through the plans for the trial again?”
“Sure, sounds great.”
With no further prompting, he dove right into their trial strategy. For the next twenty minutes they were all business, and Kelsi relaxed into work mode. When they finished their review, though, the awkwardness crept back in.
She moved to collect her files. “I should go—we’ve got a big day tomorrow. I want to check in with my mom, too. Make sure she’s okay.”
“I asked my mom to stay with yours for the duration of the trial, and I have a military buddy of mine who will head up to watch them in the morning.” He caught her eyes and added, softer, “They’ll be safe, Kelsi.
Your stalker isn’t going to be able to use them against us.
We need to focus on putting on the best case we can, and then it will all be over. ”
Her heart lodged somewhere in her throat. He’d found a way to make sure her mom and the dogs would be protected so they could still nail McGinness. Dylan always seemed to be quietly solving her problems. Tension she’d been carrying since that first threat arrived eased from her body.
“Thank you,” she croaked, hoping he would ask her to stay.
When he didn’t say anything else, her body turned leaden and she stood to leave.
She couldn’t bring herself to look at him.
“When the trial is over, don’t worry. We won’t have to see each other around the office as much.
I’m sure we can stay out of each other’s way. ”
Dylan ran a hand through the five-o’clock shadow he was sporting and exhaled a ragged breath. “I don’t want to stay out of your way, that’s the problem. I don’t understand you. You’ve been holding yourself back from me, from us, and I want to know why. What’s stopping you from being mine?”
“I’m not sure what you mean, Dylan. You are the one who ran from me a couple days ago.”
“I did,” he admitted. “I’ve got my own hang-ups I’m working through, but I haven’t intentionally hidden anything from you, the way you have. So, I’ll repeat myself, what’s stopping you?”
He was deadly calm, and it only fanned the flames of her anger.
“Fine!” she yelled. “I’m scared—no, terrified of being hurt again.
You don’t just have the power to hurt me, Dylan.
You have the power to break me. I thought I died when you left me all those years ago, but if you left now?
After the past few weeks? I would be shattered into so many pieces that I don’t think I could ever be made whole again. ”
Her answer was honest, maybe too honest, but he needed to realize how much was at stake for her. If he couldn’t respect that, they would need to figure out a way for them to not cross paths even though they lived and worked in such close proximity.
He was silent for a long, tense minute, her words hanging in the air between them.
His lack of response crushed her. Kelsi was once again pouring her heart out to a man who couldn’t return her love.
She turned away from him, but before she could take a step, he grabbed her hand and spun her back toward him.
His voice was low. “What happened to us? What did I do? Why did you run?”
The pain in his voice nearly buckled her knees. She shook her head, fighting back the tears she could feel behind her eyes. “It doesn’t matter.”
“What do you mean, it doesn’t matter? This is the only thing that matters.”
She stayed quiet, studying his face as he stared at her earnestly. His face was awash with desperation.
“Kelsi, please,” he begged her, voice cracking on the words. Dylan crouched down slightly so they were eye to eye.
She was irrationally enraged by his pain. How dare he act like he was the broken one? “You broke my heart!” she screamed at him. It felt good to finally say that to him after all these years. “You broke my heart, and then you left. You left, without saying anything. Just like my dad did.”
He sucked in a breath and took a step back, running a hand through his hair aggressively until it stood on its ends.
“What do you mean? How? You kissed me, and the next day you were gone, ignoring my calls, my texts, having your mom turn me away when I came over. You broke my heart. How did I break yours?”
Kelsi closed her eyes, and she was right back at the night everything changed—the incident.
The night before graduation, everyone was celebrating at their favorite local dive bar.
They had finished exams and gotten their final grades back.
All that was left was the graduation ceremony the following day and the bar exam two months later.
This would be their final hurrah before burying their heads in review books for the next sixty or so days.
Fueled by Jell-O shots, courtesy of student government, Kelsi felt braver than normal, and when Dylan pulled her outside of the bar to get some fresh air, she was tired of waiting for him to make the first move.
She opened her mouth to say something, she didn’t even know what, but before she could speak, the two of them were interrupted by the bar’s door opening behind them and two of their classmates tumbling out, fully entangled with each other.
Dylan laughed as the pair stumbled toward an idling ride share, barely separating enough to get into the back seat.
He turned to face her as the car drove away.
“Well, I didn’t see that coming.” His eyes twinkled, and before she could think better of it, she raised herself up on her tiptoes and kissed him.
It was a soft, barely-there whisper of a kiss, but she felt it down to her bones.
When he remained still beneath her touch, she pulled back and steeled herself before opening her eyes and looking at him.
He stared down at her with surprise, and what she thought was a little bit of awe, in his face. Although, that could definitely be the Jell-O shots talking.
“I didn’t see that coming, either.” He smiled slowly at her, raising his hand to cup her face.
“I love you,” she blurted.
His face froze in shock.
They were once again interrupted by the bar door opening behind them. This time Dylan’s roommate, Grady, stumbled out, looking a sickly green before he stumbled toward the bushes and puked into them, moaning.
Dylan rushed over to Grady, half supporting his friend’s body as he continued to heave into the bush. He looked at her, grimacing over his shoulder at the disgusting sounds coming from Grady. “I better get him home, but can we talk tomorrow? Meet me in the library after the ceremony?”
She smiled, feeling like she was floating, high on kissing him and finally confessing her feelings. “Of course.”
Now, standing in his hotel room years later, she shook the memory of that night out of her mind and scoffed. “You obviously don’t even remember what happened after I kissed you.”
“What do you mean? What else happened? Grady was puking in the bushes outside the bar, I had to leave to take him home, you said we would talk the next day at graduation, but you left before I could find you.”
“I found you at graduation,” she said quietly, turning her back to him so she no longer had to look at the hurt and confusion on his face. She was trying to stay angry at him, but it made her heart ache.
He shook his head. “No, you didn’t. I didn’t see you at graduation.”
Her anger quickly returned. “No, of course you wouldn’t have. Not with your tongue down Brittany’s throat.”
When she’d gone to find him that day, she’d been so nervous but hopeful.
She thought that maybe they would fall into each other’s arms, that their friendship might morph into something more, but she walked into the library and saw Dylan with his lips locked on his on-again, off-again girlfriend.
Her heart had shattered into a million tiny pieces, and she’d walked numbly back out of the building to where their moms waited.
She told them she wasn’t feeling well, and her mom took her home.
She’d stayed in her bed for a week, not caring to get up to shower or eat.
Her mom had never been so worried. She kept asking if she wanted to see Dylan and all Kelsi had been able to tell her was that she didn’t want to see him, not then or ever again.
His calls and texts had poured in and gone ignored.
She knew every time he showed up at her house, too. Her bedroom overlooked the driveway, and when his truck pulled into the drive she would listen as her mom’s conversations with him floated up to her through the bedroom window. She kept it cracked so she could hear his voice.
She’d been so stupid to let herself get caught up in his orbit, but she was young, and he was her best friend. It was inevitable.
He stilled completely. “You saw that?”
She whirled around to face him fully. “Yes, I saw. I bet you didn’t plan on that. What was your plan? Go back to your ex and tell me later that we were better off as ‘just friends’?” She curled her fingers in sarcastic air quotes. “I left before you had to bother. Message received, loud and clear.”
He looked stricken.