Chapter 11
Sophie
I wilted in my chair. We'd come so close. I sighed. I couldn't make Davis take a chance.
Part of me questioned why I was so eager to put my heart at risk.
Then I remembered everything I'd learned about Davis in our short time together. He might not tell me he cared, but he couldn’t help showing it.
Every ice pack, every meal, every ride, they all demonstrated he could treasure a woman.
And I wanted that woman to be me, darn it.
Breaking through his reserve had started as a challenge.
I was used to everyone liking me, and when he didn’t respond to my friendliness, it pushed me to try harder.
But the more I got to know Davis, the more I realized that trying to force him to like me would never work.
He saw through the chatter and the unrelenting positivity to the insecure woman beneath.
And if he fully perceived the real me and didn’t like her?
Well, I didn’t know how to deal with that.
I deserved a man who wanted all of me, not one who would push me away the first time things got hard or I had an inconvenient need.
Shaking off my reverie, I put my mug in the dishwasher and got ready for bed.
I could hear Davis moving around, only one wall away. It made me feel like a voyeur, wondering what he did when he was alone. Trying to picture it.
He was so closed off, so shut down. I wanted to pry him open like a nut. He was stubborn as fork. Unlikely to change. Telling myself was the only way to stay sane.
I'd tried.
I'd failed.
I wouldn't beg.
If he wasn't into me, I'd move on. Just because I thought he was hot enough to scorch didn't mean he felt even a fraction of the same interest in me.
My shoulders slumped. I snorted. Now who was brooding?
Shaking off the moment of melancholy, I reached for my phone. Digital distraction seemed like a good way to get some distance from my disappointment.
My phone buzzed.
Davis: It's not you. It's me.
I huffed. Sure.
Everything in me wanted to throw my phone against the wall that separated us.
Sophie: Are you forking kidding me right now?
He'd sent me a freaking cliché from fifteen feet away. A couple of kisses didn't make a relationship, and he'd already essentially turned me down.
Sophie: Rude.
Sophie: Fork off.