Eventually, she lifted her head, touching my collar. “I’m ruining yoursuit.”
“It was too clean anyway,” Isaid.
“Did you come from theoffice?”
“Yeah.”
“Why were you there solate?”
“Screwing around.” I cleared my throat. “Working on myrésumé.”
She glanced up at me, her brows drawn. “Vance said he wasn’t planning to replace you. You don’t believehim?”
“Would you?” I shrugged. “I figure it’s good to have it on handanyway.”
“That doesn’t sound like screwingaround.”
“Once I started researching résumés, I went down a virtual black hole and ended up on Google Earth looking up my mom’shouse.”
She inhaled sharply, shifting in my arms to see me better. That gasp meant more to me than she knew. She realized the magnitude of such a seemingly small thing. “Howcome?”
“The possibility of losing my job has spurred me into action.” I paused, tucking some of her hair behind her ear. “Ever since you came along, I’ve been thinking more about thefuture.”
Was her heart hammering or mine? I read the fear in her eyes, but it didn’t scareme.
“How’d the house look?” sheasked.
“I stared at it for about five seconds, trying to convince myself it wasn’t that scary. That I could go back, fix it up, and finally sell it.” The rundown neighborhood I’d grown up in was gentrifying. I’d been torn between a vivid image of a new family putting down roots, making memories and height charts—and my mom’s cold, dim final days. The faded memories of Libby and me fighting over the TV clicker while the aroma of tamales filled the house. Of my visits as an adult when I’d updated the television set, installed a bookshelf in the living room, or replaced her fifteen-year-old mattress with a Tempur-Pedic. “I closed the tab. I can’t do it. Notyet.”
Her limbs loosened. Maybe she’d thought I’d want to go back to Boston, and that was the fear I’d seen. If she didn’t want me to go, then she still had hope forus.
I did. And I wanted to show it to her. Despite her tear-streaked cheeks, she was beautiful. With her mouth inches from mine, I could ease her pain with a kiss. Forget my troubles. Erase the strenuous hours since we’d woken up together. Would that be taking emotional advantage ofher?
The last thing I wanted was to be compared to her prick of an ex-boyfriendagain.
“You could’ve called me, you know,” I saidquietly.
She shuddered. “Even after thismorning?”
I picked up the blanket, wrapped it around her shoulders, and held her to my chest. “Even after the last couplemonths, Georgina. Including this morning,yes.”
“I almost did when I couldn’t reach anyoneelse.”
I set my jaw. I didn’t want to come after anyone else, least of alleveryoneelse. I wanted to be her first call when Bruno had a seizure. When she was facing the rare thing she couldn’t do on her own. When she got a job offer she was excited about. I was tired of beingsomeone, of walking into a room and adapting to my surroundings the way I’d moved to New York and adopted a persona. I wanted to betheone, a man my mom and Georgina could not only be proud of, but could count on. I didn’t know how to say all that to her when she had enough on her plate, so I just rubbed her arm, hoping to warmher.
Luciano returned with a drink carrier, and Georgina’s eyes had almost dried when a woman in a white lab coat pushed through the metal doors to make her way towardus.
Georgina jumped to her feet. “Dr.Rimmel.”
“How you holding up, Georgina?” She held a clipboard to her side as she shook hands with Luciano and me. “Dr. Rimmel, nice to meet you. You guys caught me right before I left for thenight.”
“Thank you for staying.” Georgina’s voice was clear, but she was shaking, drowning in my blazer. My back muscles had tautened with the arrival of the vet, but I did my best to appear calm. I slipped my hand into Georgina’s. “Come sit,” I said, tugging herback.
She returned to her seat. “How ishe?”
Dr. Rimmel hugged the clipboard. “Bruno’s doinggreat.”
Luciano blew out a sigh of relief and fell back in his seat. “Thankgod.”
