Halston only gives me her profile, avoiding my eyes. The cute tip of her nose is bright red, her lips parted. “I asked you what this is.”
I set her journal and cell on the desk. “It’s Sadie.”
“I figured, since the folder’s namedSadie.”
“It was just . . . when we were together, I took these. It wasn’t for any other reason than I felt—”
“Inspired?” Her voice breaks.
Fuck. Halston of all people knows what that means. For me to feel moved by someone. She’s that to me every day. “She never inspired me the way you do.”
“Why should I believe that?”
“It wasn’t real. I was looking for something and Sadie came along.”
She continues to stare at Sadie, even though I want nothing more than for her to close out of the photo. “What were you looking for?” she asks.
“A way out of my marriage. I didn’t think I could do it on my own. I wanted an excuse, a partner to go through it with. I put all that on Sadie’s shoulders. I was a coward.”
A notification pops up on Halston’s phone. She goes to pick it up.
“Leave it.” I move it out of her reach. That fucking phone’s in her hand more often than it’s not. “We’re having a discussion.”
“But my phone keeps vibrating. Something’s happening.”
“I don’t care. I need your attention on me right now. Please.”
“Fine.” She returns to the computer and clicks to the next photo in line. And the next. Sadie flips between poses.
I have to look away. “Stop.”
“No.”
“I never looked at these again, not once after she left,” I say.
“It’s taken you this long to get over her—if you even are—there’s no way you haven’t been jerking off to these. Probably even when we were together.”
My face warms. I’ve been nothing but good to Halston. Her accusation is unfounded. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. She’s married. Looking at them never felt right.”
“But screwing her was?”
I shake the chair a bit to get her attention. She turns to me, startled. “You don’t have to believe me, but it’s true,” I say. “I never looked at them. I never thought of them when I was with you. I would’ve deleted them, but I forgot they were there once I met you. I’ll delete them now.”
She glances at the phone, then Sadie, then me. “She’s beautiful. I had no idea she was that pretty. I mean, I guess I figured she was. Is . . . Kendra like this too? Are all your exes like models?”
The way Halston says it, she almost makes it sounds like a contest. Her, versus the other women. I tell her a lot how beautiful and sexy she is. Even if I didn’t, she sees herself through my eyes on a daily basis. Will it ever be enough? If I forget to tell her sometimes, will she spiral down, comparing herself to every woman who crosses my path?
“Kendra’s . . . cute, I guess.”Cute? How the fuck do I describe my ex-wife and ex-lover without hurting Halston’s feelings? “She’s spunky. Not beautiful like you.”
Halston’s shoulders lower a little. “Oh.”
“And Sadie, she was attractive, yes, but cold.”
Halston shifts against the leather. She unpurses her lips, the lines in her forehead smoothing. With a tilt of her head, she asks, “How so?”
I’d rather drop the subject, but I think Halston needs to hear this. Sadie, the dark beauty on my couch, will eat at Halston if I don’t share her flaws. It’s true, Sadiewascold. “For the longest time, I didn’t see that about her, the way she could so easily detach. I thought she was unhappy, and that she needed someone to make her smile, and I did, but it wasn’t enough.”
I’m relieved when Halston relaxes, pulling her feet in to sit cross-legged. “I think I can see it in her eyes,” she says. “She doesn’t look friendly.”
