“She drives me nuts sometimes. Anytime we’re together we argue.”
“About what?”
“Literally anything. It doesn’t matter the topic, we’re arguing. I told her that those little stick figure stickers people put on the back of their cars with their family and pets are a liability because you’re giving away information about your family to every stranger you drive past. She told me I was a grouchy old man trying to ruin everyone’s fun.”
Rosie laughs. “You do try to ruin the fun.”
“I do not.”
“Hey, maybe you should use this as an opportunity to show her that you’re fun. Who knows? She might just bethe one.”
The one.
It has a nice sound to it. But then I think about the fact that she’s told me on multiple occasions she doesn’t date. The fact that she watched me come with her name on my lips, curiously, willingly, and yet never said anything. The fact that every time she gets close, she does something absolutely unhinged to block my advances or push me away.
Maybe what we’ve had these past few months is just that. Fleeting, carefree moments where both of our guards are down and the reality is we’re both too closed off. Distracted, and full of responsibilities that will never allow us to slow down and just be.
Or maybe it will.
Either way, I intend on finding that out tonight.
With a quick kiss on my cheek, Rosie’s gone, leaving me to my half-baked plan and the hope that she shows up.
???
Three hours later, I’m just as anxious as I was when Rosie left the penthouse.
Except now, I’m waiting in room 326 on the third floor of the hotel where I live, dressed in a suit and questioning every single decision that’s led me here tonight.?
What the hell am I doing ambushing her like this?
I’ve debated bolting at least a dozen times since booking this room and swiping the key card.
The logical move would be to send her payment for the session, toss in a little extra for the snow she’s had to endure making the trip, and issue a formal apology for the last-minute cancellation.
But no, here I am. Because I know her. She’ll be furious either way, and part of me can’t stand the thought of her thinking I’m a coward even if it’s the fictionalSpinstersthat she’d be blaming.
My phone vibrates in my pocket, pulling me out of my dark spiral. It’s one of my paralegals likely calling about the disaster of a case blowing up in Los Angeles that I’ve been working on this past week.
Fuck, the timing of this call couldn’t be any worse.
I swipe to answer because I’m married to my career and brace myself while Krystle immediately launches into a rapid-fire monologue about everything going sideways with the appeal.
My head pounds with each word as she details missed deadlines, uncooperative witnesses, and a hearing that’s somehow been moved up two days.
Why am I even here? I should be in LA handling this circus, not holed up in a hotel room like a love-struck idiot, pining over a woman who’s shown zero interest in anything beyond the steamy hook-ups that we’ve shared. In fact, she’s dodged every one of my recent advances. At what point do I realize my career, and her life are incompatible and give up?
Krystle finally pauses to breathe and asks if I have a specific file. It’s one that Iknowis upstairs in my office and not with me here on the third floor.
I pinch the bridge of my nose, fighting the urge to rip my hair out.
“Hold on,” I mutter, heading for the door. I need a minute to breathe. A minute to figure out how I’ve let everything—includingthis insane, last-minute plan birthed out of sheer jealousy and desire—spiral so completely out of control.
Fuck me.
“If we don’t get a copy of this faxed over to Gavin tonight, we’re screwed,” she responds dramatically and despite not wanting to leave my current location, I know she’s probably right.
This is part of the problem with my job. Even when I don’t want to be working, I am. Even when I want to relax, profess my feelings to the woman I can’t stop following around New York and Connecticut, duty calls and pulls me away in a different direction.
