Under the rack, a pair of black boots wait—thick-soled but clean, polished, heavy-looking but not bulky.
I don’t move.
Alex gestures once. “Go try these.”
The shopper takes the rack to the fitting room for me. I follow without a word, my fingers tingling. Just touching the clothes feels like slipping into a dream. The fabric molds to my skin like it already knows me. The boots hug my ankles and add just the right height.
I step in front of the mirror and I don’t recognize myself. I look like someone who belongs in the kind of world I’ve only ever seen in movies.
I walk out slowly, heart pounding for some reason I don’t understand.
Alex is waiting. Seated, legs spread, elbows on his knees, but he rises the second I appear.
His eyes sweep over me. Once. Twice. Then settles on my face.
He nods.
“This is what you’ll be wearing for the dinner party.”
The shopper gasps softly.
“You look like you were made for this.”
I glance down at myself, unsure of what to feel. I look good. Better than good.
But part of me can’t help wondering as I go back to the fitting room to take off the outfit —why make me try on all those other things if this was always the plan?
Why go through all that… unless Alex just wanted to see me in them?
fuck. he confuses me.
TWENTY-ONE
ALEXANDER
Lucas sits rigid beside me, staring out the car window like the glass has something important to say. He’s been avoiding my eyes since we left the store, and I don’t blame him.
If I were him, I wouldn’t know what to do with myself either.
I can’t stop thinking about him. Every outfit he tried on, every nervous glance he gave the mirror before glancing at me. How he had lifted a hand to fix a collar or tug at a hem, like he didn’t know he already looked good. Not just good. Devastating.
And I’d been watching him, pretending not to react. Pretending like my fingers weren’t twitching. Like I didn’t want to walk into that fitting room, shut the door, and finally do what I’ve been thinking about for days now.
Touch him.
Hold him.
Feel him close to me again after that day he came undone in my arms.
I’ve been trying to control myself, begging my self-control not to snap whenever he gets close to me, his scent, his lips, those big, innocent eyes of his.
The car slows. We pull up in front of a dark building, its front lined with warm wooden panels and low lights under the eaves. He finally turns to look at me, giving me the soft, puzzledexpression on his pretty face that I am accustomed to. He doesn’t say anything, but he raises an eyebrow.
I don’t reply.
We step out of the car, Ashley stays behind for a moment, murmuring something into her phone, then steps ahead and tells me she’ll be at one of the tables downstairs.
Inside, it’s quiet, and the scent of grilled fish, miso, and something warm fills the air.
