I should’ve been second-guessing everything. Should’ve been setting a boundary by slipping out, reminding us both of the rules, joking about rent again.
Instead, I curled into him. Again. My palm rested on his chest like it had every right to be there, and I was memorizing the way his breathing nudged my shoulder, his arm slung heavy around my middle like that was how we always slept.
I was just taking a short vacation from myself.
From Ruby’ing it, as Rio called it. Maybe, kind of like Rio did with Owen—only in reverse.
She’d allowed herself a no-strings fling and ended up in something real.
I’d sworn off permanent, and now I was attaching a few strings that I swore I could snap whenever I wanted with no harm done.
18
Sebastian
CABIN FOUR WAS MY OFFICEnow. I hauled in an unused whiteboard from Ruby’s office, plugged in a second monitor I’d borrowed, and held a full staff video-meeting with my team in Houston. I wasn’t the only one to take video calls from various locations, so no one noted the difference.
I even ran a similar meeting with Dave and his foreman—same setup, different topics—right from the cabin’s living room.
Dave gave me a knowing look when he walked in. “Feeling at home, huh? You the boyfriend or what?”
It was almost like when two of his workers had gawked when Ruby walked past to hand Dave some papers.
“Man,” one of them murmured, shaking his head with a grin, “she makes even paperwork look good.”
Dave shot him a look and hinted toward me. “Careful. That’s the engineer who helps her.”
The guy glanced at me, eyebrows up. “You’re tapping that?”
I looked him dead in the eye. “Say that when she’s around. She’d have you sanding decks until your arms fell off and you’d still thank her for it.”
“That’s a yes,” the guy mumbled, looking like he had a new appreciation for both of us.
This time, I didn’t dignify Dave’s question with a reply. Not just because we kept our conversations about the project he was executing and I had no intention of changing that, but because his question landed different and it lingered.
It lingered because the truth was, it was starting to feel that way. Like something had shifted. Like this wasn’t temporary.
Though it had only been a few days, we fell into a rhythm.
Domesticity.
We ate breakfast together. Went to work together. Walked down to the beach together, the sand cool beneath our feet and the sea breeze tugging at our hair. Slept together. Shared post-midnight snacks together. Ruby even agreed to giveAttack Of The Clonesa second chance if I triedSuperstorebecause “it’s a hidden gem, and you have to admit Jonah is better off with Kelly, even though he doesn’t deserve her.”
“So you’re into ‘ships’ in shows now?” I asked, laughing. “You didn’t even ship Buffy and Angel back when all the girls did.” Even then, she’d claimed she didn’t believe in fate or true love. Back in high school, I hadn’t thought she meant it. Experience proved otherwise.
“It’s a harmless diversion. Sometimes.” And then, probably catching another meaning behind my question, she added, “It’s not different than getting excited over ... I don’tknow, the Millennium Falcon, even if I don’t know or care how to fly one.”
“In my case, Idowant to try it.”
“Try what?”
A serious relationship, I wanted to say, but didn’t. “To fly a spaceship. I have a lot of experience with everything to do with it, and I would love to try it for real.”Like with relationships.
“I hope you will,” she said with a soft smile, bumping her knee against mine. I knew she was talking about spaceships again, but I couldn’t deny that the more time we spent together, the more I felt it and wanted it—this closeness.
Another evening, in bed, Ruby leaned her chin on my chest and looked at me. “So ... if I end up doing a reopening party once the inn’s ready, do you even have clothes for that?”
I knew she wasn’t asking me on a date—God forbid—but the question felt more personal than logistical, like she was picturing me there beside her.
