I almost didn’t answer. Then something made me pick up.
“Yeah.”
“You really went too far.” Her voice hit me before her name did. Ivy. Calm on the surface but with something tight underneath it. “You sent flowers to my house, Griz. My house.”
I didn’t say anything right away. Just let her talk.
“If you did your research then you already know I have a life. A whole life that exists outside of what happened between us last night. And whatever you think that night meant—”
“How did you get this number,” I said.
She paused. “I bribed the florist.”
I almost smiled.
“That’s beside the point,” she said quickly. “I’m calling you because I need you to understand that nothing can come from this. I’m serious. Whatever you’re thinking, whatever you sent those roses to say, it doesn’t change my situation. I need you to respect that.”
“I don’t want to hear that,” I said. She was talking about a whole lot of shit that I didn’t care to hear.
“Griz—”
“I’m on my way.” I reiterated.
Silence.
“On your way where,” she said slowly.
“I’m on my way to your house.”
“Don’t you dare—”
I hung up and dropped the phone on the passenger seat and pressed down on the gas.
She had called me. That was all I needed to know. She could have thrown those roses away, torn up that note, blocked every unknown number that came through, and moved on with her life, her fiancé and her white fence and never looked back.
Instead she bribed a florist to give her my number.
Ivy wasn’t calling to shut a door. She was calling because she didn’t know how to open it herself.
I was going to open it for her. I knew it was late, but I needed to see her. And I didn’t give a damn about that lame ass niggashe shared a house with. She was mine and soon, she would understand that.I was about to pull up on her and she was finna bring her ass outside, or I was gonna go inside and get her.
I hung up and stood there in my home office for a second just holding the phone.
He said he was on his way.
Just like that. No question, no negotiation, just I’m on my way and then nothing. Like I hadn’t just told him that this couldn’t go anywhere. Like I hadn’t called him specifically to shut this down before it became something I couldn’t manage.
And now he knew where I lived and was apparently in a car headed in my direction.
I set the phone face down on my desk and pressed both hands flat against the wood and took a long, deep breath. Then I fixed my face, because Brendon was in the kitchen and I had been in this office long enough that he was probably already wondering what I was doing. I couldn’t walk out there looking like what I was, which was a woman who had just gotten off the phone with a man who had her turned inside out and terrified her at thesame time. The same man that had just tuned me every way but loose last night.
I walked into the dining room and Brendon had already set the table. Tonight we were having a late dinner. Both of our days ran long, but he still insisted on cooking for me. And here it was, after 11:00 pm, and he had just finished.
Candles, the good plates, everything laid out like he had been planning this all day. The food was already plated and it smelled incredible. Steak with gravy, rice, mixed vegetables, honey butter crescent rolls sitting in a basket in the center of the table. This man had come home from a full day, handled more of his workload, cooked all of this, and set the table like we were at a restaurant.
He looked up when I walked in and smiled.
“There you are. Go wash your hands, it’s getting cold.”
