“The night before, my neighbor said she saw a Peeping Tom outside my house. Said he took off in a stolen car. How aboutthat, Mitchell?”
Mitchell closed his eyes briefly. “I was going to return something to you, but I saw you and your friends… I thought better of it.”
My bra. I swallowed hard. I’d realized I’d left it the moment I stepped out of his room, but I’d refused to turn back. Also, he’d just confessed to spying on me. Maybe evenstalkingme by lurking outside my house. A heavy flop of something turned over in my lower half. Not embarrassment. A thrill, maybe.
There was something seriously wrong with me.
“I don’t need your help, Mitchell,” I said. “And as for the bra—fucking burn it,” I jerked my empty wineglass from the table and strode into the hallway, leaving Mitchell Harrington behind.
I knew the reprieve wouldn’t last, but I still let out a breath when I reached the living room. I let out another when I saw the two remaining vacant chairs weren’t anywhere close to each other. I took a seat in the closest, an armchair next to the couch where Cassandra and Blake sat, his arm wrapped around her, his fingers absently stroking the curve of her shoulder. If I weren’t so wholly distracted, I might feel a pang of pitiful loneliness I’d never admit to at the sight.
But I was distracted. In a bad, bad way. I needed to get out of here as soon as possible without looking like I was fleeing a crime scene.
Sarah was in the middle of a story about some mishapat the hotel. I sat back in my chair, gratefully taking the bottle of wine Cassandra passed me.
My phone buzzed as I topped up my glass. I’d been expecting a text from Ryan, letting me know his flight had arrived. He was visiting Calvin for Canadian Thanksgiving, which I was sick about not being a part of, but they’d be here for the American one next month. Since I’d missed the beginning of the story, I pulled my phone from my pocket to glance discreetly at the screen.
It wasn’t Ryan.
MITCHELL: You make my chest hurt, Winona. You’re so fucking beautiful.
My stomach dropped.
I knew he thought I’d blocked him. He'd said as much. And I really should have. I almost did, after the first text he sent. And the ones the next day. But then, after he said he knew I couldn’t see his texts, he sent me a line of poetry. Poetry!
For what is beauty if not the embodiment of God?
If only it had been someone else who’d sent me that. That fictional teacher or accountant with the reliable sedan and love of lawn mowing. A simple, easy Prince Charming who’d never, ever, hurt me.
The opposite of Mitchell Harrington.
But he kept messaging. And each text he sent pierced a tiny hole in my resolve to hate Mitchell Harrington. As they got softer and softer, all I could see was that side of him I saw in the pool, when he’d been so astonished that I’d gone in after him. A boy so surprised someone cared. I loved each text. I waited for them like a hit of a toxic drug, swearing each one would be the last I’d read.
Then one day, they’d stopped. The day after Mrs. Moody had lost her shit.
I’d felt bereft without them.
But now, I swallowed down the knot in my throat and locked my phone’s screen.
Mitchell writing that without me knowing I could see it, and while he was in the next room? It was too much. A knot formed in my throat as I stared at the words, my finger touching them as if they couldn’t be real.
I swallowed hard. I wouldn’t cry over him. Not again. Not when he washere.
Luckily, anger took over as I thought about our conversation in the kitchen. His pupils had flared when he’d mentioned thethingI’d left at his house.
But then I was thinking of him holding my bra in those big, rough fingers. And how those fingers had held me, however briefly. And now here I was getting turned on at my friend’s house, while they all sat around oblivious.
How fucking dare he be here? My sweater hung off my shoulders, but it still suddenly felt too hot knowing he was in the next room over.
I focused on slowing my breathing.
But when I finally locked the screen and looked up, I startled.
Mitchell was standing in the doorway, staring at me once more. Only this time, his expression had shifted to something like shock.
I think I really was going to be sick.
Because Mitchell’s phone was in his hand. And so was mine.
