Swallowing a giant fucking lump from the base of my throat, I accept her call and set the phone on speaker, placing it on Ryan’s drawers so I can continue my search. “Um… hey? Is everything okay?”
“Yeah.” She exhales, telegraphing how tired she already is. How intolerant. How she’s done with today, and sadly, I suspect, her entire life. “Sorry if you’re busy or something.”
“It’s no problem.” As quietly as I can, I nudge the drawer closed and search through the next. “Your power isn’t all messed up again, is it?”
“No. I’m not even home. I’m just walking out of the bank, actually.”
“Really?” I pull my hands from Ryan’s stack of jeans and glance toward the closed door. “You on your way home?”
“No. It’s time for lunch. Alicia said I was scaring the customers anyway, so I’m heading to the park to eat my sandwich. I needed to talk to you, so I just… I, um…” She struggles to organize her thoughts, flitting from one to the next and settling on none.
“Nova?”
“I need to talk to you about your loan. Which is my professional excuse for calling. But I also wanted to discuss last night,because it feels like I have an anvil sitting on the back of my neck. I keep trying to carry it. I even try to set it down and pretend it’s not mine to deal with. But it’s right there, Lincoln, and I swear to God, if I don’t get this out, I may as well quit my job. My boss is nice and all that, but he won’t keep me on for much longer if I keep growling at people.”
I wanna hear her growl.
I want to see her ferocity and experience her bratty rage. Because all I’ve seen so far is devastating heartache, and last night, complete neutrality once she shut me out.
I don’t like either of those.
“I’m sorry for what happened.” I riffle through Ryan’s things and grit my teeth as I slide the second-to-last drawer closed. “You needed a friend last night, Nova, and I was…” I shake my head. “Not that. I don’t wanna say I was taking advantage of your current predicament, because that wasn’t my intention. But you areinyour current predicament, which makes my advances inappropriate. That wasn’t cool of me.”
“You think I’m not interested in exploring something with you?” From her end of the line, birds call from the trees, and the soft breeze fluttering through the branches creates music in the air—then the sound of her grunt rings through. In my mind, I imagine her sitting on the only bench the city planners graced the place with. “You think I’m mad at you or something?”
“Well…” I cough and clear my throat, though it comes with the added benefit of covering the sound of Ryan’s drawer grinding against the frame as I push it in. Standing tall again, I carefully set the watch aside and open the notebook, flicking through the pages without allowing a single one to make a noise.
“Lincoln?”
“Yeah. I thought you were mad. And you have every reason to be. I came into town during the most difficult time of your life, Nova. I introduced myself as a friend of your brother’s, though you can’t know that’s true. You can’t even confirm. For all you know, I might be lying.”
Jesus, Linc. Shut the fuck up already.
“Then you called me last night in a time of vulnerability.Addedvulnerability,” I clarify. “Since the power being out was on top of an already shitty week. You needed a friend, not a fucking hand on your shoulder. Not a guy on your couch. And definitely not someone who wanted to eat you the fuck up.”
“I think you think of me as a girl.” She sighs. “Like, a young girl. A teenager or whatever.”
I assure you, babe. I don’t.
“I think you’re caught in this in-between, obligated to keep me in the little sister category, but you’re attracted to me, too. It’s clear I’m nothing more than a cliché, just waiting to be screwed over. I wasn’t mad about what we did. I’m not even mad youmaythink of me in a way that isn’t brotherly at all. No woman would have a problem with a man desiring them, especially when that man’s sense of right and wrong is so firm.”
“Nova—”
“Wealmostcrossed a line,” she butts in, a paper bag crinkling on her side of the line. “But when I changed my mind, you didn’t attempt to convince me otherwise. You didn’t plead or whine or coerce. Desire is okay. And as crazy as it sounds, focusing onyouthese last few days has been the only time in nearly two weeks I’ve been able to come up for air. My heart hurts,” she rasps, “and I continue to ask the same questions,time and time again.Why us? Why him? Why did this have to happen? And why does it feel like no one gives a shit? From the moment that SUV hit our truck and everything changed, it’s like oxygen disappeared from the world, and my lungs stopped working. But when you’re right here in front of me, or in my office, or in my freakin’ living room, I can breathe again.”
Jesus. I lick my lips and swap the book for the watch, turning it over and checking the back in case he left a chip inside it. A message. A fucking love letter in Morse code. “You say those things, Nova, and you probably think they’re a convincing argument for why my presence in your life is a good thing.”
“Air is good. Air is necessary.”
“Sure. But those are the same reasons I should stay the fuck away. You not being able to breathe? That’s grief, Nov. And me being a distraction? That’s a trauma bond.”
“Lincoln—”
“You lost your parents, which made you and Ryitfor each other. You’d go to war for the other and make anyone bleed if it meant keeping your sibling safe. You watched him die, Nova.”
God. Shut the fuck up!
“You went through what most others wouldn’t survive! And then I walk in and become the connection to your brother you’re desperately clinging to. It’s not that I mind being here for you, but I’ve gotta admit, the idea you want me around as a distraction from your grief, and not because of my sparkling wit and sexy body, is just?—”
