“Maybe three-quarters.”
“I’ll take it.”
She turned onto her side, facing the pillow wall. Through a gap between cushions, she could see him lying on his back, one arm behind his head. Moonlight traced the lines of his profile.
“This is torture,” she said.
“Absolute agony.”
“The partners’ evaluation tomorrow…”
“Won’t matter.” His voice was quiet. Certain. “They’ll see what we already know.”
They lay there in the dark, separated by a barrier that seemed increasingly absurd.
“Victor?”
“Mm?”
“More than three-quarters.”
She felt rather than saw his smile. “I know.”
“Insufferable.”
“You like it.”
“How much are you?” she asked. “In love, I mean. Since we’re keeping score.”
Silence.
Then:
“All the way, Ava.” His voice was rough. Certain. Like he was confessing something he’d been holding for centuries. “I’m all the way in love with you.”
The pillow wall suddenly seemed very stupid.
But they’d made it this far. One more day of evaluation. One more night of restraint. They could survive a few more hours.
She reached through the gap between pillows and found his hand.
His fingers threaded through hers, warm and strong.
They fell asleep like that, connected across the barrier, the moonlight silver on their joined hands.
CHAPTER 10
The pillow barrier was a lie.
Ava had known it was a lie the moment Victor constructed it: his careful hands stacking cushions down the center of the California king like he was building a fortress. Protecting her. Protecting himself. Pretending that goose down and Egyptian cotton could hold back what had been building between them for weeks.
Now she lay on her side of the lie, staring at shadows on the ceiling, listening to the ocean through the cracked balcony door.
The silk pajamas clung to her skin despite the breeze. Every rustle of fabric felt amplified. Every breath too loud in the quiet room.
Beside her, Victor’s breathing had settled into a suspiciously steady rhythm. Too steady. Too controlled. The kind of breathing someone did when they were trying very hard to appear asleep.
He wasn’t fooling anyone.
