“No, it’s fine, er…” She fussed with her shirt sleeve, looking anywhere but at me. “I was just making dinner. Do you want anything?”
I could not stay at Jade’s house for dinner. Not when I had this knot in my throat just looking at her. But this place was so warm and welcoming and just… felt like home. I knew it wasn’t just because of the cozy design. “Well,” I said, “that depends.”
“On?”
“Does it have hot sauce?”
She paused, leaning against the corner of the doorframe, smiling wider at me. “You tell me. Big on spicy food?”
“Not to brag, but my local Thai place back in Boston eventually stopped giving me white-people spicy.”
She laughed, pushing off from the wall and towards the kitchen. “In that case, I’ll use a heavy pour. C’mon.”
Chapter 22
Jade
The cat didn’t come back. Girl was abandoning me with Alyssa and I knew damn well why, and as much as I wanted to complain, I knew I wouldn’t. Not when Alyssa looked like this in my kitchen, her hair down and a little messy over her shoulders, wearing her chunky cable-knit sweater and soft makeup that made the damn blue of her eyes pop—that blue that was haunting my dreams as I tried desperately to color-match the dye of the candle. Seeing her standing here in the low lights of my home, eyes sparkling as she laughed, I tried to tell myself it was limerence and nothing real, but I couldn’t help the way my heart ached when she was in front of me.
We’d kissed. Did it mean anything? What happened when she went back with Abby? I didn’t dare ask. So we talked about everything else—made small talk while I finished up the noodles, which conveniently went well with hot sauce.
True to her word, she could take a little heat. Daniela’s sauce was a biohazard as far as I was concerned, and I loaded up Alyssa’s bowl to about the maximum I could handle, but Alyssa tasted it and went back for more hot sauce before she dug in happily, not even breaking a sweat. I laughed incredulously when she went in for even more.
“If you just wanted to pepper-spray the inside of your mouth, that’s probably simpler than doing it with noodles.”
“Thanks for the offer, but I actually enjoy it more in a noodle dish than a crowd control weapon,” she said, settling in and sipping her broth with a contented noise. “It is a good sauce… Daniela really can make anything.”
My chest panged briefly. I wasn’t getting jealous of her with Abbyandher with Daniela. She just liked Daniela’s food. And she also, importantly, was not mine to be jealous of in the first place. “She’s a damn good cook, I’ll give her that.”
“Right?” Her eyes sparkled as she looked at me, and I flashed back to our kiss. To the way she’d moaned breathlessly when we moved together. How was she carrying on normally like it never happened? “I’ve been so spoiled living with her, I don’t know how I’ll handle leaving her house once I finally get a life.”
“I’m sure you could drop by anytime you wanted. Hell, she’d probably trek cross-country to bring you more food. She’s like that.”
She flashed a small, insecure smile at me, and it made my chest tighten. “You two have a lot of history, huh?”
“Oh, er… I guess so. I mean, we’ve been friends for a while. As far as I do friends, anyway.”
She looked down, and my pulse quickened when she moved closer, putting her hand on the table close to mine. “Do you, er… you know… we talked before about whether you like her as more than a friend.”
I could not have this conversation with Alyssa fucking Taylor. I tried to sound nonchalant even though I was really fucking chalant. “Not really. I think I just… er… didn’t really know how to have a close friendship. So when she came around and got really close to me, I think my feelings just got… confused.”
“Mm…” She folded her hands on the table, forcing a smile at me. “I think friendship is the foundation for any good relationship, though, isn’t it?”
Christ, she was sitting too close to me. Too far, at the same time. I was fucking obsessed with the timbre of her voice, and it was terrifying. “I guess,” I said. “But… doesn’t mean every good friendship is waiting to become a relationship.”
“Maybe not. I mean, you’d have to have a lot of relationships if that were a thing.”
“You’dhave to. I don’t have that many friendships. You’d be surrounded like a sultan with his concubines.”
“Stop,” she laughed, swatting my arm lightly, playfully, but her hand lingered there, moving too slowly until it was more of a caress, and I felt like I’d break. The slow, gentle movement of her fingers… I had to pull my thoughts back together, just in time to realize we’d been there for too long. Alyssa’s breathing came shallower, looking down at her hand on my arm, and slowly, achingly, she moved her hand again—not away from me like I needed her to, but slowly caressing up, and then down again, tracing small patterns on my arm. I swallowed hard, and I felt dizzy when she moved closer still. “Jade…” she whispered.
“Yeah?”
“I think… you and Daniela would be good together,” she breathed. Still caressing me while she did. I couldn’t hold myself together anymore.
“Alyssa.”
“I think she really likes you.” Higher, up my arm, and then along to my back, feeling along my shoulder blade.
