“This is kind of”—she waves her hands, smiling, but her eyes still shine—“coincidental. Graham called me into his office at the end of the week. He had an ... opportunity he wanted to pass along.”
“What opportunity?”
Ren turns to the water, maybe towards the seagulls, and she tilts her head to try and stop me from noticing the way she drags a knuckle across her lash line. But I don’t think there’s much about her I wouldn’t notice at this point.
She shifts back to face me. “Well ... as we know, Scott stole my job opportunity here. And I don’t think—I wouldn’t be competitive most places—I need my PhD. I know that’s on my list, but Graham has a colleague who’s looking for an assistantcurator at a museum in Halifax. It’s ... smaller. So my lack of ... qualification wouldn’t matter as much. I know I wanted to apply to school, but who’s to say I’d even get in this fall with the new application cycle? So maybe ... this is my only shot at it.”
Her voice catches on the wordsmaller. And I think of her, taking up all this space in me, and I can’t imagine a world where Ren should try to contain herself in anything defined assmall.
“They, uh, have good fossils?” I ask.
A laugh tries to gather in her throat, but it drops to nothing when she looks back out at the water. Her voice drops, too. “Not like mine.”
“Is that . . . what you want?”
She worries at her bottom lip. “Maybe. I don’t know.”
“So we might both ... move? Like, far apart?”
I hate the sound of the words as soon as they’re out in the world, and I hate what they mean even more. They feel wrong.
The idea of living somewhere where she isn’t does too.
She woke me up, and I think a world without her would be a really, really tiring one.
“I guess.” Ren shrugs before bumping my shoulder with hers. “We could be pen pals.”
I still at the contact. But I swallow down whatever feels like shit at the thought of her absence and toss her a sideways grin. “What happens to our kid, then?”
Her bottom lip dips into a pout. She turns back to me, confused. “Our kid?”
“How quickly you’ve forgotten our custody arrangement.” I click my tongue, widening my eyes. “Which, by the way, you haven’t kept up your end of the bargain. Haven’t seen our trophy in weeks.”
A laugh shakes her shoulders. Whatever clouds living in her eyes clear, and they sparkle again, more than the water stretching beyond us, when she throws a hand in the air. “I’mso sorry, Miller. Please don’t take legal action. I promise, we can swap tonight.”
I cock my head. “I did have my lawyer on speed dial, but as long as you pass him off tonight, won’t need to hit call.”
“I promise.” She points a singular, slim finger at me, face scrunched up all serious. “You can get him tonight. You’re all into chivalry. You take me home, make sure I get in safely.” But then she straightens, mouth popping open, indignant. “I just realized I’ve never seen your place. Don’t tell me—it’s like an overgrown frat house. You are twenty-seven, after all.”
“No.” I snort, but I pinch the bridge of my nose. “No abandoned beer bongs littering the floor. It’s clean but, uh—”
“But what?” she asks, suspicious, before her voice turns teasing. “Miller, where do you live?”
“Not far from the stadium.”
“Don’t tell me—”
I grin, nudging her shoulder with mine. “The stupidest, douchiest, sprawling King West penthouse money could buy.”
She laughs, tipping her head back, revealing the lines of her neck that aren’t unlike the ones of her legs. The dip at the hollow of her throat that could probably use a kiss too, and her hair tumbling down her back. I think I wouldn’t mind running my fingers through it.
I watch for a bit too long, and when she comes back down to earth, she starts when she notices me staring. Her palms find her cheeks, worried, when she asks, “What? Do I have ice cream on my face?”
“No.” I shake my head.
“Then what are you looking at?”
I shrug, mouth tipping up at the corners. “Just thinking about what you’ll say when you finally lay eyes on my place. Probably never live that down.”
