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She grabs my tie and pulls me in closer, but before our lips can meet, there’s a knock at the door.
We jerk apart with a guilty shuffle, then stare at one another in concern. Who is at the door? Is Sterling back for round two?
Her lips part and her worried gaze shifts to the door as if silently begging me to open it this time. I want to ask her if she’d like to hide behind the door - I can say she’s out if her boyfriend is back to make trouble.
I get up and make my way to the door, pulling it open right as there’s a second knock. Emma leans against her desk in a deceptively relaxed pose, and I come face to face with the delivery guy on the other side of the door.
He offers me the bag with our subs and the drink tray with a smile and upbeat attitude. “Thank you, sir, have a lovely day.” With that, he’s gone, and I close the door behind him, then turn to Emma.
“Lunchtime,” I say weakly, well aware the moment is shattered, but hopeful there’ll be another moment not too far in the future.
With a smile, she settles in her chair and I bring over the food, wishing the delivery guy could have waited until after I kissed her.
Then again, if we kissed, we might not have heard the knock at all.
Chapter Twelve
Emma
I bite into my meatball sub, savoring the tangy sauce and melted cheese. These subs are one of my guilty pleasures, and Clifton knows it. The food paired with the tall iced coffee that's the perfect mix of sweet and smooth leaves me feeling like he knows exactly what I need - even if I don’t know.
Since we're both shoving food into our mouths, we're not talking, but that doesn't matter. I don't feel the need to fill every second of silence with awkward conversation.
I’m comfortable around him.
I enjoy his company.
And I'm starting to think he enjoys mine.
I glance at him and catch his green eyes on me. Without a word, he flashes a charming smile and I’m struck in the moment. He’s so damn good looking with his dark hair, his bright eyes, his strong jawline, and that heart-melting grin.
There's no way I can deny that I have a crush on him. Especially now that all I can think about are the two times that he kissed me and how he was about to kiss me just a few minutes ago. Once again, I find myself wondering why his father had such a problem with him. Sure, the guy got into a few scuffles, but knowing him better now, I can only imagine he had reasons, he just didn’t share them.
“Why did you get into that fight?” Maybe now that we've built up a bit of a rapport and he trusts me, he'll let me have a deeper peek into his inner workings and what makes him tick... or ticked off.
He hesitates, going completely still for a moment right down to his jaw freezing mid chew. When he starts moving again, he lowers his food and stares at the foil wrapping on his sub, thoughtfully finishing his bite before glancing into my eyes again.
“Why do you want to know?” he asks in a low voice.
I’m not sure how to tell Clifton I want to get to know more about him without putting him on the defensive.
“Just curious,” I say as nonchalantly as possible while picking up my iced coffee to take a drink of the creamy chocolaty goodness.
He sets his sub down, wiping his mouth with a napkin before leaning back in his chair as if unsure where to start. “Camdon and I go way back.”
The familiar way he says the man’s name leaves no doubt about his words, and I lean in, interested. This certainly changes the narrative I’d known about the fight and why it happened.
“He and I didn’t get along in school; we were rivals. He beat me out for top of class by point zero one percent on our grades because he’d done some extra credit I hadn’t known was available. He laughed about my mom’s death and told me she didn’t love me enough to beat cancer, that she didn’t want to live with me and chose to die instead, all the worst things you can imagine a kid saying to another.” He looks out the window of our office, but I can see he’s not present in the moment with me - he’s back in memories of the past. “That’s awful,” I whisper.
Clifton lifts a shoulder. “And when we got older, he liked to try to steal any romantic partner I was interested in. And this time, he stole my ex-girlfriend. She cheated on me with him, and they got married.”
I sense that saying the words feels like a punch to his gut, and I suddenly feel bad for my previous jokes. “I’m sorry I made jokes-”
He lifts a hand and cuts me off. “I know you had no ill intent, and you’re funny. You make me smile.”
Something about that admission has my cheeks burning and my heart fluttering.
“Well, they both sound awful and you’re lucky to be free of them. And they have each other.” I shrug. “Once a cheater, always a cheater - she’s just going to do to him what she did to you.”
