Frankie Curtis wasn’t waiting to tackle her dreams, she was going after them full throttle. I envied her for it more than I liked to admit.
My phone buzzed. My heart kicked stupidly hard before my brain caught up.
Rachel.
It was a voice note.
I didn’t open it right away. I never did. There was a small, ridiculous part of me that liked knowing it was there, waiting. A kind of private promise.
When I finally tapped play, her voice filled the quiet office.
“Hey,” she said softly. “Tonight was… perfect.”
I closed my eyes.
“As tired as I am right now, I know I’m exactly where I’m meant to be.”
There was a yawn, unguarded and real, and I smiled despite myself.
“I am also dead tired. So, sleeping now. More stories later.”
The message ended.
I didn’t move.
There was something about hearing her like that—unpolished, half-asleep, happy—that made the distance between us feel both unbearable and somehow survivable. She wasn’t pretending with me. She never did.
That was what I loved most. Rachel didn’t censor herself. She justwas. She didn’t try to be someone she wasn’t. She never made me any promises.
None.
I wanted to be where she was. In her mornings. In the rooms where she hung her photographs. In the space between her thoughts when she wasn’t performing for anyone.
Paris had her now.
I tried not to resent that. I really did.
She sounded alive there. Lit from the inside. Hungry in the way people only got when they were becoming something.
I wanted that for her.
I just didn’t know where itleftme.
Frankie had four men planning a future around her. A whole orbit of devotion. I’d listened to Coop explain it once, earnest and unguarded, like it was the most natural thing in the world to build a life around the person you loved.
Honestly, I agreed with him. I just didn’t know if Rachel would ever want to build one around me.
I replayed her message.
Just once.
Then I set the phone face down on my desk and went back to work, because that was the only way I knew how to keep from wanting something I couldn’t reach.
Still, as the city negotiated and the night stretched on, one thought refused to let go.Will Rachel ever choose me?
The bar Ezrapicked was too loud and too polished, the kind of place that smelled like money and bad decisions in equal measure. Low lights, glossy surfaces, cocktails that cost more than they had any right to.
Ezra was already three drinks in when I arrived.
