“And yet,” he says, reaching for his water, “you keep talking to me.”
I tip my chin up. “Maybe I like difficult.”
His eyes hold mine as he takes a drink.
And then, very quietly:
“Maybe I do, too.”
Oh.
Oh no.
No, actually—oh yes.
The servers begin clearing plates, the lights dim a little more, and somewhere near thedance floor I spot members of the wedding party starting to gather, which probably means speeches or cake-cutting or some other ceremonial development is imminent.
I should be paying attention.
I should be acting normal.
I should not be mentally replaying every point of contact Miller and I have had in the last three hours like a scholar assembling sacred texts.
But here we are.
HereIam.
Hopelessly, gloriously in trouble.
And the worst part is?—
I don’t think I want out.
eleven
“COME DANCING” — THE KINKS
Miller
The night is going exactly the way I planned.
I don’t let myself think that too loudly. I’ve spent enough time in enough high-stakes situations to know that the moment you congratulate yourself on your success is the moment everything goes to shit.
But sitting here, with Tavey beside me, the reception humming around us, candlelight doing something unreasonable to her hair and those dragon clips catching the light every time she turns her head — I let myself have it.
Just for a second.
This is working.
She’s been making me laugh for the better part of an hour. Not the polite, managed version of laughing I do at work when something is actuallyfunny but I don’t want to encourage anyone. Real laughing. The kind that comes out before I can stop it. She said something about the best man’s speech — something about how he seemed to have mistaken “heartfelt tribute” for “lightly veiled blackmail material” — and I had to set down my drink.
I don’t do that.
I don’t set down drinks because someone made me laugh.
And yet.
At some point her hand ended up in mine. I’m not entirely sure which of us was responsible for that and I don’t particularly care. What I care about is the way she turned her hand over when I covered it. Deliberate. Unhurried. Like a question she’d already decided the answer to.
