But that moment made me feel ridiculous. Like a silly girl who needed looking after.
This moment makes me feel everything else.
All the emotions I’ve been trying to wrangle about Miller for all this time come washing over me. Nearly overwhelming me.
It’s there. In the details.
Miller said it best — and I am suddenly, devoutly certain that he did say it — the details matter.
I swallow past my emotions and do some mental CPR to get my heart pumping again before smiling up at him. “I’m ready.”
His gaze drops to my lips for a second before he returns my smile. “Ready to go, I assume?”
I nearly choke, but turn it into a laugh. “Yes. Because I’m pretty sure checkout is in about twenty minutes.”
seventeen
“TAKE THE LONG WAY HOME” — SUPERTRAMP
Miller
She thinks she’s ready.
Hell, she might even be ready.
But there’s a delicacy about her that wasn’t there when I picked her up for the wedding yesterday. And she’s still hungover.
So, is she really ready for what I want?
No. Not just yet.
But that’s nothing a couple of hours of coffee and hydration can’t fix.
We load up the SUV. She’s doing her best impression of a normal person. Well, a normal hungover person, that is. She’s armed with oversized sunglasses and multiple forms of hydration. I’m doing my best impression of a man who didn’t spend half the night in a chair beside her bed andthe other half thinking about her in considerable detail.
Which I’m going to need to stop thinking about immediately if I’m going to drive this vehicle in a straight line.
I shove the thought aside.
Focus.
“So,” I ask, testing the waters as I back out. “How did you sleep?”
“Like a woman tormented by bad decisions, heavily poured theme drinks, and false memories.”
“False memories?” I ask.
I can feel her staring at me through the inky lenses of her sunglasses. She’s trying to gauge my reaction.
Just ask,I want to tell her.
But I know she won’t. Not yet. Not with a two-hour car ride ahead and nowhere to go if it goes sideways.
Truth is, I know she slept badly. No one—not even angelic rays of sunshine—sleeps well after drinking that much. God knows I’ve had enough nights of overindulgence to know how it goes. Hell, there’ve been nights when I drank twice that much just trying to forget her.
For all the good that did me.
Those days are past. I’m done running from this.
