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“Mmm.”
He knocked my desk one more time. “Anyway, thought I’d let you know. I told Jacinta as well, and she was impressed. Thanks for that.”
Jacinta, his boss, was nobody’s fool. She’d know it wasn’t Hunter who’d came up with this idea, but I didn’t care about taking credit right now. I cared if my underarms smelled okay.
Hunter walked off with his hands in his pants pockets, sauntering like a stallion who’d just taken care of a herd of mares.
What was I going to do? The private room in which Hunter and Drake would meet was directly opposite my desk. It would be impossible for me to look the other way and not notice Drake. Not that I wanted to. And he wouldn’t do that either. It wasn’t his style to pretend.
No. I was either ready to see him or I’d have to leave my desk.
It took but a nanosecond to decide I needed to leave my desk. Some things never changed. Flight was my MO. I stood to survey the office, wondering if anyone had left a free desk today. None of them were far enough from the meeting room Hunter would use. Anyway, Drake’s tall ass could see everything from up there. Nowhere in this space was out of eyeshot.
I’d have to leave the building. Hell, the sizzling on my skin made me want to leave the country. I did but I didn’t. I flapped and frazzled my way through paperwork. I grabbed everything I needed for the next few hours of work.
And just as I quite possibly appeared as frazzled as I felt, I could feel it in the air. I felt it the way dogs must feel rain coming. Instinctual. It was hardwired into our reptile brains to know when our mate was near.
Sure enough, when I glanced up from my desk, with a stack of manila folders in my arms, he’d walked through the door, into the open-plan office, and had his gaze firmly fixed on me.
My God, he was beautiful. Nobody in the world had his warm brown eyes or lips, naturally upturned so he either looked like he smiled or was simply a bit coy. His skin, his hair, his athletic silhouette. I would never, ever, find someone as good as that again.
Suddenly, I felt like a fleeing convict with loot in my arms. I tried to push back my regret and shame and somehow at the same time wished I’d moved my ass a bit faster to have gotten away with it.
Would he come over and say hi? Would he just wave from over there or give a close-mouth half-smile like people did on the sidewalk when passing a neighbor that they knew, but didn’t really know, so it was all awkward? Fuck, I didn’t ever want to be a stranger to this man. Was I? Would I become one?
Taking in a deep breath, I decided the answer was up to me. I put my things down and raised a hand in the air to wave at him. Not a wave like, “Come over and say hi!” but a wave like, “I’ll never ignore you.” I tried on a smile that looked more confident than I felt.
He received it, tilted his head to the side, smiled, and winked. It was a greeting like he probably gave a lot of people. But Drake’s everyday smile served as a battering ram through your ribcage and a key to any chastity belt.
No wonder Quinn tossed her panties at him. Hunter probably would, too, in a minute.
We held the gaze for several beats, and I wished I was brave enough to close the gap between us by hurrying over, throwing myself at his feet, and begging forgiveness. But I wasn’t. And before I could even consider something less dramatic, Hunter approached him, shook his hand, and ushered him toward the conference room.
Once I’d settledmy paperwork onto a table and chairs outside the building, I’d hoped it was a short meeting between Jacinta, Hunter, and Drake. It was a chilly day, and the breeze that blew was definitely going to be problematic. This was beyond idiotic.
I knew I was being a total wimp. Avoidance to the max. I should have stayed upstairs, waited for Drake to get out of his meeting and actually spoken to him. He was right, I really was a fairy, constantly flying away.
I tried not to be too hard on myself. After all, a couple of months ago, I thought I might have lost both my parents within the same year and I discovered at the same time that I was a jealous mess, meaning I wasn’t half as confident as I’d thought I was.
Then, I dumped a guy who really didn’t deserve it both because he’d done nothing but love me for who I was and stood by me when I was a moody dark cloud. But also, he hadn’t actually cheated on me or shown Quinn anything but our solidarity when we were all together. Now, I wanted him back.
That was the only good thing about this case was that I knew they weren’t on tour together anymore. This was probably the most evil thought I’d had in my lifetime. Wanting someone I loved to be sued just to ease my ego. I was stooping lower and lower by the minute.
As if that wasn’t bad enough, sometimes I wished I would develop some real heavy problem just to take the time off in rehab and come back to find that a recipe book was the only bandage I’d needed.
You knew you were messed up when you were thinking like that. When you thought something really bad happening would be easier than facing your demons. I needed therapy.
Drake had felt like therapy most of the time. He’d always offered that special kind of love. It was something like the love of a parent, mixed with infatuation and a huge dollop of friendship. Drake had been every kind of love I’d ever experienced rolled into one hunk of a man.
I snapped out of my daydream, securing a flapping paper to my desk. This wasn’t working. None of it was. I needed closure with Drake. I needed the total truth with Drake. We couldn’t end on an argument. Or even on a strange text thread about burning people at the stake.
I promised myself that at some point soon, really soon, in fact, I’d pull myself up and have a talk. In order to face reality, I had to see what it was first.
