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Charlotte looked at her with wet, glossy eyes. “Do you think you can really do that?”
Alex’s heart ached. “I want to say yes.”
“But you don’t know,” Charlotte guessed as she fiddled with the edge of her baggy hoodie.
“I’d like to try,” she decided. “You showed me something new was conceivable. That I could have a partner in all ways.” Alex stopped herself. She didn’t want to talk about the business now.
“What? Are we just supposed to start over? How can you ever forget how we started?”
Alex inched closer, the scent of Charlotte’s soap wafting toward her as she did. How she missed her fragrance. Her warmth.
Hesitantly, Alex reached for her hand to stop her from unraveling the loose thread she’d started picking. The contact with her skin was a bigger rush than the time she and her cousins went skydiving. “I don’t know that we can forget,” she admitted with a heavy heart. “But . . . I don’t know that we have to let that beginning be our end.”
“I would never hurt you, Alex.” Charlotte scooted over, filling the space between them and clasping her hand over Alex’s. “I know it sounds crazy considering, but I would never betray your trust.”
Alex’s lips twitched into a smile. “Considering your harrowing last few days, I can honestly say I believe you. If you hadn’t warned me about Eric, I would be facing a much more complicated problem. In some ways, you being there might have saved me.”
“Is it okay to ask for a hug?”
Alex’s response was to pull her into her arms and envelop her. As soon as Charlotte crashed into her chest, tears rushed out of her as she trembled against her body.
They sat like that for a long time. Neither of them willing nor able to speak.
“What now?” Charlotte asked as she looked up at her.
Alex took a deep cleansing breath. “I don’t know. I think we just start and figure it out as we go along. How about we start with dinner?” She refrained from commenting on her weight loss but couldn’t help but notice that where she once felt muscle there was mostly bone.
Charlotte looked down at her clothes as if she’d been dressed by someone else and she was seeing their selection for the first time. “Let me change.”
Before Charlotte could stand, Alex grabbed her by the wrist. “Who said anything about leaving?” Slipping out of her shoes, Alex started for the kitchen. “Let’s make something together.”
“I don’t know if I have anything you’d like,” Charlotte said as she followed her across the small living room.
Alex turned around in feigned o ense. “What do you think of me? Do you have food that’s good enough for you?”
Charlotte chuckled, her eyes glistening with life for the first time since Alex walked in. “I don’t think you’re a grilled cheese and canned tomato soup kind of person.”
“Ms. Castro, don’t presume to know what I will or won’t enjoy,” she said with the most exaggerated snooty tone she could muster.
Charlotte rolled her eyes and pulled her close. “I love you,” she whispered. Her widening eyes reflected that the
words had slipped out. Maybe having been interrogated for so long wore her out. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have—”
The rest of her unnecessary apology was snu ed out by Alex’s mouth on hers. Charlotte’s soft lips were salty from her tears, and it only made Alex kiss her harder. She needed to replace the lingering sorrow with something else.
Something bright and beautiful.
CHAPTER 46
AS SOON AS Alex drifted into her bedroom, Charlotte realized she’d never once pictured her there. In nearly a year, she’d never conjured the image of Alex strewn across her full-sized bed.
Even before she’d seen the inside of Alex’s house, she’d imagined her in some moment of grand repose. Dressed in a silk nightgown maybe, perched on some piece of furniture that cost more than Charlotte’s car.
She could have been embarrassed by her room. It was little more than a chest of drawers someone donated to a second-hand shop and a mattress on a metal frame. There weren’t sturdy matching nightstands or a fragrant, cedar lined, walk-in closet.
Despite all the things that weren’t, Alex was perfectly at ease as she walked Charlotte backward into the room.
Comfortable as she kept her hands on Charlotte’s waist and spun her toward the bed. Confident as she started to pull o her jacket.
