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“If there were ghosts in this place, I still think you’d stay here,” Cleo said, reading the excitement on his face. “You look like a kid on his birthday. They’re just steaks.”
“Ah, another clue about who you are,” he teased as he familiarized himself with the kitchen and took the food out.
“What clue?”
“Just steaks,” he replied as if that explained it all. “I never ate a steak in my life until I was old enough to buy my own. These are grass-fed, gorgeous cuts of meat. The butcher marinated them perfectly. I’m going to cook them exactly to the temperature we want, and they are going to melt in our mouths. If that’s no big deal to you, you grew up with money.”
“What would it matter if I did?” Cleo felt a roll of tingling nervousness every time he asked about her past. “Would that change how you feel about me?”
“How do you think I feel about you?” he asked, the verbal gymnastics their specialty.
“Don’t start all that,” she said, waving him off. “I just don’t understand why you want to know anything about my past. I’m right here. I’m the person standing in front of you. Why does it matter how I got here?”
“It matters completely,” Nick said, a seriousness falling over his face as he paused his food prep. “We’re all the product of a bunch of experiences and perspectives. No one just becomes who they are. It’s not that passive. You’re shaped by how you grew up. There must be some science you could point to there, right?”
“Nurture versus nature is a nuanced debate,” she said but could tell that wasn’t what he meant. “Fine, how exactly did your youth shape you?”
“I’d do anything for my family. When they hurt, I hurt. And that usually ends in me hurting someone else for them. I work my ass off because my parents did. The money my family has now doesn’t make me want to do less. I’m slow to trust anyone. I’ve seen every bad thing that can happen in the South End of Boston. I punch first because I’ve seen what happens when you don’t. I know that the element of surprise is the biggest advantage anyone can have. So I’m always paying attention to what’s going on around me. Where I sit. Where the exits are. How people are standing. What might be going through their mind. I’ve had broken bones, broken hearts, and too many wrecked cars to count. Things, like possessions, don’t really mean anything to me, and not just because we never had much. I knew really early on that you couldn’t take anything with you when you died, so collecting things seemed like a waste of time. I don’t plan because everyone I ever saw with a plan found disappointment waiting for them. Plans don’t work out. You fail, or you change your mind, or you die.”
“That’s—” She gulped, trying to process how openly he was baring himself to her. She could feel every element of that in him. She’d seen it all. “That’s very different than my experience.”
“I know it is.”
“But you know yourself.”
“Do you?”
“I like to think I do.”
“So that’s why I’m asking about your life, your family. I think it’s a pretty good road map to who you are and why you do things.”
“I thought you hate maps,” she teased. “Can’t you just see where the wind takes you when it comes to knowing me?”
“I could,” Nick said, looking up at her in a dangerously sensual way. “But I don’t know how long it will be until you walk out of my life. And I’d be pissed if I didn’t figure you out before that.”
“Because?”
“Because you confuse me. You annoy me. You challenge me. I haven’t met a woman like you before. I don’t really want to spend the rest of my life wondering what makes you tick and why.”
“You know I’m not going to make it easy for you,” she said, flipping her hair off her shoulder. “Not because I’m playing some game. It’s a me thing, not a you thing.”
“I get it.” Nick went back to prepping the meal. “I hope you don’t mind that I’m going to keep trying.”
“I’d be disappointed if you didn’t.” As she moved in closer to ask if he needed help, a picture slipped from the wall and loudly hit the ground. She shrieked and scrambled to get behind him. “Clementine,” she gasped, clawing her nails into his bicep.
“More like cheap nails and too heavy of a frame. You’re fine.”
“How are you so chill about this?”
“I’m not really worried about ghosts. I have a theory.”
“Would it make me feel better?”
“It might. But I don’t believe in the kind of ghosts that knock pictures off the walls and rattle chains.”
“Why?”
“The hardest thing my mother ever did was die.”
