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CHAPTER 7
ROCHELLE
Just like that, he’s gone.
He left me sitting naked in the bed we’d shared all night. I’d been happy all night, even in my sleep, and even happier when he woke me up and gave me two more orgasms, and I’d been looking right into the glorious sunshine of a life together.
A Goddess blessing.
(Even though I’m still not sure about the Goddess.)
Now he’s gone, terribly upset, and I don’t even know why!
I’m torn. Go after him, even though I don’t think he wants me to, or do my duty and go to work?
Oh, just hell. I don’t know what to do.
It occurs to me that the Goddess, if she does exist, could help—but I don’t know how. No, I have to fix this myself. If the Goddess sent Alaric to me, she already wants this to succeed. The key must be inside me. Inside both of us.
I call his phone. No answer. I text that I don’t know what I did wrong, but I am so so sorry to hurt him, and will he please call me so we can talk? No answer.
I throw on my robe and grab my keycard, and rush down a floor to Alaric’s apartment to bang on his door.
No answer. I can hear water running. I hammer at the door again. His neighbor opens his own door and pokes his head out, looking aggrieved. “Sorry,” I say. I’m clearly a mess, so Neighbor Guy opens his mouth and then shuts it. “Sorry,” I say again. “I didn’t mean to disturb you. Sorry.”
And right then, I’m catapulted back in time to the day that Alaric poured hot coffee all over me and couldn’t stop apologizing. I can still see how his face looked that day. How abject he was, how eager to be forgiven.
He thinks he’s not worth loving, my heart says. You have to show him that he is.
A stillness comes over me.
This is truth.
I understand him.
And I love him.
And he is so, so, so much more than the items on my list. I didn’t imagine his sweetness. His ease in being delighted. His happiness in belonging, despite his unspoken suspicion that people don’t really like him.
He’s complex and complicated and aggravating and wonderful, and I need him in my life. I need to show up for him and let him know how important he is to me.
And just like that, I know what I need to do.
I go back upstairs and get ready for my day, and I make plans.
I can’t lose him. I won’t. He’s a gift from the Goddess, and I will not waste that.
ALARIC
I bury myself in work.
I put my headphones on and put up the privacy screen around my workstation, and every time my thoughts stray toward Rochelle I yank them away.
I protect my heart. Which I should have done before falling in love, but too late now. She’s everything I ever wanted, but how could I be what she wants? I can’t.
She deserves better.
I work through lunch. Juliet brings me a sandwich from Mindy’s, but I can’t eat more than a few bites. My stomach is still roiling.
