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Natalie smirked, taking a sip of her coffee before calmly declaring, “There’s a hickey on your collarbone.”
I gasped, my hand immediately flying upward to tug the collar of my shirt higher, and tried to picture which one I’d forgotten to cover. Natalie started laughing and fixed me with a lopsided grin. “I’m just kidding, but now Iknowyou two have a thing!”
While she was often the more sensible one, whenever it came to my dating life my older sister was always excitable. When I frowned at her, Natalie offered her own mock pout before smiling again. “Tell me everything!” She paused for a moment, considering her next words carefully. “Of course, I’ve dated a patient before so you don’t need to worry about me saying anything to Santiago.”
“Oh, Nat,” I grumbled, rolling my eyes petulantly. “You know that’s not true. And I really don’t want to break the heart of the only other guy who’s my typeandreally seems to like me…not to mention lose my job in the process.”
Natalie crossed her heart and zipped her lips like she used to when we were kids, promising, “I won’t tell a soul as long as you tell me so you at least have someone on your side who knows everything that’s going on.”
Considering my options, which were to either craft an elaborate lie about an imaginary man I’d been seeing or brief Natalie on my unprofessional affair, I chose the latter. “You can’t share this with anyone, and I mean it this time, Nat,” I warned her, glaring seriously at my older sister as she tried to stifle a giggle at my antics.
“Start from the beginning, Ames, and make sure not to leave out any of the juicy details!”
Joshua
I finished my meeting at Collective Expectations early and instead of picking Amelia up from her sister’s apartment an hour ahead of when I said I would, I called up Anthony Carlisle.
“Tony!” I greeted my best friend when he answered the phone. “Are you busy? I’m in town with nothing to do and was wondering if you wanted to grab lunch?”
Sure enough, Anthony was more than willing to grab sandwiches from a local deli with me, especially since I had spent most of my free time as of lately with Amelia. We took our time strolling to a nearby park with our food tucked securely into a bag which Anthony carried so I could focus on “full knee extensions” while walking.
“It’s something Amelia has been nagging me about,” I said fondly, thinking back to all the minor arguments we’d had about my shambling around the mansion instead of taking full steps to get my knee moving properly again.
“So you’re on a first name basis,” Anthony remarked cheekily. “Have you made your move yet?”
Looking at him suspiciously, I twisted my lips in a smirk even though I dreaded having this conversation with him. “I thought you wanted me to get back with Laila, Tony. Why are you suddenly interested in me and my physical therapist? Could it be that things with Iliana aren’t going so well?”
Anthony rolled his eyes and scoffed, “We both knew that relationship would last a few monthsmax…I’m surprised we even dated to begin with.” I thought I had successfully sidetracked my best friend but then he returned to his own line of questioning as we sat down on a surprisingly clean park bench. “I’m interested because I care about your happiness, Josh. And if this woman has been keeping you sobusythat we haven’t had lunch together in two weeks, then she’s obviously doing more than rehabilitating your knee.”
I cast a sidelong glance at Anthony, envying his simple life for a moment. Anthony, of course, could stick his nose in my business because he had none of his own; there wasn’t an ex-wife to deal with or the fear of a scandal (Anthony had already had a few of those in his younger years, so by now no one was overly shocked by his playboy behavior).
He met my gaze with his piercing blue eyes and I knew it would be pointless to hide the truth from him, so I decided to only tell him fragments of it. “Fine. I’ll tell you as long as you promise that none of this gets back to Lai—” Anthony nodded sincerely, running a hand through his inky black curls. “Yes, Amelia and I have been sleeping with each other for the past few weeks and I think she’s starting to fall in love with me.”
I neglected to tell him that I felt the same as a precautionary measure. But what Anthony said next shook me to my core. “Are you sure that she loves you? There have been plenty of girls in your life that sought you out for your money and nothing more, Josh. I mean, you barely know her and you’re going through a divorce…just, are you sure your head’s in the right place with this?”
For all his friendly immaturity, I could always count on Anthony to point out things I might have otherwise never considered. I took a bite of my sandwich and gave myself time to consider what he said while I chewed, eventually settling on, “It’s the way she looks at me, Tony. I can remember Laila gazing at me that way when we were first married and that was what drew me to her in the first place.”
Anthony immediately shot back, “drew you to Laila or Amelia?” And when I tried to correct him, he cut me off with a wave of his hand. “This is what I’m saying, dude. You fell in love with a woman who is now divorcing you and are in the process of moving on to another woman before the ink has even dried.Andyou’re telling me that what you like about Amelia is what you liked about Laila, a woman you aren’t even with anymore.”
I laughed dryly. “You’ve seen too many movies. Life just happens sometimes, Tony…I can’t control who I like and who I don’t.”
“But you can control how quickly things move with Amelia,” Anthony pointed out, the sun’s rays haloing him as he turned to look at me like my guardian angel. “All I’m saying, man, is that you should take things slowly with Amelia.”
I didn’t interject to tell him that I had been taking things at a tortoise’s pace until we started sleeping together, because what Anthony was saying was starting to make sense. As much as my heart yearned for Amelia, how could I be sure that she was the right woman and not just the most convenient one? And even if I did love her, were there red flags I was missing because I was so caught up in the youthful, carefree nature of our relationship?
Not wanting to add to Anthony’s ego, which I was sure had reached its maximum capacity over the course of the conversation, I replied with, “Thanks, Tony. I’ll think about what you said.”
“No problem, Josh. Now tell me, is it true what they say about redheads?”
“Don’t be fuckin’ gross,dude.”
Chapter Ten
Amelia
TheridebacktoJosh’s was quiet and comfortable, each of us engrossed in our own books. He held my hand loosely in his and I silently marveled at how we fit together—each ridge, knuckle, and callus configuring to complete a puzzle. As we pulled into his driveway, gravel crunching beneath the tires of his car, Josh looked up from his novel and asked, “did you have a good time with your sister?”
I bit my lip nervously and used my finger as a placeholder so I could give Josh my full attention. “Yeah, it was fun. I…I told her about us.”
