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“Thought so. Sorry I didn’t fall for your Blue Banana hint and loadPretty Woman.”
I let out an exaggerated gasp. “What? That’s the ultimatebig strong man in distressstory!” I mocked.
He laughed and nudged my shoulder, leaving his against mine. “It is, huh? It helps because the hotel doesn’t have it on demand.”
I laughed out loud, but I was overtly aware of his nearness, as I snuggled down into bed when the movie started. “I didn’t think you picked up on that! Aren’t you getting under the covers?” I glanced up at him expectantly.
Dylan adjusted the volume down, and then threw the remote down on the comforter. “Sure.” He moved to pull his side of the covers down and slid beneath. “I was going to wait in case I needed to add wood to the fire.”
“I think it’s warm enough,” I offered.
The pillows and sheets were so comfortable it felt like the bed was swallowing me up in a big fluffy hug as I sank down in. I made a happy moan.
“Comfortable?”
“I think I may never leave,” I said with a nod as my eyes closed.
“Let’s see,” Dylan said, scooting down further in the bed and pulling the covers up. His eyebrows rose in surprise. “Mmm… Amazing.”
“Yep.” I sighed.
“So, spill,” he demanded.
“About what?” I hoped my coy response sounded plausible, even though I knew what he was asking.
“About that thing you said in the tub. About telling Alan the truth,” he confirmed.
I pulled the covers closer, rolling them around my fists under my chin. “Oh. Well,” I began. “I told him I was with my family in North Carolina this weekend. I didn’t tell him we were coming here.” I thought I’d done a good job of covering the actual truth of what I had been speaking of.
“Oh. Why?” Dylan persisted. “Are you ashamed or worried what he might think?”
I let his words sit for a few seconds before answering. “I mean… I didn’t want him to show up.” It was an honest answer.
Dylan was leaning toward me in the bed, after turning and propping his head up on his arm. He wasn’t the least bit interested in the movie playing in the background. “Really? That’s good, because I spent the entire drive up here worrying that he was already part of the plan,” he admitted.
My eyes flashed up to meet his, surprised. “Why didn’t you just ask me?”
He half shrugged. “Things have been so weird the past three years. I didn’t know how to reach out or fix things between us, so I didn’t think I had a right to ask.”
Hearing Dylan refer to Alan as my boyfriend felt strange. “Dylan, you’re my best friend. You can ask me anything.”
His blue eyes were intense; it felt like they could see right through me. “Can I?”
I nodded slowly. “Of course.”
“Okay, then what really is between you?”
The defensive part of me, that didn’t want to be hurt, wanted to ask why it mattered considering Christy and whoever else he’d spent time with instead of me for the past three years. Even the year I was at Clemson with him, we barely saw each other without other people included.
“He’s a good man. We have similar career goals. It just, sort of happened. We started studying together and kind of went from there. Then we ended up in a couple of the same courses and then a lab.” The explanation, while emotionless, was the truth.
I could see the unspoken question in his eyes. He wanted to know how intimate Alan and I were. I didn’t want to go there. “How did you and Christy get together?”
“She was just around a lot, and she was fun. It also just happened, I guess. After you left.”
I wanted so much to reach out and touch his face. To push the lock of hair that had fallen over his forehead back but resisted. “Yeah. I regret that decision, but it seemed right at the time. You had a lot of other friends.”
“I did, but I missed you a lot,” he confessed.
