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It’s why I finally snapped and told him all about the new love of my life, just to try to balance it out.No need to preen around like you’re the only one who’s getting laid, old chap. I used Clover’s middle name, because of course I couldn’t use her actual name. She was CCed on every email we exchanged, and no matter how oblivious he is about the people who work for us, he’d recognize a name likeClover.
So Clover Jane Hall simply became Jane, my new girlfriend, and then my fiancée. And it felt good to finally reveal my deep affection for her, to someone, even if it was under a fictional pretence.
But it also made my wildly off-limits attraction to her that much worse. It heightened how much I crave Clover,andwhat was at stake if she ever found out.
Tonight is the last time, I tell myself just before I step through the door.
There he is, helping Heather into her seat at a table right in the center of the restaurant, not far from where a jazz trio is playing. My step falters, then I push myself forward.
“Andrew,” I say with more enthusiasm than I feel. “And Heather, so good to see you again.”
They both look past me. “Where’s Jane?” Andrew asks, a weird smile playing at his mouth.
“She—”
“Sorry I’m late,” Clover says breathlessly, appearing at my side from out of nowhere. “Hello, darling.” Her hands wrap around my arm, one squeezing my forearm, the other gripping my biceps in a way that forces me to turn toward her.
My heart slams into my ribcage as I realize just how different she looks. Her usual black square glasses are gone, and her hazel eyes are transformed from their usual soft, knowing mossy depths to glittering amber popping from a frame of inky pewter makeup. Even her eyelashes look different. Longer and fuller and darker. Her mouth is glossy, hypnotically so, and once my gaze tangles there, it takes me a second to drag my attention anywhere else. But I don’t miss that she’s wearing a short, sparkly dress and heels that bring her up over my shoulder.
There’s no amount of a makeover that can erase the difference in our ages, though. If anything, the makeup and dress highlight just how much younger she is than me.
“Darling,” I repeat dumbly.
Her mouth curves like we’re in on a secret together, but we aren’t—all my worst secrets are about her, and the filthy fantasies I have about her mouth. That mouth is now painted up in such a way that if I leaned down to kiss her I would probably make a mess of her gorgeous face, but ohfuck, now all I can think about is smearing that lip gloss for a very good cause.
Darling.
She can’t find out what I’ve done, what I’ve said, how I’ve—
“You’re Jane?” Andrew asks, a tightness in his voice.
Clover’s eyes sparkle as she holds my gaze a beat longer, as she pushes up on her toes like she might kiss me with that impossibly glossy red mouth, but then at the last second she laughs and turns her head. “I sure am,” she says, laughing. “Who else would I be?”
I don’t want him to answer that question. I inhale a ragged breath, breathing in the scent of her hair, which tumbles down her back in thick golden waves. Is this what it looks like when she lets it down from her usual twisted bun?
I want to sink my hands into it and tighten my fingers into fists.
I want to drag her right up against me and never let her go.
As Andrew gapes at her, I clear my throat. “Well, let’s sit down.”
I turn us both so, for a moment at least, I’m between her and my dinner companions. “You don’t need to do this,” I say quickly and under my breath.
She tips her head to the side, gently takes my tie in her hands, and adjusts the knot. “Nowhere else I’d rather be,” she murmurs back.
“But—” Before I can protest further, she slides around me and I find myself pulling out her chair across from Heather.
Which puts me on one side of her and Andrew on the other.
“Well this is nice,” Clover says brightly. “So sorry I haven’t been able to meet you before, but you know how it is.”
“Not sure I do,” Andrew says slowly. “Why don’t you tell us? You’re than I expected.”
“Am I?”
“Younger,” he says pointedly.
I’d kick him under the table if we weren’t twenty years beyond that kind of childish petulance.
