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He shifted around so he was sitting between my thighs, and then he leaned against me and murmured, “Oh, wow.” The back of the house faced the open desert, so there was nothing to dim the jaw-dropping view of the night sky. He reached out and traced the river of stars above us as he whispered, “I’ve never seen the Milky Way before, except in pictures. It feels like I’m dreaming.”
I wrapped my arms around his shoulders and said, “This is my favorite thing about living out here, and a big reason why I haven’t abandoned the house and moved back to the city.”
“I get it. This is extraordinary.”
We both fell silent as we took it all in. After a while, I told him, “I want to bring you back here to see the meteor showers. There’s one in December, but the one in summer is even better.”
When he shifted around to face me, he bumped my phone and lit up the screen. In its faint glow, I saw his look of surprise as he asked, “You think we’ll be together then?”
I’d said more than I’d intended. It wasn’t like me to just put it all out there, so I tried to reel it back in with, “I hope so.”
Instead of replying, he hugged me tightly. The phone powered back down, and once again, we were in darkness. After a moment, I felt him shiver, so I said, “Maybe we should go back inside.”
We both got ready for bed, and once we were under the covers I drew him into my arms. He was uncharacteristically quiet, but that was probably because he was tired. Lord knew I was, too.
I settled in and said, “Good night, Jack.”
He whispered, “I want you to know this time with you has meant the world to me.” I kissed his forehead, and then I closed my eyes and let sleep pull me under.
* * *
When I awoke the next morning, I was alone in bed. A glance at my phone told me it was nearly nine a.m. Since I’d slept in, I figured Jack was probably in the kitchen, making himself some breakfast.
I used the bathroom and brushed my teeth before going downstairs. But instead of finding Jack, I found a note on the kitchen counter. All it said was:
I decided to go back to San Francisco. You’re going to think I stole your Cadillac, but I only borrowed it. I’ll leave it with valet parking at one of the hotels on the Strip before I take the bus home. I don’t know which hotel yet, but I’ll message Romy and let him know, since I don’t have your number. The valet ticket will be at the hotel’s front desk, in an envelope with your name on it.
Also, I swear to you I’m going to get your watch back. It’s the first thing I’ll do when I get home. I’ll send it to your Vegas address by certified mail, since it looks like you might be there a while.
Please stay safe, Adriano. You mean more to me than you’ll ever know.
I didn’t care about the car or the watch. All I cared about was Jack, and I needed to know why he’d suddenly decided to slip out in the middle of the night like that. Why didn’t he tell me he was going? And did he ever plan to see me again? The note left me with a million questions and an ache in my chest.
The thought occurred to me that maybe he’d only left a minute ago, so maybe I could still catch him. I rushed to the front door and threw it open, which set off the alarm. It kept shrieking as I ran out into the middle of the street and looked all around.
But he was long gone. Of course he was. He’d probably left hours ago.
I pushed my hair out of my eyes and yelled, “What the fuck, Jack?”
13
Jack
The pre-dawn sky was just beginning to turn pink as I let the big convertible roll down the driveway and out into the street. I ran back into the garage and entered the alarm code, which I’d noted when we first arrived. Then I hurried to the Cadillac, shut the garage door with the remote, and started the engine.
I drove out to the main road and made it about a mile before I started freaking out. It was so bad that I had to pull over, for fear of driving into a ditch.
Part of me wanted to go back, right the hell now. Adriano was a sound sleeper, and he probably had no idea I’d taken off. I could tear up the note and climb back into bed. He’d never know.
But then there was that other part of me, the one that had kept me up all night, worrying—about getting too attached to Adriano, about making myself vulnerable, about setting myself up to get not just hurt, but devastated if he didn’t want me the way I wanted him.
Whenever I really wanted something, it always ended in disappointment. In fact, most of my life was nothing more than one let-down after another. Over the years, they’d chipped away at me, until my thick skin was worn down to nothing more than the flimsiest veneer. I acted like I was strong and tough, but in reality I was fragile and terrified of getting hurt.
I took a few deep breaths before pulling back onto the empty stretch of road. Okay, so it had been cowardly to leave like this, but I’d been too scared to be up front with him and talk about my fears. I’d only end up admitting how hard I was falling for him.
And then what? There was no way he’d want me. Right now, he was distracted and stressed out from this situation with Greco, and he was probably reaching out to me just because I was there. That had to be the explanation.
Once his life returned to normal, he’d wonder what the hell I was doing in it. He’d remember the way I’d betrayed him on the night we met, and he’d realize he couldn’t be in a relationship with someone so untrustworthy.
