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“Ah.” He nodded. “We were always planning to come home at this time. It was a short tour, remember?”
Memories came back to me as he said that. But you’ll be back in time for your wedding, no prob, Yasmine had said, that first day. “Right,” I said. “Now I remember.”
“Yup.”
When we got to my door, Andrew patted my jacket pockets. When I frowned at him, he rolled his eyes. “Your keys, Ace. Where are your keys?”
I grinned at the notion that he would ever find my house key. I reached between my breasts, watching Andrew track the movement. I tried not to think about how even in my current state of drunkenness, I could feel the heat of Andrew’s gaze on my…hand. It also didn’t help that I had buried the key deep within the depths of my bra.
When I finally produced the key, I dropped it in the palm of his hands. “Here you go.”
“Took you long enough,” he grumbled as he fumbled to get it in the lock. He opened the door and maneuvered us through the doorway. “Welcome home, Ace.”
“Are you welcoming me to my own apartment?” I gave him a lazy sidelong look as I kicked off my shoes. I burrowed my toes into the carpet, loving the way it felt on my bare skin. I loved it so much that I laid down spreadeagled and moved my limbs around as if I was making a snow angel. “How kind of you.”
“Ace, get off the floor. We gotta get you changed and ready for bed.”
“Nope, I think I’ll stay here for a bit.” I almost rolled side to side but thought better of it. The room suddenly had a pulse, and I knew that if I were to move just then, I’d probably regret it.
“I’ll join you, then.” I heard a quiet thump as Andrew took off his shoes and lay next to me. “Better?”
“I guess.” I laughed, my voice teetering on the cliff, slightly off balance. When my laughter died down, we sat in the expectant quiet of my apartment. The clock ticked off every second, the floors creaked, and I could hear Andrew’s soft sigh from next to me.
The feeling of panic, that soft suffocation on my chest and burning sensation in my throat, overtook me. I wanted to say that I didn’t know why, but I knew. Even my drunk brain knew. It might be the last time I ever saw Andrew. I was struck with the sudden urge to get it all out there. I turned my face to him, waited for him to catch my eye. “Hey.”
“What?” Momentarily, I got lost in the browns of his eyes, those eyes that had tracked my every movement from the moment he saw me tonight. The same eyes that clouded over when I told him the fate of our friendship. The same eyes that lit up when he found a new adventure or discovered another “favorite” food.
“Ace?” he prompted. “What is it?”
“This may be the last time we see each other, so I wanna ask something.”
“Sure. Okay.”
“Did you really not love me all those years ago? When you rejected me?”
He regarded me with cautious eyes. I held my breath as he brushed a curl back from my face. “Maybe we should wait till morning to have this conversation.”
I closed my eyes as the urgency of it all overtook me. “We don’t have time for that. You won’t be here in the morning.”
“I will.”
I opened my eyes, now regarding him with the same cautious look he had just moments before. “I can’t leave you like this, Ace. You could choke on your own vomit. Plus, I promised Cat.”
“And those are the only reasons you’ll stay?”
“Yes.”
“Liar.”
He looked away.
“So, answer the question. Did you? Not love me?”
“I’ve always loved you, Ace.” He smoothed a hand down my arm. “You were my best friend.”
“You know that’s not what I mean, Andrew. Come on.” The drink in my system emboldened me. I met his eyes without fear of repercussion, the usual urge to fidget not hitting me. “Answer the question. Did you really not love me?”
He sighed, pushing his hair back in the way that I adored. Andrew’s resolve was hard to break most of the time, so it did something to me that I could unravel him with a question. “I don’t know, Ace. I didn’t give myself time to explore that.”
