Page 20 of Dream Girl Drama

“I’m sorry, Sig.”

“It’s okay. If I’d grown up all posh like you, I wouldn’t be ableto teach you how to do laundry now. See?” He winked at her. “Everything happens for a reason. My mom was too busy working two jobs to teach me how to wash clothes, so I did what any hockey player would do. I asked my coach. His wife came over and showed me the basics.”

“How old were you during all of this?”

He squinted an eye. “Seven, maybe?”

“Wow,” she whispered, only vaguely aware that they’d gravitated together over the course of Sig’s story and now their foreheads were almost touching. “Did she teach you anything else?”

Sig nodded. “How to make chicken and dumplings.”

“I don’t know what that is, but it sounds really good.”

“I’ll make it for you one day.”

“No.” She shook her head. “You’re doing enough for me.”

“I’ll never... do enough for you, Chloe.” He turned his face away on a dry chuckle, as if he couldn’t believe he’d made that statement out loud. “What about your father? What’s his story?”

Chloe hummed in her throat, trying not to be obvious about memorizing the shape of Sig’s hard upper lip. “There was a very messy divorce with my mother when I was a toddler. She got custody—and the house. He remarried and had two more children. They live on Long Island, and I’ve never met a single one of them. But I speak to my father a couple times a year.” She bit the inside of her cheek. “Every once in a while, an article is published about him in one finance journal or another. He mentions me every time. That his oldest child is a harp prodigy.”

Sig studied her closely. “You don’t like that.”

She shrugged a shoulder. “He’s never even come to a performance. It doesn’t seem right that he should get some kind of credit for it, you know?”

“Yeah. Absolutely fuck that.” He nudged her forehead with his own. “You going to let me come to one?”

Her heart crammed its way into her throat. “Will you?”

“Damn right I will.”

She was suddenly smiling so wide, it hurt. “Okay.”

“As long as you come to a hockey game.”

“Damn right I will.”

Now he was smiling, too. How did she get here? Doing laundry in a basement in Boston with this beautiful man? Two weeks ago, she couldn’t have imagined it. Now, she couldn’t imagine being anywhere else.

“What about your mother?” Sig asked quietly, his hand lifting to brush back her hair, but dropping before he could complete the action. “It’s hard to get a read there. She obviously cares so much about you...”

“But the vibes are giving Disney villain? Yeah.” She searched through her mom-related discomfort for the right words. “It’s complicated with Sofia. She wants what is best for me. She was simply brought up in a world where inconveniences don’t exist. If you want a situation to look a certain way, you just pay to have it tailored to your taste. When she can’t have what she wants, she leans on cash harder and harder to maneuver people. Including me. She’s my mother, though, and I love her even though she is far from perfect. And kind of scary.” They both laughed softly. “It’s like, I know if I needed her, she would be there. I also know she’ll find a way to maneuver me into a place that makes her comfortable again.” Chloe looked up into Sig’s eyes, wanting to absorb the understanding she already knew she’d find there, finding the distance between their heads had dwindled. “She can’t help it.”

Chloe could see the moment he realized how close their mouths were, the intimacy of the setting. No matter what they did, they seemed to end up here. On the verge of making a wrong move. One they wouldn’t be able to take back.

Slowly, they pulled back from each other and finished sorting the laundry. He walked her through how to add soap to the machine, which buttons to press, then eventually how to work the dryer. While they talked about everything from favorite breakfast foods to hockey injuries, Chloe hopped back onto the machine and waited for her first wash to finish. Sig was directly in front of her with his hands propped on the corners of the machine, his thumbs inches away from the outsides of her thighs. A little close, maybe, but...

Had they tacitly agreed not to fight the need to be near each other?

Or was that her imagination?

Chloe was halfway through a question about Sig’s college days when the spin cycle started. And it started with a vengeance. The violent shaking began so suddenly, a laugh flew from her mouth and continued...

Until she saw the stark hunger transform Sig’s face. His attention had locked in on her breasts. Namely, the way they were being jostled with every sharp movement of the machine, her cleavage jiggling in the neckline of her T-shirt.

“I should get down,” she said, breathless.

“Yeah. You should.” The resonant whir of the washing machine nearly drowned out his words, but somehow, they were still loud in her ears. Like she alone had the ability to hear him under any circumstances. “God, I wish we’d never gone to that dinner, Chlo.” His palms hovered a centimeter above her thighs, before he rested them there, skimming them upward toward her hips. “I’ve never wished for ignorance, but I wish we didn’t know what we know. I wish I’d just taken you and ran.”

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