Page 67 of Slow Burn Summer

“I miss him so much, Kate. I don’t know what to do with the life he left behind. It’s his house, his business…his captain’s chair.”

Charlie was fortunate in many ways to have been left such a legacy, but it was a lot to ask of one man, of an only child, to carry the weight of Jojo’s world along with his own.

“It’s blown a hole straight through the middle of my life again. Isn’t it just so damn typical of him to die in the Ivy?”

She’d read a couple of articles online, enough to know Jojo had died at his favorite table while eating his favorite shepherd’s pie.

“A legendary place for a legendary man,” she said.

“I’m glad you knew him,” he said.

“I’m glad I know you,” she said, unable to keep the words in.

Charlie turned toward her, their knees almost touching. He looked into the depths of his champagne, his arm along the back of the sofa, his fingers resting lightly on her hair.

“He never once asked me if the rumors about my marriage were true.” Charlie glanced up at her. “I know you’ll have heard them. People love to talk, as Fiona was quick to point out recently.”

Kate nodded.

“I didn’t cheat or lie. I just fell out of love and I couldn’t pretend otherwise, but that’s not sensational enough for a place like that. Hollywood thrives on stories and scandal. Tara’s family has been established there almost as long as the hills themselves, and they know how to spin the narrative to make sure they stay there.” He sighed. “You’re in or you’re out.”

“You don’t have to explain yourself to me,” she said.

He twisted the end of her ponytail around his fingers. “I don’t want you to wonder if I’m a decent man.”

The vulnerable truth of his words struck a nerve. “You’ve shown me who you are countless times over the last few months.”

“I meant what I said that night outside the hotel,” he said, leaning forward to put his glass down. “I’ve never met anyone quite like you before. You have this…this translucency, you wear your soul close to your skin and it scares me stupid. It’s probably what makes you such a good actor. You look into the lens and show the world exactly who you are, unfiltered.”

It was such an unexpected thing to say, she just stared at him. “Why does it scare you?”

“Because I put you in this precarious position in the first place. You walked into the office and I could see all of those things. I knew right away that you were perfect for the job because no one would doubt anything you told them.”

“You’re not responsible for everything, Charlie,” she said. “I wrote the letter, if you want to play the ‘who started it’ game.”

“Do you regret it?”

She swallowed. “I hate that Liv and Alice have been pulled in, and it breaks my heart that readers feel deceived. But do I regret being here, right now, with you?” She shook her head and slid her champagne glass onto the table, then moved closer to Charlie. “No one knows we’re here. It feels like a pause, a place for an intentionally blank page.”

She’d known coming here that there was potential for something to happen between them, and she appreciated that even though he must have thought the same thing, still he didn’t make the first move.

“If you could write something on it, what would it be?” he said.

“I’d write that she wondered what it would feel like to be kissed by him,” she said, watching the subtle shift in his eyes in response to her directness.

He nodded, his hand on the back of her neck now, stroking. “And then what does it say?”

She bit her lip. “I think you should write the next line.”

He thought about it before he spoke again. “I’d write that in the ordinary run of things he’d like to take her dancing and see a movie and buy her flowers, but that isn’t how their story goes. They only have this one deleted scene, so they pretendthey’ve already done all of those things and skip to the part where he kisses her breathless and asks her to spend the night in his bed.”

“You’re too good at this,” she said. Quiet music still played through the sound system, stripped-back, late-night stuff designed for lovers, and Charlie slid the silk band from her hair and let it fall around her shoulders. He frowned at the pale-blue band momentarily, then dropped it behind the sofa.

She placed her hand flat on his chest, his heart banging beneath her palm. “I’d write that he took her hair down, and it was the single most sexy thing that anyone had ever done to her in her entire life,” she said. “Ask me and I’ll say yes.”

Charlie held her face between his hands. “Come to bed with me?”

“Yes,” she said, his breath warm on her lips. “I think this is the bit where you kiss me breathless.”

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