Page 18 of Strange Seduction
Touch base with the crew, oversee the adjustments on the Trastevere site, and get the hell out. But I was halfway through marking corrections on a plumbing schematic, and I couldn’t stop wondering if she’d found the setup in the bedroom. If she liked the banner I had strung up. If she was curled up underthe blanket I picked out—soft, cashmere, because she always got cold when she was tired.
Carter leaned back in his chair with a groan, the sound exaggerated as he tossed a rolled blueprint onto the table.
“So,” he said casually, “did your girlfriend get in okay?”
“Yeah,” I said, without looking up. My pen scratched over the half-distracted note in the margin of a printout. “She’s back at the hotel resting. I’m meeting her later.”
Carter nodded and stretched his arms overhead. “You should bring her by sometime. Let her meet the team.”
I shrugged, noncommittal. “I’ll think about it.”
Across the table, Vince made a noise—something between a scoff and a laugh—as he spun a pencil between his fingers.
“I’m surprised you even came back in. Thought for sure you’d be drowning in pussy by now.”
I looked up slowly, flat and unimpressed. “You do realize I sign your paychecks, right?”
Vince just grinned, completely unbothered. “What? I’m just saying. All those months without it? I don’t know how you’re still walking upright. I’d have turned into a goddamn monk.”
“It’s called discipline,” Carter said dryly, tossing a pen at his chest.
Vince caught it with a smirk. “Or insanity. One of the two.”
I rolled my eyes.
“He’s probably sitting here thinking about what he’s gonna do to her the second he’s outta here,” Vince added with a laugh, nudging Carter. “Right? That’s why you’re pretending to care about these duct measurements, huh, Theo?”
I set my pen down a little harder than necessary. “There’s more to my relationship than just fucking, Vince. Now, can wepleasefocus?”
He blinked, as if the concept personally confused him. “Sure, sure. Love, loyalty, forever, and all that. I get it. Still don’t knowhow you haven’t lost your damn mind. I mean—” He leaned back in his chair, gesturing vaguely. “If it were me? My girl flies across the ocean for me? I’m not leaving that bed for days.”
“Please,” Carter muttered, rolling his eyes. “Not everything is about sex.”
“Exactly.” I was tired of this conversation.
Vince shrugged. “You two sound like high schoolers. Men’s and women’s relationships rely entirely on sex. It’s biology. If all that love and devotion shit really mattered, why don’t we marry the first girl who makes us feel good? Why are guys still obsessed with tight dresses and girls who fuck like rabbits?”
“Youdate women like that,” Carter shot back. “Theo and I? We’re happy in actual relationships. Besides, Theo and his girl have lived apart for years, and they’re still solid. That says something.”
“Yeah.Realsolid.”
I gave him a look because I knew what he was implying.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Vince just shrugged, unbothered. “Nothing. But I stand by what I said. Besides, long-distance only works when someone’s too busy chasing their own shit to notice how miserable they are. So they settle for what they have. Even if it’s a million miles away.”
I leaned forward. “I don’t settle.”
Vince held his hands up, grin still in place. “Never saidyoudid.”
The silence after that lingered.What the fuck is that supposed to mean?
Was that what people thought? That Carmen and I were just playing pretend? That we were still in love with the memory of each other and not the real, living, complicated version? Had we been apart so long that people couldn’t fathom why we’d still be holding on?
Carter clapped his hands together, breaking into forced cheer. “Alright, enough of this bullshit. We’ve got deadlines.”
“Exactly,” I muttered, turning back to the table. “Let’s focus.”
