Page 45 of Unless It's You
“Sounds familiar.” I squeeze my ab muscles, my core aching from the long run I took around Regent’s Park yesterday after rugby practice. I tried to sweat out the growing feelings I have for Stella.
I don’t think it worked.
“Sorry. Yeah. I guess it would be familiar to you.”
“No worries.” I nod my head away from the bar. “Let’s sit. Tell me more.” I choose a table along the back wall with a soft bench on one side and a couple of chairs on the other, hoping she’ll sit next to me on the bench. She doesn’t.
“Her mom disappeared a few days ago, then got back in the middle of last night. Meanwhile, she’s trying to enter this scholarship competition, which could be life-changing, but I can’t help but wonder what’s the point? She doesn’t have the support. What can I really do to help her in the long term?” Stella’s face crumples, but she keeps her eyes locked on mine, searching for an answer that I might just have.
I shake my head twice. “Don’t think like that. You are doing it. Just being there for her is helping. Having someone to text. To call. Someone who will support her. That’s what Ben’s family was to me.” I flinch when I say his name, hoping she doesn’t notice my physical reaction. “His parents helped me get to university. If it weren’t for Robin and Simon, I don’t know where I would be today. These kids need someone to believe in them.”
I lean forward on the table, forearms crossed and hands tucked in the nooks of my elbows. Images of my childhood flash through my brain. Days on end without my mum when she disappeared with a boyfriend or went on a bender with a friend, Helen’s mum more than once. Ben would tell his parents and they would come pick me up, a pitying look in their eyes. A shadow descends on my shoulders as I start to slip down that well of bad memories.
“And look at what a wild success you are now,” Stella says, deadpan, but the corners of her eyes crinkle.
I snort, then laugh, a rolling chuckle. It feels good. I don’t want to spiral down into the mess of my childhood. I’m years beyond that now. Stella laughs with me, her eyes wide, her face smoothed out.
“I’m fucking amazing.”
“Jesus, don’t get a big head about it. I never said that.” She twists her face in mock disgust.
“You thought it, though.”
She rolls her eyes dramatically. “Can we get back to Izzy, please?” But she’s still smiling, and so am I, and that shadow inside me, beckoning me to the edge of the black hole, has completely disappeared and been replaced with a bright, warm sun, the one that occasionally shines on London.
Fuck, she’s gorgeous.
I think it before I can stop myself, and now I’m on a lust-filled roll. Those full pink lips, the ones she’s pressing together, and... damn, licking with a quick flick of her tongue.
“Hello? Why are you looking at me like that?” But she’s blushing, and I bet she knows what I’m thinking. Cause I’m thinking about kissing her. I’m thinking about that night I got to run my hands up her back and press her mouth to mine. I’m thinking about more.
My center feels warm and alive, like something’s growing, a feeling I’m not familiar with. I want to trace her jaw with my fingers and pull her toward me. I desperately want to kiss her and see if I can make the feeling change, evolve.
Fuck. Ireallylike her. From the way she’s furiously independent, to how she’s focused on helping her mentee—even before the bucket list—and the way she’s offended by her great-aunt’s demands.
I more than like her.
It doesn’t matter how off-limits she is. I’m not sure if I’ve ever had this feeling for a woman before.
What a beautiful disaster. I can’t let it happen, of course, not as we talk about how what she’s doing for Izzy is like what Ben’s family did for me. I can’t betray my best friend like that. He still has a thing for her, I know it, and it’s not like she’s into me.
Or is she?
But even if she did want to take this further, I shouldn’t let ithappen. There are so many women out there. Helen wants to be with me. Hell, I can go back to the coffee shop and ask the barista out. I’ve never had a problem getting women to talk to me. Choosing me day after day? That’s another story.
But notthiswoman. I can’t with her.
I swallow hard.
“Let’s look at that launch plan.” I need to change direction before things get out of hand.
Stella blinks. “Right. Yeah, of course. I texted you the Google Docs link.”
We both grab our mobiles and scroll through the document.
“I like her stuff. When I read it again, I realized it’s got some good thought to it, a bit of strategy I didn’t know she had in her. But the plan needs more meat and a clear structure.” Stella narrows her eyes and scrunches one side of her mouth. I have to remind myself to look at the document, not her lips.
“She’s really into influencers, huh?”
