Page 30 of Texts From My Exes
“Catch up sometime, absolutely.” she finished for him. Her hand brushed his arm—too long of a linger with those fingernails—and then she was gone, heels clicking across the polished floor like a mic drop with each irritating step.
I stared at him. He stared down at the table. “So, yeah, I’m Vex, but some people know me as Ezra Wyatt, in another life I was kind of a big deal.”
In another life he was called the love child of James Dean and Marlon Brando.
In that moment, something in my gut whispered what my brain hadn’t caught up to yet, something dangerous and hateful to admit, no not hateful, embarrassing.
I didn’t know him. My best friend in the whole world.
Not really.
Ezra slid into the seat across from me like nothing had happened.
LikeLila, Yale, Past lives, YouTube, and weird arm touchesweren’t hanging in the air between us like smoke.
The replacement martini arrived—thank you, bartender who clearly ships me with my own mental breakdown—and I took a long sip.
“So…” I said, the word drawn out like I was unspooling fishing line. “Yale?”
He glanced up, one eyebrow lifted. “What about it?”
“Oh, nothing. Just… not a detail I had in my little mental file labeled ‘Ezra: Grumpy Pain in My Ass.’”
The corner of his mouth twitched. “Didn’t think it was relevant.”
Didn’t he though? Why the omission on all of this?
“Mm. Right. Just like how you didn’t think it was relevant to mention you’re apparently on a first-name-basis with a Bond Villain? Bet she’d kill you first, just saying.”
He smirked, shaking his head. “You’re cute when you’re jealous, maybe that’s why it didn’t work out last time, hmmm?” He said snapping me back into the date’s purpose. Why we never had another date, why this never worked out, the apartment, the lie, right. In this scenario I needed him. I could murder him after dessert.
“And yet here you are.” I swirled my martini and eyed the pokey side of the stick. “On a date.”
“For the record,” he said, leaning in slightly, voice pitched low so only I could hear, “I’m here because you asked me to be, remember?”
The way he said it—quiet, steady—made something unpleasantly flutter in my chest. Damn it he had no right being that pretty.
I deflected and pointed the stir stick at him. “Right. Because it’sdefinitelynot because you wanted to spend your Friday night being interrogated on camera by a woman in a wet dress.”
Thank God, I almost said ‘wet dream’. That could have gone sideways quickly—again.
His gaze flicked down for a fraction of a second—like he remembered exactly where the ice had landed—and then back up to my face. “Could be worse.”
Oh. Oh, that was unfair. Rules. We needed rules! No lingering stares! My ovaries were not strong soldiers! They were currently fighting for their lives like I’d just slapped Spanx three sizes too small on them and told them to breathe! My brain short-circuited somewhere betweencould be worseanddamn, just, hot damn, I’d look good on you naked.
I took another sip of my drink and tried to focus on the fact that my phone was still recording. “So, Vex. The internet says you’ve played… what, six different characters who’ve died tragically in the rain?”
“Seven,” he corrected. “One was snow.”
“Right, of course.” I made a show of writing it down, because otherwise I might have reached across the table to shake him until his secrets fell out. “And tell me, Vex—does the tragic death thing get you more fan mail, or do people prefer when you brood in, say, dimly lit kitchens?”
He grinned faintly, leaning back. “What doyouprefer?”
The question hit with more weight than it should have, and I suddenly hated the fact that the answer wasI like it when you’re in my kitchen, Ezra.
I cleared my throat. “I think the internet can decide that one.”
The rest of the questions felt like wading through syrup—his answers easy and charming, my smile tight but camera-friendly. Every time he looked at me, I kept thinking about Lila. AboutYale. About the fact that I’d never once thought to Google him, and now it felt like there was an entire other life I’d missed.
