Page 61 of Bordeaux Bombshell
She closes the distance between us, laying a finger across my lips to cut me off. “Would you come with me?”
“Baby, I would do anything you asked.”
We don’t say much as I lead her to my car and hold the door for her while she climbs in. She’s quiet, clicking at her phone—I assume to cancel her Uber—as I pull away from the restaurant and drive toward her house.
We’re a few minutes in when she turns in her seat, tucking one leg under her so she’s facing me. “Why are you being so nice?”
Two spots of heat burrow into my cheeks from the intensity of her stare. I don’t look, grateful for the excuse of driving. “Because I want to be.”
She makes a noise, flipping her hair out of her face. “Because you want to be nice to me specifically, or because you want to be nice in front of everyone else.”
“Does it make a difference?”
“Yes.”
I readjust my grip on the steering wheel, my palms suddenly sweaty. “I wanted to know if we could put the shit aside and exist in the same space. I was prepared to take the high road if you came back guns blazing, but you didn’t.”
A left turn gives me a chance to pause, to slowly pull air in through my nose to calm my racing heart. God, I wish I wasn’t driving right now. But also, I’m glad that I am. It feels safer, being able to talk without having to make eye contact.
“I, uh. I wanted the same thing.” Sydney’s voice is barely a whisper, but I hear every word.
“Did you figure out how to stop fighting? How to stop fightingme?”
A hand touches my knee, and I nearly accelerate into a curb.
“Sorry.” She pulls her hand away, and immediately, I miss it. “Turns out, the way to stop fighting…was to stop fighting. Weird, huh?”
I risk a glance as we wait at the light. Her hair cascades over her shoulder in large curls, catching the glow from the streetlamp. The gold dress she’s wearing dips low, but not too low, between her breasts, the thin straps barely holding it on her shoulders.
I won’t lie and say I haven’t imagined slipping those straps off all night long. But I’m doing my best to stay away from Very Bad Ideas tonight.
With a smile, I turn back to follow traffic once more. “Yeah. Crazy how that works.” But there’s no heat, no sarcasm behind my words.
Sydney turns back in her seat, watching the cars as we get closer to her place. “So, just existing, huh? We haven’t done that in a very long time.”
“I don’t know if I really know how, to be honest. Whenever we’re in the same room, you’re all I can think about.” I hadn’t intended to confess that much, but she isn’t yelling at me to stop the car, so I’m taking it as a win. The fact I’m turning into her complex is probably helping.
“Is that why you told me to leave?”
What is she talking about? I’m sure I told her to leave a thousand times when we were kids. Probably even in the last two years. But the weight of her words means something else. Something I’m missing.
As soon as I finish parking, I turn to face her. “I told you to leave?”
With a sigh, she leans back against the seat, eyes closed. “Of course you wouldn’t remember.”
My instinct is to defend myself, but then it sinks in that she’s not making an accusation.
“Tell me. What don’t I remember?”
Those hazel eyes pierce me despite the surrounding darkness. “The first thing you said to me when you got back. You walked into Greg’s hospital room and told me to get out.”
The way her words sink in my belly, dragging me down to the bottom of my soul, changes everything. “Fuck,” I whisper. “Syd. I’m so sorry. I don’t even remember saying it—I was so angry when I walked into that room. I’d been on the worst flight ever from France. Then I walked into Kel’s place and found him and Maggie in bed together.” I shudder at the memory—one I’ve tried very hard to forget. “All I could see was my dad in a hospital bed and my life exploding, but you were there. And the second I saw you, all I wanted to do was fall on my knees and beg you to help me. The fact that, even after all that time, just the sight of you was enough to undo me was infuriating.”
Her small hand reaches out, landing on my cheek before she leans forward to press a kiss to my forehead. “You’re forgiven. Let’s go inside.”
I follow her up the stairs and into her apartment. This time, the familiar furniture seems to greet me as I toe off my shoes and the suit jacket I dusted off for tonight. Maybe because Sydney smiles when she turns back to take my hand.
Instead of leading me to the familiar leather couch, she turns down the hall. An open door reveals the sacred space she’s never shared with anyone.
