Page 23 of Abduction
“Hey,” I called back as she hurried down the steps toward me. “I was passing by this part of town, thought I would come by the law office and see if you were around.”
“You got lucky,” she told me. “I just finished up the most intense study session.”
“Exams coming up, right?”
“Yeah, way too soon for my liking,” she replied, pulling a face and shaking her head. “I just...I don’t know how I’m supposed to keep all this information in my head at once, you know what I mean?”
“I never got a degree,” I told her. “I don’t know much about studying.”
“Oh,” she replied, tipping her head to the side and eyeing me for a moment. Probably trying to work out how I had so much confidence in myself without having to earn even a bachelor’s. I was almost tempted to tell her the truth, but I held back. I knew my father would have ripped me a new asshole if he found out I was spilling shit to women I didn’t even know.
“Guess I never had the patience for it,” I added. “Anyway. Can I do something to help you get your mind off of it?”
Her eyes flickered for a moment, and I could tell there was something filthy on her mind. I almost wanted to draw it out of her, but I figured she would tell me when the time was right, not when we had just bumped into each other like this out of nowhere. I could tell I was getting to her, and it wasn’t going to take much more to convince her to give up on the shitty guy she was with and have some fun with me.
“Uh, actually, there is somewhere I usually go when I’m really burned out from studying,” she admitted.
“A bar?”
She laughed. “No, nothing like that,” she replied. “I’m not much of a drinker, honestly. But I guess you could say the people I go visit like to get wet.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” I demanded, and she giggled, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. God, she was cute. She had this playfulness to her that I enjoyed, as though the whole world was hers for the taking and she just needed to snatch it up when she had the chance.
“I like to go to the aquarium,” she explained. “I know it sounds crazy, but I got this season ticket at the start of last year, and it’s been the only thing keeping me sane while I try to keep on top of my studies.”
“The aquarium?” I asked, making sure I had heard her right. She nodded.
“I know how it sounds,” she replied. “But it’s a lot of fun. And it’s so calm there, it feels like the only place I can really get away from everything.”
It wasn’t something I had ever really thought about before. I was sure I had been dragged there on a school trip, somewhere in the distant past, but I had never felt any particular urge to head down and check it out again now that I was an adult. It was just...some place you wandered around for a half-hour before you got bored and found something more interesting to do, right?
Or maybe, with her, it could be something more than that. Maybe it could be a fun way to pass a few hours before I had to go and meet my brother. As long as I was with her, I didn’t really mind what we were doing. And if she wanted to invite me along to something she normally didn’t share with anyone else...hell, I was going to take it as the sign of interest I had been waiting for.
“Sure, why not?” I replied, and she clapped her hands together, smiling so widely it looked as though it was going to split her whole face in two. I wondered, briefly, if this Aaron guy had ever bothered to go with her to this place. I got the feeling it would have been beneath someone like him. Well, if he wasn’t going to step up and do it, then I would.
“How do we get there?” I asked.
“A water taxi is usually the best way,” she gushed happily. I could see how glad she was that she would have some company, and I felt a little bad for her, thinking about all the times she’d had to go there alone because her shitty man had never thought to go with her. Didn’t she have friends who would have made the trip? Given that the one friend I’d seen her with had basically been on the side of her obviously-cheating man, maybe there was something to be said for brushing them off for now.
“Are you sure?” she asked, biting her lip. As though she didn’t want to impinge on my day. I wondered how many times she had been made to feel like she was getting in the way of something more important. I promised myself, right then and there, that I would never make her feel anything like that. She deserved someone who actually gave a shit about how she felt, instead of just brushing her off every chance they got. I had never met her fiancé, but the more I got to know about her, the more I didn’t like him.
But hell, I would fill in the role for her, if that’s what it took. I wasn’t going to make her feel like she was anything other than wanted here. I had come all the way across the city to find her, and now that I had, I refused to pass up the chance to spend an afternoon with her.
And find out just what it was she wanted to show me. Or if it was an excuse to get me on my own.
