Page 27 of Until Now

“Oh, fuck me,” I mumble.

“If you insist.”

Oh for the love of God, I am not in the mood for him today. “If you’ll excuse me,” I try to make a quick escape up the stairs, but he follows.

“So, where did you and Alaric go earlier?”

“As if you have to ask,” I chuckle. “Where are you coming from?”

“I ran into town to grab a few things that I forgot.”

“Typical.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Lee touches his hand to his heart. Under his stare, I tuck a strand of hair behind my ear. It’s small moments like this I missed most after we broke up. In moments when Lee isn’t trying to put on a show, he is kind and funny. He seems genuinely interested in me. When Lee acts like this, it makes me nostalgic for the old days when we first started dating.

Lee motions for me to go ahead of him. I oblige but keep my distance. “See? We can get along!” He moves closer as we walk upstairs. “Are you sure we can’t catch up?”

“Don’t push your luck.”

“Just a coffee, nothing else. You owe me that much, don’t you think?”

“I owe— Non ti devo merda.”

“Lee, is that you? Did you get the stuff?” Teagan appears at the top of the stairs and her face drops at the sight of me and Lee together.

“I’ll be right there, Teag,” Lee assures her and turns back to me. He’s trying to fix this problem before he worries about the one upstairs. “Nina, I didn’t mean it like that. Please, don’t take it that way.”

“Fuck off, Lee.”

Lee grabs me when I try to walk by him, but I rip my hand from his grasp pushing past Teagan.

“What was that about?” Teagan hisses just before I exit out the kitchen patio.

Outside, Eileen and Kai swim in the pool. A natural-infinity hybrid, the pool combines the natural landscape of the mountain it’s built into and an infinity edge that overlooks the surrounding landscape. This is actually my favorite part of the house.

“There you are!” Eileen shouts from the water. Clearly, she’s been waiting for me to get home. “How was lunch?” She untangles herself from Kai and swims to the edge.

I lower my feet into the water. “It was good, Daddy took me to—”

“Vintage House, we already know.”

“Why don’t you join her, Nin?” Kai climbs out of the pool and dries off. “I was about to go inside anyway, gotta jump on a board call.”

“You’re leaving me?” Eileen pouts.

“Sorry, babe, duty calls.”

“Do you love me enough to make us some margaritas before you go to work?”

“How about I pour you a glass of wine and call it a day?”

“Deal.” Kai leans down and kisses her. When he closes the door, Eileen turns to me, “Everything okay?”

“Bene. Perché?”

“Just curious. Seemed like something was bothering you the way you were bursting at the seams to get out of here this morning. Not to mention, Nick was acting weird before he left.”

“Yeah, where is he?”

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