Page 11 of Liv Parrish

“How have you been?” Her question pulls my attention back to the present and I take a pull from my bottle while I think about how much I want to tell her. She’s looking directly at me know, the nervousness from earlier slightly less obvious, which I’m grateful for.

“I’m good. Better than the last time you saw me,” I attempt to joke but she makes a choking sound and the sip of soda she took threatens to make a reappearance. She coughs a few times before getting herself under control and averts her gaze again.

“I’m glad things are going well for you, Heath. Riley mentioned work was keeping you busy.” They talked about me. Riley didn’t mention anything. At least now I know she hasn’t forgotten about me and something about that makes me ridiculously happy. This is not impossible. Liv. A future where we are together. Sure, I’m jumping the gun here. We’ve only spent a few minutes in each other’s company and Liv hasn’t given me any indication that she feels anything for me, but I’m here in her apartment and we’re talking, and it’s only slightly awkward. Things could have gone a whole lot worse.

“That’s true, but I’ve been wanting to come by, to see you again. Riley only just mentioned to me that you were hanging out together. You weren’t trying to make me jealous, were you?” I smile, letting her know that I’m joking, but Liv stares at me in obvious confusion for a few seconds.

“Why would you be jealous? You have a girlfriend.” The seriousness of her tone catches me off guard.

“What makes you think that?” Her frown deepens and she opens her mouth to respond before closing it again. She pauses for a second before trying once more.

“Because I–” She cuts herself off and I find myself leaning closer, wanting to hear what she was going to say. “Guys like you, you’re usually with someone,” she mumbles. I consider for a moment digging further into what she means by guys like me, but it’s pretty clear that was not what she was going to say so I let it go.

“I was for a while, but it didn’t work out. She went back to her ex.” This seems to surprise her, and she meets my gaze with some reluctance.

“Oh, I didn’t know that.”

“Why the strange look? Don’t you believe in second chances?” I hold my breath, completely invested in her answer, because this has as much bearing on us as it had on Kelsey and her ex.

“I guess it depends on why they broke up in the first place, but generally those reasons don’t change, so no, I suppose I don’t. But that’s just my opinion and I haven’t had that much experience so I’m probably wrong.” And then she blushes and fuck me! I just want to take her in my arms and never let her go, hold all that adorably sweet energy close to me and savor everything about her, even though she might have just confirmed that I’ve missed my chance. But my next question begs to be asked.

“You don’t date much?”

“No, I’ve kind of moved around a bit lately and just haven’t …” She trails off, not looking at me but rather at some invisible spot on her coffee table. “Ren tries to get me to go out, but I prefer to stay home. It’s comfortable here. I don’t have to worry about impressing someone for a few hours, only to never hear from him again. And after–” She stops again, her eyes widen as they shoot up to meet mine and now there’s definite unease in her gaze. Before I can say anything, she jumps up off the sofa. “I’m sorry, I completely forgot I need to go out for a bit. It was nice of you to stop by though.” It’s a blatant lie and I can’t stop myself from calling her on it, not ready for this time together to end.

“Hey, it’s okay. We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to.” I stand up as well, wanting to close the distance between us, but her rigid posture confirms I’ve made a tactical error that needs to be corrected without delay. “Did you know I came by here a few days after you rescued me?” I hoped that would lighten the mood, but she’s still standing by the door, her arms wrapped around herself, seemingly debating whether she should just tell me to leave or not.

“Yeah, you returned the sweatshirt I gave you. Evan told me.”

“That was just an excuse, Liv. I wanted to see you. I was hoping to ask you out on a date.”

“I thought you were dating someone.” Fuck, I hate talking to her about Kelsey. And how would she know? Riley wouldn’t have told her.

“No, I only started seeing Kelsey about two months after you and I met. From the way Evan acted that day, I thought you were involved with him.” The tiniest smile appears, and then she shakes her head.

“Evan is gay, and in a committed relationship with his partner.”

“Yeah, Riley told me.” She peaks up at me again.

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you sent him to spy for you.”

“No, I had no idea you were friends until recently. Believe me, if I knew I would have been here much sooner. I honestly thought you had left town by now.” The change in her demeanor is almost instantaneous. She goes from slightly less rigid than she was a moment ago, to fully alert in less than a heartbeat. Ah fuck!

“Why would you think that?” Too late I realize my mistake. I’ve admitted to knowing something I could have only found out if I had done some digging into her past, and she knows it. I try to play it off as no big deal.

“After that night I spent here, I looked you up. Nothing too invasive. Just the basics. A security precaution because of the work we do.” A few seconds pass while she thinks on this.

“I don’t understand. Were you worried I could be a threat? Because that doesn’t make sense. Our meeting was completely random and even after you left, I knew next to nothing about you. All I had was your business card.”

“Riley mentioned you looked us up, so you know the kind of work we do, right? Well, there’s other things too. Things we don’t put on our website or make public knowledge. Because of that, we don’t make assumptions, about anything. I had to be sure, Liv. And you should be grateful I was the one who did the search. Riley is our resident IT specialist. He would have had the name of your third-grade teacher and the doctor who removed your tonsils before you could blink. I promise, I only looked up the basics. The fact that you worked for AFD meant that you had already gone through background checks and that was good enough for me.” I could have gone on, but her face suddenly drains of color and she looks like she might faint. “Liv?” Instinct has me reaching for her, but she steps back and almost trips over her own feet, stumbling but not going down. “Shit, are you okay?”

“Don’t touch me! I’m fine. You need to go now.” I open my mouth, but have no idea what to say, because I honestly don’t understand what’s happening. Just then, there’s a knock on her door, causing Liv to shriek before spinning around and reaching for the knob, yanking the door open. I recognize Ren standing in the hallway, her hand poised to knock again and concern clear on her face.

“Liv, are you okay? I heard you call out.” Then her eyes fall on me. “Oh, hey. Heath, right? I thought I heard another voice in here. How are you?”

“Hey, Ren. I’m good, thanks. How are you?” Her attention swerves to Liv before I’ve even finished my question.

“Hon, are you okay? You look a little …” She looks back at me. “What’s going on here?” All the friendliness has left her voice, but Liv responds like a racehorse out the start gate.

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