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My laugh is frigid and hacking. “S-sorry.”
“We’re even. I’ll never try one of these stupid heart-starting life-affirming boondoggles again. No skydiving. No mud runs.”
“What about an escape room?” I tease, giggling over his use of “boondoggle”. I snuggle my head closer to his heart. “I hear they’re a hoot and a holler.”
“If I wanted to be trapped in an over-priced, never-ending series of themed rooms I’d go visit my mother’s house.”
“I’m sorry.” I cock my head back to look at him with concern. “Did you say ‘themed rooms’?”
He nods sagely. “Did you know you’re not a billionaire unless you have a room covered in old-timey guns and animal heads?”
“Your mother is a big game hunter?!”
“No. God no. Mother avoids the sunlight like it’ll turn her to dust. Which, ya never know… No, the heads are from whoever owned the place before. Probably some mustachioed gentleman with a pocket watch.”
“Oh so she lives in Brooklyn,” I crack.
That gets a laugh from him and I love the way it booms against my ear. I’m warming up finally, the heaters turning the refrigerator into a toaster oven. The water on my skin is drying; we’re becoming comfortable. But neither of us move from our position amongst the blankets. Outside the winter wind howls across the lake, the waves crash and recede.
“Mother wouldn’t be caught dead in Brooklyn. In fact, she hates going south of Central Park. She always says if Robert Moses was so great he would have figured out a way to swap Harlem with the Financial District.”
He sighs and looks around at the cozy space we’re suddenly occupying. “This isn’t so bad,” he says. “A little bed. Some storage. I’ll bet I could fit a sink and some cabinets in here too.”
“No animal heads?”
“Not really my style,” he replies. “Are you going to come visit me?” he asks suddenly.
The question of where the two of us stand on Monday had been nudging at me, a problem delegated for later. Now Rhett is probing for an answer. What does he want to hear? What do I want to say? And what is the realistic answer?
“If you want me to,” I say. It’s a safe noncommittal answer.
“I would,” Rhett says.
He sounds peaceful, but I sense a shift in the air. Rhett doesn’t know yet that even if I manage to get the account, everything has already changed. He’ll no longer have a place at the bank, and god knows what reaction that will cause in him, especially since I didn’t tell him immediately.
Now would be the time to tell him. It’s soon enough that he can’t accuse me of keeping it from him. But I’ve already gone over his head to Sloane. I should have told him first, let him decide what to pass on to the boss.
But maybe I’m overthinking this and, despite Rhett’s claims of wanting to step up at the bank, it would actually be a relief. I mean, he’d keep his former lifestyle, be able to maintain his weird relationship with Sloane. Give it another week and Rhett might find a new life’s goal.
Deciding that he wants to run the bank after a single successful business deal is too quick a turnaround, like a child jumping from wanting to be a firefighter to a doctor. Maybe Rhett’s just laboring under the “rich kid syndrome” that leaves so many of his fellows with half a dozen half-finished college degrees or numerous nonprofits all dead in the water, the fallout from having too many options and no reason to commit to any of them once the going gets hard.
And forgetting the bank, when that lens is shined on our future my heart goes as icy and numb as it had been in the water. What if this is just a marriage of convenience for him? Once we’re back in New York and he can have his pick of any woman he wants for a one-night stand, why would he go back to a moderately attractive workaholic who can never fully leave her job at the office?
All of this flashes through my mind over several horribly anxious moments. All my fears are starting to bubble up like a science fair volcano, and I’ve just turned my eyes up to Rhett, hoping that he can quell some of my worries when his eyes connect with mine. He closes the inches between us and kisses me.
My fears don’t disappear but they’re definitely pushed to the backdrop. I can hear Anna whispering in my ear, Just live a little, Liz. Enjoy something nice without having to attach meaning and disaster to it.
For once, I decide to take my best friend’s advice. I like Rhett. A lot. But if this is just a conference trip fling then that’s okay too. Probably better. Right?
Rhett must sense my hesitation because he pulls back, cocks his head, looking deep into my eyes. “Are you okay?” he asks. “Is this okay?”
In response I untangle a hand from the blankets and run it up the sharp curve of his jawline. It’s darkened with black stubble which serves only to highlight his cheekbones, that powerfully masculine jaw.
“It’s perfect,” I respond, and then I’m the one kissing him, ferociously, with abandon, like there’s nothing in the world outside of this little van, outside of the two of us and this moment together.
He smells clean and wild, like fresh-fallen snow. Beautiful and dangerous wrapped into one and presented to me as a test, a choice. And today, for once, I’m going to choose the now and not worry about tomorrow.
There’s zero protest from me when one of those gorgeous, long-fingered hands slips between my legs.
