Page 45
As his face grows increasingly serious, flipping his grilled cheese and clearly contemplating what I said, I wait for him to say something. As he transfers his sandwich to his plate, he turns toward me and leans with his elbows on the surface. “Well, that would explain why I’ve already taken in one stray.”
With a smile that lights up his eyes, he takes a bite of his sandwich, and I reach across the counter to swipe at him, but he dodges easily.
I tell myself this could work, and his smile makes me believe it.
CHAPTER 16
ALEXANDER
Having her in my house feels right. She breathes life into these empty walls. After lunch, we take a dip in the pool and then a trip to the grocery store for the essentials. She pushes the cart around the store, hopping on for short rides while I fill it with more than I normally do—which feels better than I expect it to.
I feel eyes on us while we shop, and I know what they are thinking.
Is she my daughter or girlfriend?
And it’s a relief to accept that I don’t care. When we come around to the bakery, I buy a whole cake because I’m just in the mood to indulge. I catch her eyes on me more than once on the drive home, and I decide that I can do this. I can keep Sunny, take care of her, be the person she needs without crossing the line.
After dinner, the sinking feeling of bedtime looms closer. I hate to put her on the couch, but the guest bedroom is still in boxes. And if I’m being honest with myself, the idea of waking up next to her again is tempting, but I don’t trust myself to do that. So, I take a pillow and blanket out to the living room and toss it down as she comes out of the bathroom in her pajamas.
I watch her stand in the middle of the room, swallowing down her nerves.
“I’ll sleep out here,” I say before she can get anything out.
“I can’t take your bed.”
“It’s fine, Sunny. I sleep like shit wherever I am, so it hardly matters.”
I didn’t sleep like shit last night with her next to me—but I don’t say that out loud.
A moment of silence passes before she speaks again, looking nervous as she picks at her fingernails. “It’s a big bed,” she breathes.
It feels like swallowing a baseball as I force down the thought. “I don’t think that’s such a good idea.”
“It was fine last night.”
That was under very different circumstances. And while I know I won’t lay a finger on her, the subtle meaning of it all is harrowing. What are we if she lives here and sleeps next to me?
My shoulders sag as I think about it.
“I’ll keep my hands to myself,” she says with a smile, lightening the mood.
Something about her smile makes me give in. That smile is like a rare gem. “Fine, but you stick to your side,” I answer in a scolding tone. I watch the smile spread across her face. It shines like a diamond.
As she crawls under the covers that night, I keep my eyes down on my phone. She curls her body into a ball around her pillow. It feels strange to go to bed with someone I didn’t just fuck and feels a little like we’re playing house or having a sleepover.
“Whatcha reading?” she asks quietly from her pillow.
“A boring email.”
“Email.” She giggles. “That’s cute.”
Dropping my phone to my lap, I turn my head toward her. “Are you calling me old, rain cloud?”
She muffles her laugh by biting her lip, and it takes everything in me not to tickle the exposed flesh of her waist between her tank top and pajama pants.
Shutting my phone off, I don’t reply to the email from my old work contact about a new investment opportunity that actually sounds pretty solid. The idea of getting back into business scares me. I should be glad he’s even emailing me after the way I fucked things up last year. But I miss the days of having purpose. Having somewhere to go and something to work for.
Sunny spends the day in the pool house working while I unpack the box waiting by the linen closet.
