I weakly smiled. “You did that tonight.”
“Right. So I’ll have to add in wanting to spend time with you in a non–seat filler capacity, too. Maybe this Friday?”
“I can’t on Friday,” I told him. “My mom is doing this one-woman show where she’s giving birth to herself for one of her theater classes.”
“That sounds like an oddly specific lie,” he said.
“It’s the truth. My mother’s midlife crisis involves her going back to school to pursue that acting degree she’s always wanted. You should totally stop by. Fun will be had by all.”
The car came to a stop, and the engine turned off. I looked out the window and was surprised to see that we were in front of my apartment building. The night was officially over. And other than my one mini-freak-out, things had gone well and I’d enjoyed spending time with him. As friends did, right?
I put my hand on the door handle and was about to thank him when he said, “Wait. There’s something else I need to tell you.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
That worried, panicky feeling returned. Was he about to take it back? Say he didn’t want to be friends?
“It’s about Shelby,” he said, and I immediately felt reassured.
“You mean how the two of you masterminded this evening? Don’t worry, it doesn’t take a genius to have figured that one out.”
“No. I mean, yes, we may have schemed a little, but this is about something else.” My mind went to a weird place. Like, if he told me right now that in the last week he and Shelby had fallen in love and were running away together, I was going to march straight into our apartment and set fire to all of her favorite lipsticks.
“What?”
“I’ve hired her to do renovations on my house.”
“Oh.” Yeah, that made much more sense. Shelby’s makeup was safe. “Well, that was a good choice. She’s excellent at what she does.”
“I only did it because—” He stopped himself short, studying my face like he was hoping a clue would appear. “I guess that doesn’t matter now. With us being friends and all.”
The rest of that sentence felt vitally important, but I knew I didn’t have any right to it. I was the one who’d said friends only.
“The important thing,” he continued, “is that she agreed and we’ve already started. She’s working on getting the permits.”
I couldn’t believe she hadn’t said anything. She told me everything. Like, sometimes an uncomfortable amount of information. There was one time I couldn’t look Allan in the face for a week because of her oversharing. How could Shelby keep this from me?
Because you’ve never kept anything from her? my guilty conscience asked me. I told it to shut up.
“That’s good,” I said. I knew how excited she must have been. And I’d bet she’d told Allan. While I understood that was how things were supposed to be, it felt a little like I was being replaced.
“Well,” I said, realizing that I’d been sitting in his parked car for what was an unusual amount of time, and I could only imagine what poor Ray thought about what might be happening in his back seat, “I should go.”
“Do you want me to walk with you?”
I most definitely did not. I needed to escape his appeal, not prolong it even further. “I’m good, but thanks.”
I opened the car door and got out. I turned to shut it behind me, but he poked his face out of the opening. “Can I tell you something I’ve never told anyone else?”
“There’s more?” I asked, again trying to be jokey and failing. I wasn’t sure my nervous system could take it.
“I like you. Buddy.”
His face was like an open book, and I could see what he meant without him speaking the words. Even with his qualifier, he wasn’t saying he liked me as a friend.
“I bet you say that to all the seat fillers. Good night, pal.” I smiled at him and then walked away, letting him close his own door. This was the problem with being friends with an actor who had hinted that he wanted something more. He had the ability to show every emotion he was feeling or to hide them all from me because it was his literal job. Which meant I could either be overwhelmed by what was on his face or left wondering what he was thinking.
Get out, get out now, that worried voice inside me whispered. Stop this before it starts.
I couldn’t. There was this feeling of inevitability. Now that we had crossed paths—and had done so over and over again—it almost felt like I was destined to have him in my life in some way. I shook my head. So many women would have killed for this chance. And maybe I was being naive in thinking that I could dictate how this was going to go.
Because it felt a little like being on a runaway freight train heading toward the side of a mountain. I couldn’t stop it or slow it down or jump off. I was on board for the full ride, wherever that was going to take me.
I woke up the next morning on the couch. My neck was stiff, and I groaned as I came to. I’d been waiting up for Shelby because we had so many Very Important Things to discuss. But I must have passed out, and instead of waking me up like I had wanted her to, she’d put a throw blanket over me and had gone to bed.
“Good morning!” She was in the kitchen turning on the coffee maker, way too cheery.
“How could you not tell me about the remodeling thing?”
She rushed over to the couch and sat next to me. “You have no idea how hard it was to not tell you. But isn’t it the best news ever?”
I still couldn’t believe that Shelby had sat on a secret that big. It was so unlike her. Not unlike me, but I wasn’t the one being questioned here.
“The best,” I echoed.
“This is going to be everything. His publicist put in a call to California Architectural, and they fell all over themselves to offer us the cover. The cover! I’m going to be launched into a different stratosphere.”
“That is going to be so great,” I said. I was happy for her, and it was selfish of me to be worried about how all this was going to affect me. Maybe it wouldn’t affect my life at all. I’d already told the guy we could be friends. What that was going to look like I wasn’t sure, but why would it be a bad thing if my best friend was fixing his atrocious house?
“And he is paying me so well. So. Well. He offered to double all of my fees and costs for doing rush work, and unlike you, I didn’t talk him out of it because I’ve found that I like making money instead of throwing it away.” She was teasing me, but it wasn’t the same thing. Him paying her versus him paying me. Although if I’d been pressed about it, I couldn’t have explained why.
I also hoped he’d pay her in actual dollars.
“And you know,” she continued, “you’re such an awesome person that he’s basically hiring me based on the fact that I’m your friend. I mean, he went to my website and looked at my other projects, and I got a floor plan of his house from that friend of mine who works in the records office and I pitched him my ideas in that program I have that renders 3D schematics—”
“So, for more reasons than just being my friend,” I interjected with a smile. “It’s because you’re talented and you’re going to do an amazing job.” But I didn’t really want to talk about Noah Douglas. “How was your night?”