“It’s a no,” James says to Dean as he carries me through the apartment.
Dean’s face is a picture as he stands from the stool, walking slowly into the middle of the room as he watches us leave. I raise a hand and offer a small, guilty smile before the wood of the door comes between us.
Only once we’re in the elevator does James put me down. “What’s up?” he asks, assessing me closely, blindly hitting the button for the first floor. I don’t like it. Not at all. I can’t look at him. Being involved with a man who’s a dad is no joke. It carries responsibilities. I’m not equipped. God damn it, and I feel awful for thinking it, but I’m pissed off. Pissed off that he’s ruined the illusion. Tarnished my escape.
“Nothing.” I thank all the gods when my cell rings. Nath’s name on my screen fills me with dread and relief all at once. “Excuse me,” I say to James, stepping off the elevator when the doors open. “I need to take this.” I wander to the seats in the lobby, but I don’t sit down. “Nath?”
“Hey, you free?” he blurts, no greeting, no enquiry into how I am.
I’m not imagining it, he sounds tense, and Nath doesn’t do tense. He’s as cool as a man can come. “Now?”
“Yes, now.”
“Is everything okay?”
“I don’t know,” he says, and I feel every muscle in my body harden.
“Is this about Mom?”
“Can you meet me at mine?”
“Why your place?” I have never, not ever, met Nath at his place. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever stepped foot in his house. I’ve picked him up. I’ve waited outside while he went in to fetch something. But I’ve never been inside. He’s always claimed it’s too messy, that he’s ashamed of how undomesticated he is.
“An hour,” he says, not answering me. I glance at my screen, seriously disliking the pinching feeling all over my skin. He sounded out of breath. Stressed.
“Okay?” James asks, approaching with caution.
“Yeah.” I back away, and even though I don’t like the call with Nath, it’s a perfect excuse for me to gain some space from James to get my thoughts in line. “A friend needs me. I have to go.”
He can’t disguise his displeasure. Or his suspicion. But I have to make him believe it’s nothing much, because the alternative will open a whole can of worms that I absolutely do not want to share with James. “Man trouble.” I shrug lamely. “Call you later?”
He looks shell-shocked. “Sure,” he replies, gathering himself. “Can I drop you anywhere?”
“I have my car.” I point aimlessly to a wall. “Up the road, but thanks.” This is getting more awkward by the second, and in an effort to try and kill it, I step forward and kiss his cheek, a better attempt to convince him that I’m fine. I’m not fine. Not at all.
I only intended to make it chaste, but James grabs me and holds me close, deepening our connection. I’m literally a prisoner in his arms. I try so hard to match his soft swirling tongue, but my mind is elsewhere, and I never would have thought it possible while James kissed me. It’s disheartening on so many levels, because isn’t it the whole fucking point of seeing him?
“I have to go,” I whisper, wedging my palms into his chest and pushing him back.
I turn. Walk away.
And I don’t look back.
42
JAMES
I’m left in the lobby of the building with a scowl bigger than Miami. What the fuck just happened? I don’t waste too much time wondering. I follow her, keeping a safe distance. She rounds a corner, her pace hurried, and I watch in fascination as she constantly zigzags from one side of the road to the other. She crosses the street three times by the time she’s made it to the end of the road. She’s avoiding the crowded pavement. Removing herself from the busy sides of the street as and when needed. And she wants to live here?
She zips around the corner, and when I make it there, she’s halfway up the next street. I spot her clapped-out muscle car in the distance. “Shit,” I mutter, mentally locating my own car. Half a mile away. I pull out my mobile and call Goldie, spewing my exact location.
“I’m two minutes away,” she says.
“Make it one.” I glance up and down the street, assessing my situation. Beau will be gone in less than a minute, even in that old jalopy she calls a car. “Fuck.” I spot a grocery store across the road, the outside lined with carts of fresh fruit and veg.
Stall her.
I rush over, grab the side of a cart, and upend it, sending the endless piles of fruit spilling into the road. I hear the sound of brakes immediately, a cab screeching to a halt in the middle of the road, its horn blaring. The traffic is soon backed up, Beau’s car trapped in its parking space. I go back to my phone, dialing Goldie as I pace up the street. “Come in on the north end.” By the time I’ve made it to the end of the street, keeping close to the buildings, Goldie is stuck ten cars back in the jam.
I hop in the passenger seat.
“What’s going on?” she asks, crawling forward with the traffic, craning her neck to see down the street.
“Not a fucking clue. She was fine, she took a call, and then she bolted.” I motion to her car up front, the nose butting out of the space.
“And what was she doing here?”
“Looking at an apartment she won’t be buying.” I pull on my seatbelt as Goldie starts to creep forward. I can feel her worried attention splitting between me and the road. “Don’t say a thing.”
“Fuck you,” she says on a laugh. “What are you thinking?”
Thinking? Am I thinking at all? My mind is as tangled as fuck. “Just follow her,” I mutter as the traffic breaks and we start to pick up speed. Someone up front give’s Beau the right of way, and she pulls out, startling everyone within half a mile radius when her car backfires.
“Fuck me,” Goldie breathes, and I nod in agreement, my eyes laser beams on the death trap up ahead carrying Beau to . . . where?
I don’t know, but I’m fucking raging.
43
BEAU
I rumble down the cobbled street toward Nath’s place—a converted attic space above a row of garages—and turn off Dolly’s engine, getting out and putting all my weight behind me to shut the door. I look up at the Juliet balcony. No lights are on. It’s not dark, but there’s definitely not enough natural light to warrant that.
I approach the door and knock, unable to shake off the lingering sense of caution since I took his call, every inch of me dreading what he has to tell me. I hear no movement beyond. No doors opening or feet coming down the stairs. I knock again and frame my eyes, squinting as I try to see past the opaque glass of his door. Nothing.
I pull back, thoughtful, my mind racing. “Where are you?” I say to myself, knocking again, this time harder, more relentlessly. Shit, I need to rein myself in. What would the old Beau do? Once a cop . . .
I can’t think straight. “Nath?” I call, stepping back and peeking up at the window. “Nath!”