“Ace,” I say into the silence, and he turns to look into my face, his gray eyes dark, his forehead slightly furrowed with embarrassment. “I feel the same way.”
His expression relaxes, but he keeps his lips pressed together, hard. I waited too damn long to say anything and now this is awkward and awful.
I want to tell him how I feel—how I really feel, like my heart is going to explode when he’s not with me, how, more than anything, I want all these rumors to go away and leave us both alone forever, but if I do that….
If I do that, it’s going to mean coming clean about every aspect of my life. Including Rainflower Blue. Including the private investigator.
Now or never.
My phone buzzes in my purse, and then a ringtone kicks on.
“Shit.”
My phone is almost always on silent, so that it only vibrates, but calls from the boutique have a special ringtone so that I know not to ignore them. I leap up from the couch and hustle across to where my purse hangs on a hook near the doorway, fumbling for it and answering it at the last second.
“Hello?” I say, with just a hint of irritation in my voice. The boutique isn’t open on Sundays, so I don’t know what the problem could possibly be. I glance back into the living room. Ace is looking at me, eyebrows drawn together, and when I mouth “just a second, I’m sorry” he rubs the back of his neck and picks up his own phone.
“Carolyn? It’s—it’s Natalie.” Her voice is wavering, shaken. I’m such an asshole sometimes. She wouldn’t be calling me on a Sunday afternoon unless something was wrong.
“What’s up, Natalie?”
“I was coming in to the boutique to make sure we were all set up tomorrow, since—since last Monday was so busy, and—”
“Did something happen, Nat?”
“The front window is smashed!” she wails, and I can tell she’s on the verge of tears, if not already crying. “It looks like there’s some stuff missing on the inside, but I can’t tell what, and….”
“Did you call 9-1-1?”
“N—not yet. I just got here, and I—”
“I’m going to hang up, Natalie. You call 9-1-1 and tell them what happened. I’ll be there in five minutes, okay?”
“Okay,” she says, her voice choked. I can’t leave her like that, even for five minutes.
“Natalie, are you still there?”
“Y-yes?”
“You did the right thing, okay? You’re not at fault for this. Unless you were the one who smashed the window.” I keep my tone calm, with the hint of a tease at the end.
“I didn’t!” she says, letting out a burst of laughter that verges on hysteria. “I would never!”
“I know it. That’s why I hired you. Now, call 9-1-1 and wait for me.”
I end the call and turn back toward Ace.
“Something happen with the boutique?”
“Yeah,” I say, shoulders slumping. Today of all days…. “Someone smashed one of the front windows, and it looks like some of the merchandise was stolen.” I think of Natalie standing on the sidewalk by herself, and that’s all it takes to send me sprinting to my bedroom.
While I’m pulling a respectable outfit from my dresser drawers and throwing it on, Ace appears in the doorway. He leans against the doorframe with his arms crossed over his chest. “Do you want me to come with you?”
“No,” I say, then realize I’ve rejected him too quickly. I give him a flirty smile, but the corners of his mouth barely turn upward. “You’ll distract me with your sexy ways. I don’t want this to take up the rest of your day.”
He opens his mouth like he wants to argue, then moves into the room and starts collecting his clothes. “You’ll let me know how everything goes?”
The sincerity in his tone, the hurt that’s underneath, tears my heart in two. I want to knock the clothes out of his hands and take him right back to bed, where we can just talk everything out…after a slow, delicious fuck. That’s what I want right now.
I just can’t have it.
“Ace,” I say, straightening up. “I want to talk to you. I don’t think our conversation is over.”
He pulls his pants on over his boxers and waves dismissively. “Another time.” There’s a jolt of something cool in the air between us, and I don’t like it.
I’m going to have to be the one to change it.
But what the hell am I going to be able to do?
“You’re working tomorrow, right?”
“Of course.” He pulls his shirt on over his head, then finishes with socks. I watch him as he scans the room, looking for anything he might have left behind, and then he heads for the doorway.
I follow him out as he moves toward the front door.
“Wait.”
When he turns to me, I pull him down and kiss him, long and hard, and he kisses me back, but there’s a hint of reservation there that sends a chill down my spine.
What have I done?
“There’s one more thing,” I say, slipping on my shoes. Then I go back into the kitchen and open one of the cupboards.
When I get back to Ace, he’s put his shoes on and is waiting to leave.
“Will you come back and wait for me if I call?”
He pauses for a beat, then nods. “Yes.”