When we sat down to order I went with the risotto, while Trev asked for the beef bourguignon. His quietness put me on edge. Trev wasn’t one to sit still and be quiet often. I wanted to fill the void but I couldn’t think of anything to talk about. In the end, it was Trev who broke the silence.
“You ever hear from your family these days?”
A brick sank in my gut. I didn’t want to sit in silence but I didn’t exactly want to talk about my family either. “Nope. It’s same old story with them,” I answered on a sigh.
Trev’s expression grew contemplative. “Did you try to get in touch with them?”
I tensed, because his question hit a sore spot. When I spoke my voice was quiet. “I emailed my sister about a year ago to see if she wanted to meet up. I even included my new phone number, but I never heard anything back.”
Trev exhaled. “Fuck, Reya. I’m sorry. She’s an arsehole.”
I sniffed. “She isn’t. She’s just scared. Her whole life she’s worked for my parents at their restaurant. She doesn’t know anything else. She thinks if she starts having contact with me that my parents will shut her out and she’ll have nowhere else to go.”
“Does she still live with them?”
“I think so.”
“What about your brothers?”
I shook my head. “They’re both married with kids. Paula’s the only one who still lives at home, though for all I know she could be married and moved out by now. I have no real way to keep up with their lives.”
Trev exhaled heavily, his compassionate gaze wandering over me. “Well, you’re probably better off. They don’t deserve any of your time.”
I fiddled with my place setting. “Deserve has nothing to do with it. Even when I hate them I still love them. That’s fucked up, right?”
Trev shook his head. “No, I get it. When Mum was alive, I used to feel so angry at her, because she constantly chose drugs over us. But then some weeks she’d get clean and I’d instantly forget the anger. I was just over the moon to have her back to normal and would forgive her for all the shit she pulled before.”
I thought of Trev’s childhood, how his dad had been a non-entity and his mum died of a drug overdose when he was still a kid. How he and his brothers had to rob and steal just to survive. At least I had a proper family. Maybe I was lucky even though they let me down in the end. I certainly had it better than Trev ever did.
“It just doesn’t make sense. Maybe it’s God’s sick joke, making us love the people who hurt us,” I said, my voice sombre.
Trev’s brows drew together, his lips flattening in a frown, and I realised belatedly that he wasn’t thinking of family anymore. He was thinking of us. He’d hurt me a lot in the past, but I always forgave him.
Until I didn’t.
He dragged his hand across his jaw, rubbing at the stubble as he murmured, “Yeah well, I guess sometimes I’m glad for His sick sense of humour.”
Our meal arrived but the mood between us was subdued. Trev wouldn’t stop looking at me with sad eyes, like I had some kind of terminal disease but he didn’t have the heart to tell me yet.
“If you’re having troubles you can talk to me, you know,” I ventured, hoping he might open up. He’d expressed some of his frustrations back on the bridge, but I knew there was more to it. I wanted him to feel like he could talk to me as freely as he talked to his doctor. If we just put everything out on the table then maybe we could come to some new level of understanding.
His voice was cautious. “Troubles?”
“That whole scene today with Barry, and how you’ve been talking. It makes me worry about you.”
He exhaled a long breath and played with his food a little. “That was just a blip. I’m sort of prone to them if you hadn’t noticed.”
I reached out and placed a hand over his. “And what caused the blip?”
His mouth turned down at the edges. “Frustration, I guess.”
Yeah, join the club. “What have you been frustrated about?” I asked, though I suspected I already knew. I was on the other side of it, after all.
He lifted his gaze to mine. “You.”
His answer caused my cheeks to flush and I willed them to cool down. I traced circles over the top of his hand and cleared my throat. “Can I, uh, help somehow?”
Trev’s gaze darkened substantially, his voice thick when he replied, “Yeah, but I don’t think either one of us is ready for that just yet.”
I looked down at my plate, a smile curling my lips. “Since when did you become the mature one?”
His look was direct. “Since I spent two years without you. I don’t plan on going another two.”
I arched a brow as my lungs filled with exhilaration. It was both thrilling and nerve-wracking to be having this conversation. I couldn’t manage to meet his gaze when I replied quietly, “I wouldn’t like to go another two without you either.”
Trev stayed silent, but his expression spoke volumes. I saw his surprise clear as day and realised he didn’t know how much I’d loved being around him again. Inhaling deeply, he turned his hand to face upward and linked our fingers together. I felt hot in the dim light of the restaurant as I lifted my gaze to his. He never broke eye contact when he brought my hand to his mouth and gently kissed it. Tingles skittered down my spine at the feel of his lips on my skin. Trev let go of my hand and I busied myself shoving a forkful of risotto into my mouth.
He leaned both elbows on the table and rested his chin on his hands as his attention travelled from my lips to my nose and over my cheeks. “Can I ask a question?”
“O-of course,” I replied shakily, somewhat affected by the husky quality in his voice.
He hesitated a moment, then said, “This afternoon aside, since we’ve been on this trip, do you feel like my behaviour towards you has been consistent?”
His question was surprising and it took me a second to formulate an answer. “It hasn’t been inconsistent, but it has been unexpected to a certain degree. You told me you wanted to be friends, but you flirt with me all the time.”
Trev arched a brow, seemingly amused by that answer. “Do I?”
I smiled a little. “Don’t give me that. You know you do.”
He smiled back, the expression so bloody handsome. “Yeah, I guess I do. It’s kind of hard not to. Flirting with you was always my favourite pastime.”
“Oh, don’t worry. I remember.”
“You flirted back.”
“Trev, we both know women flirting with you isn’t anything new.”
“Yeah, but it always felt like a little victory when you did it. I remember when we first started hanging out and you’d blush at the tiniest innuendo. Then you finally got used to my filthy mouth and started giving as good as you got. Best fun I ever had.”
“Of course I blushed. I rarely got to spend time with boys when I was growing up, aside from my brothers. And even when I was in college I was never the sort of girl to have ‘guy’ friends. You were like this new, alien species in my life.”