“These are for you,” he says, giving me the roses. They’re red and smell heavenly. I head toward the main entrance to my building, and he falls in step behind me, resting his hand on my back. The doorman opens the door and ushers us inside, where we wait for the elevator.
“What time will Lucy be home?”
“Not until later. My mom takes her to the library after school. This is usually my late night.”
I smile at the people getting off and step in. The confined space of the elevator is making it hard to focus. Travis’s cologne overpowers the scent of the roses, and I find myself leaning toward him to get a better whiff. I’m tempting fate, I know, but I can’t help it.
We’re silent as we walk down the hall to my apartment, and once inside, he goes over to my tree and turns on the lights before bending down onto the floor.
“What are you doing?”
“Checking the water level.”
“It’s fake,” I tell him with a laugh.
“Right—I think I knew that.”
I hang up my coat and motion for his. He hands it over. “I’m going to cut to the chase, Travis,” I say as I hang his coat next to mine.
“That would be nice.
”
“Right,” I say, wringing my hands together. I go to the couch and sit down, and he follows, except he takes the middle cushion, leaving no space between us. When his hand rests on my leg, my mind goes fuzzy. “I can’t think when you’re this close.”
“Why not?”
“Because…” I shake my head and turn my gaze away from him.
“Why?” he asks again.
“Because I like you, Travis, and you make it hard to focus on the objective.”
“Which is?”
When I look at him, he’s smiling. But he won’t be after I tell him what happened and why I need to stay away from him.
“That night, the one we spent together, it’s been one mistake after another. Not only can I lose my job for being with you, but I can also lose everything. After I left, I wrapped my car around a telephone pole and was arrested for a DUI. I lost my license and am on probation. The night you saw me…I’m not allowed to be in bars, Travis. If you tell Irvin, I could go to jail.” A single tear falls down my cheek, and before I can wipe it way, he’s doing it for me.
Nineteen
Travis
“Why did you leave that night?” I ask, needing to know if it was something I did. I tried my damnedest to make her feel special. To show her that she meant more than any of the others I had been with, that she was different.
When she walked into the fund-raiser, all eyes were on her. The royal-blue dress accented her olive skin, and I found myself drawn to her. We had worked together in the past, and she’d always been on hand for my screwups but seeing her in that room, and watching all those men flock to her, I grew jealous. I’ve always been attracted to her. It’s hard not to be when someone looks like she does with that long, dark hair and eyes so light blue that I sometimes mistake them for hazel or even gray.
Saylor sighs and brings one leg up underneath her other one. “I had gotten up and made the mistake of checking my messages. Jeffrey had texted that an associate let him know that we had left together. He didn’t need to remind me that I’d lose my job if I slept with one of our clients. But I knew that’s why he had sent me a message.”
“I asked you not to leave. Hell, I think I begged you,” I say to her. I had never begged anyone until that moment. I didn’t want her to go. I wanted to wake up with her in my arms and feed her breakfast in bed.
“I was so upset and angry at myself for going home with you. I was crying and still drunk when my car struck the telephone pole. I had minor scrapes and a few bruises, but I blew over the legal limit and was hauled off to jail.
“I lost my license and was given probation for five years. One of the conditions is that I’m not allowed in bars or where alcohol is served. I have to get permission to attend work functions, and Jeffrey almost fired me because of this. He put me on probation for a year.”
“That’s why you called and asked me for help the next morning, isn’t it?” I ask as the realization sets in. I knew I let her down but wasn’t aware of the magnitude.
She nods. “I thought I could get the charges dropped and figured…”