“I have some stuff to sort through before we leave tomorrow, and I still have to pack.”
“Okay.” Her smile looks a little forced, and like most of the emotions that cross her face, I can easily read the disappointment. “I understand. I’ll see you in Santa Barbara then.”
When she gets out, so do I, alarming the car and following her to the front door.
“Oh.” She turns to face me, her gaze flitting from me to my car parked on the street. “I thought you had things to do.”
“I do, but a man’s gotta eat.”
She grins and retrieves her keys, opening the front door. “Well I hope you don’t expectme to cook. I’m ordering takeout and calling it a night.”
“Sounds great, but let the record show I did cook for you.”
“Not after a twelve-hour workday you didn’t.”
The house is dark and quiet, and as soon as the door closes behind us, the stress drains from my shoulders. She walks ahead, but I catch her from behind by her waist, pulling her into me.
“Hi,” I say, dusting kisses along the curve of her neck.
She tilts her head, offering me more of her satiny skin like a cat who wants to be stroked. “Hi.”
“Today was crazy.” I turn her to face me, trying to read her expression in the half-dark. “You okay?”
“I am if you are.”
“What’s that mean?”
“At first, with everyone looking at me and all the phones going off and . . . it kind of caught me off-guard.”
“And then?”
“Well, with some time to think about it,” she says, grinning, “and to nap on it, I feel the way I did before. Let ’em talk. Let them believe what they want to believe. We will show them. Dessi Blue is brilliant, Canon. I dare anyone not to be moved by this story. It’s music and art and history. It’s restorative. Redemptive. And I’m proud to be a part of it.”
She reaches up to skim her thumb across my bottom lip and then the top one, tracing the bow and trailing over my beard. “And I’m proud to be with you. How could I be ashamed of this? Of us? I’m not.”
“I’m not,” I echo back to her. She put into words what I felt when I was talking to Verity. The way forward is open. “I told Verity you were my girlfriend.”
Her eyes widen and her mouth pops open, shock projected onto her face. “You what?”
“I think it’s kind of anti-climactic after Camille’s stunt.”
“But you haven’t even asked me.”
Well, ain’t this some shit? I don’t call a woman my girlfriend for . . . years, and when I do, she responds like this?
“So . . . you don’t want to be my girlfriend?”
“Oh my God! You should see your face.” She points at me and laughs. “Of course, I want to be your girlfriend. What do you think I am? Crazy?”
She snatches the phone from my hand, waggling it in the air. “And in my boyfriend’s best interest, I’m taking this. No work for a few minutes.”
I try to grab the phone, try to grab her, but she dances out of reach, running up the hall. I’m so damn tired, but do I literally run after her like a horny teenager?
Yes. Yes, I do.
She dashes into one of the bedrooms and I follow her in. She locks the door as soon as it’s closed.
“You fell for that?” She grins, plucking at the buttons running down the front of her sundress. “Now I have you.”
Our lovemaking has been restricted to Sundays for the last month. Having her during the week? No longer needing to keep this a secret?
I push the dress away from her shoulders and sigh at the delicious sight of her.
“Now you have me.”