He was about to go back into Mrs. B’s apartment when Delaney came out and walked over to him in that bold way she had. “So you did a nice thing. Thank you.”
Then she pulled out her phone and started tapping on the screen as she brushed past him. He had a feeling that he and Delaney weren’t going to be besties anytime soon.
Which suited him just fine. He was here for Paisley. For a second chance to see if the last few months had been real or just some residual feeling from the role he’d playing.
The door opened again and Paisley joined him. “Sorry about that. Wanted to let the ladies know they could stop working frantically to bake cookies. They are having cordial and we are invited to join them.”
“Sure,” he said. Seeing Paisley in this environment was making him want her even more. She’d dropped her guard while they were here, and no longer seemed to be keeping him at arm’s length. “Candace mentioned you bought Mrs. B’s condo for her.”
“I did.”
And just like that, she had her defenses up again and was looking at him as if to ask “what of it?” He touched her hand and felt a shiver go through her. She was trying to keep them on some sort of platonic footing, but it was evident she wanted him too. He realized that his lying to her must have been triggering. Sort of putting her right back to that time in her life where she could never trust her father.
“It was a kind gesture. I think too many times people overlook doing those types of things...but not you.”
She turned her hand over under his, those magic fingers of hers moving against his palm and sending a bolt of heat up his arm and through his body.
He wanted to concentrate on her words and not on the arousal she stirred so easily in him.
“It was only right. Dad had used the money to pay for my college tuition and expenses. I wouldn’t have taken it if I’d known, but he had told me he got a bonus at work... I—I think I hated that I believed him after he’d lied so many times before,” she said.
He had the feeling she was letting him know why she was so mad at him and he got it. Truly. He pulled her closer to him, blocking out the rest of the room with his body, and leaned in closer. Her mouth was a temptation he couldn’t resist. He brushed his lips against hers, just briefly.
She sighed when he lifted his head.
Suddenly he understood how much his lie had hurt her. Could he make up for it? He should back off for now. He needed to play this right or he was going to lose her.
“So how did you afford to buy Mrs. B’s place?”
“After IDG started I put all of my money in savings and used my stake in the company as collateral to get a mortgage for Mrs. B. I pay it off every month,” she said. “It’s not a big deal.”
He thought it was a big deal and that he was learning a lot more about Paisley now than he had over the last few months when they’d been a couple. “Why didn’t you ever mention this to me?”
She flushed and chewed her lower lip. “Didn’t seem important.”
He wanted to run his thumb over her lower lip but kept his hands at his sides. “But it is. Did you come and see Mrs. B without me?” he asked her.
“I did,” she said.
“So I wasn’t the only one who was hiding part of themselves.”
She turned away for a minute and then looked back at him. “Maybe we both were afraid to let our guard down.”
“No maybe about it,” he said thickly.
“Other than this, I shared everything with you. And...it’s not easy when your father is a convicted felon. It’s not something I go around talking about.”
Something about this conversation was making him remember all the intimate conversations they’d had in her bed. But this was the first time they’d gotten to the truth. He felt more intimate with her now in this room of people than he had when they’d been naked.
He wanted her naked now. Wanted to somehow find a way to put them back on old footing. But he was starting to realize they couldn’t go back.
“Like me and my career. Sometimes it’s nice to just have a fresh slate and be the person you wish you were,” he said. He was leading her a little bit. Trying to make her see that his lie wasn’t as intentional as she might have thought. But at the same time, she had obviously sensed something in him that made her not trust him.
He tried to tell himself it wasn’t a big thing, but that doubting part of him was very afraid it was. Maybe she’d sensed the same emptiness that he’d always feared was all he had inside.
Seven
Paisley didn’t have time to really dwell on everything that Sean had said. But he’d had a point that she’d missed, or maybedeliberatelymissed. She had hidden part of herself from him and she felt more than a twinge of guilt as she realized she was still doing it. The afternoon went by with lots of conversations with the women and she purposefully kept her distance from Sean, watching him to see what else she had missed.