Brian climbs into bed beside me. I’m turned on my side, away from him, as I stare out his window at the mountains.
“Did the dinner go as well as you wanted?” I ask.
“It was fine,” he says, turning off the light on his nightstand. I can tell he’s lying on his back, staring up at the ceiling.
“Are you mad at me?”
He pauses. I wonder if he’s looking at me or if he’s still staring up at the ceiling. I haven’t moved. “No. Why would you think that?”
“You seemed irritated with me at dinner. The whole hacker conversation.”
“Mr. Everly is tight with his security and his whole idea is to create something hackers can’t hack. You wouldn’t have known that.”
“If you would’ve talked to me, maybe I would’ve known.”
“Excuse me?”
“You invited me to come to your dinner and then I was brushed aside as an outsider for the entire night.”
“I’m sorry,” he says, but he doesn’t sound very sorry. In fact, I detect more than a hint of sarcasm. “It was a business dinner, not a date.”
“That didn’t stop you from talking to Kelsey all night.”
“Oh my God,” he says, his voice laced with frustration. “You have got to be kidding me right now.”
“Fine, I crossed the line. I’m sorry.” I mimic his sarcastic apology from a few seconds ago. My blood comes alive and adrenaline kicks in as my body prepares for a fight. “How about Kendra? You ever going to tell me what happened there?”
“Jesus, it’s just shot after shot with you tonight.”
“That’ll happen when I’m forced to drink wine all night by myself.”
“You weren’t by yourself. You had Keith the bartender keeping you company.”
I finally turn over to face him. “What’s your problem?” I spit.
“Nothing.” He doesn’t bother to look at me.
“Talk to me,” I whisper.
“It’s complicated.”
“What is?”
“My ex.”
“What’s complicated about it?”
“We were together for a year. We broke up shortly before I moved out here.”
“When did you move out here?”
“About a week before I met you.”
“Are you over her?”
“Yes.”
“Are you?”
“Don’t make me repeat myself.”
I sigh and reach over to cup his cheek. “You can talk to me, Brian.”
“I know I can. I’m over her, okay? I love you. I want to be with you.” He glances over at me.
Even though I’m pretty sure I feel it in my heart, I still don’t say it back. I don’t want the first time I tell Brian I love him to be part of some argument. “Then why can’t you tell me what happened?”
“You first.”
“What do you mean?”
“You tell me what happened with your last relationship, and then I’ll tell you what happened with mine.”
I don’t know whether to consider Mark my last relationship. Does a one-night stand qualify? Probably not. I go with Justin instead.
“I dated Justin for over two years. We got engaged. I planned to marry him. And then we broke up.”
“Why?”
“He decided he didn’t want to get married.”
“I’m sorry, Reese,” Brian says, the sincerity back in his voice. “When was that?”
“Seven or eight months ago.” I realize only now that I can’t even remember the exact date anymore. It used to be a daily count in my head. One day gone, one day further from what we had.
“Are you over him?”
“Yes.”
“And there hasn’t been anyone else since then?”
My heart races. Should I tell him? He’s giving me an opening. “Well,” I start as I think of how to word it. I don’t have to tell him who it was. I can keep it vague, can’t I? “There was a one night thing.”
“There was?” he asks, finally turning to face me and sitting up on his elbow.
“You said if I told you about my ex, you’d tell me about yours.”
“Tell me about the one night first.” His eyes light up with excitement, like he had no idea I had it in me. To be honest, I didn’t know I had it in me, either.
I shake my head. “Nope. Your turn.”
His phone starts buzzing on the nightstand. “Shit,” he mutters when he picks it up and looks at the screen. “Fox,” he answers.
I glance at the clock. It’s a little after one in the morning. I was just about to gain some insight into Brian’s last relationship. Instead, it sounds like Brian has some business to tend to.
I hear a voice through the other end, but I can’t make out the words. “Book me on the next flight out. I think it’s just after six.” There’s a pause as he listens. “Yes, book for both. Just one way for now, plus hotel.” Another pause. “I’ll do it. Thanks.”
He hangs up and looks over at me, annoyance in his eyes. “That was the call for Houston. I have to go.”
“Why are they calling you at one in the morning?” I ask.
He gets up from the bed and heads to the closet. He pulls out a suitcase and starts filling it with clothes, and then he pulls out a garment bag and sets several suits inside. “We just got word from our partners in Germany. They’re sending some associates over tomorrow, and I need to get there before they do.”
I give him a sad face, and he gives me a sad smile back. “I’m sorry. I’ll take you home.”
“My car’s here,” I remind him.
“Fine. Stay here tonight. I don’t want you driving home after all that wine.”
“Okay,” I say, thinking of his brother.
Why couldn’t Mark be in town tonight? It would be our first chance to talk without Brian around, but instead who knows where he is and who’s keeping his bed warm?
Not that it matters. It’s not my business.
But it still sort of feels like my business. Or maybe I want it to be my business.
When he finishes packing, he sits on the edge of the bed. “I have to go to the office to get some things before I head to the airport. Will you be okay here?”
“Of course.”
He leans in for a soft kiss. “I’ll miss you.”
“I’ll miss you, too. Good luck with whatever it is you’re doing.”
He chuckles. “Thanks. Have a good few days. Hopefully I’ll be back mid-week.”
“Think about me lots.”
“Always.”
He kisses me once more, not a searing hot, panty-melting kiss, but one of those kisses exchanged between two people who have been together a while, an automatic, sweet kiss that tells me he loves me without the words.
I wonder if I should say it. I wonder if I should tell him how I feel about him as he leaves, tell him I love him right before he’ll be spending day in and day out with his pretty secretary.
He slips out the door before I get the chance, and I’m glad. I want to say it when I feel it, when I’m positive it’s true—not as part of some manipulation to make sure I’m on his mind while he’s spending time with another woman.
* * *
I sleep in, luxuriating in Brian’s bed. It’s the same sort of mattress as Mark’s bedroom, I realize. I scroll my phone lazily, checking the texts from Brian letting me know he landed hours ago and writing back about how much I miss him even though it’s not how I feel. He’s only been gone a few hours—hardly long enough to miss him yet.
I finally pull myself out of bed a little before eleven. I make the bed and head to the bathroom to clean myself up. I’d figured I’d be spending the night, so I slipped a change of clothes, a hairbrush, a toothbrush, and some makeup in my huge purse so I’d at least be presentable enough to get my car from valet.
I wouldn’t say I look good—that’ll take a shower for sure—but at least I don’t look like I just rolled out of bed. I scrap my hair back into a messy ponytail and change into the sweatpants and t-shirt I stuck in my bag. As I pull on the shirt, I realize it’s the Vail shirt I wore the night I met Mark—the one I bought at the concert that night. I even washed it in an effort to get over him, so the sandalwood Mark scent is long gone from it. I thought I’d grabbed a different one, but I guess this will have to do since it’s the only shirt I have with me.
It’s almost noon by the time I emerge from Brian’s bedroom, and the place has been transformed. There’s no trace left of the business dinner that took place here last night. The round tables are gone, the couches are back, the food has been cleared, the temporary bar has been disassembled and removed. It’s spotless in here, and I can only imagine Hazel has been through with her magic wand.
It’s quiet, and I realize for the first time that I’m alone in Mark Ashton’s penthouse suite. I wonder what I should do. Part of me wants to snoop. I thought about it when I was in Brian’s room, but I refrained.
I set my purse down on the kitchen counter and wander over toward the windows. It’s different in the daylight. Vegas loses a bit of its magic when the bright light of the sun shines down on the Strip. Crowds of people mill the sidewalk below, tiny little ants from this distance. Cars rush to get somewhere, and while traffic isn’t anything like it is at night, it’s still a constant and steady stream of movement. Life goes on as usual as I stand at the window and look down upon it, feeling strangely like a goddess up here in the clouds gazing down at the subjects below.
My fingers rest on the glass. I shouldn’t touch it, shouldn’t mar the clear, clean surface, but I can’t seem to stop myself. It’s cold against my fingertips, a strange sensation since I know it’s near a hundred degrees on the other side of the window.
I’m lost in thought, still torn. Brian loves me. We have a good thing going. Telling him about my night with Mark would only tear us apart, but guilt eats away at me every time I look him in the eyes and don’t tell him. How do I keep up the charade? How do I live with the guilt?
And Mark. God, Mark. How can I possibly form a long-term commitment to his brother, knowing I’ll inevitably see him again? How can I get serious about a future with Brian if Mark will always be part of the background? How will I ever bury the intense feelings I can’t seem to let go of when they keep rising to the surface unbidden?
I have no idea how long I’ve been standing there, staring down at the movement of the ants, the little toy cars darting in and out of traffic when I hear the click of a key in the door.
I turn around just as the door swings open, and my eyes meet the eyes of a man who seems very surprised to see me standing alone in his penthouse.