I’m stood at the bottom of the stairs whilst she gets ready. Tonight, I’m taking her out for a meal.
It’s been a week since Lucy gave her police statement and it’s been five days since she had her first therapy session. Her second one was today, and the change in her in such a short amount of time is incredible.
The first session, she came out broken and spent the rest of the day curled up in my bed. I’ve been sleeping on an air-bed since Lucy came to stay with me, and as much as she had tried to argue about it, I won’t give in. Giving her my bed is no hardship. I’ve slept on cold, hard floors and in the fucking grass on occasion during the time when I travelled, so an air-bed to me is comfortable.
“Where are you guys off to tonight?” Sullivan asks as he appears from the lounge and leans against the door frame. I told him he could stay for one night, but he’s still here. Danielle hasn’t forgiven him, and I think he might be starting to see that she never will.
“Just to the diner down the street.”
“Pushing the boat out there, Cal?” Sullivan says.
“Actually, I wanted to go somewhere that was casual,” I reply, a bit irked at his comment. “Unlike you, I’m not just trying to get into a woman’s knickers.”
“Like fuck you aren’t,” Sullivan says with a snort and I round on him.
“What did you say?” My hands ball into fists at my sides.
Sullivan holds his hands up, palms facing me. “Whoa, whoa, I was just joking, bro, I didn’t mean anything by it.”
“You better not have,” I say through gritted teeth.
“Shit, she’s got you all tied up in knots, huh?” he says, but there is no joking in his tone. This time his words are sincere, and fuck if they’re not true.
I run a hand through my hair and sigh. “She’s my friend, Sul.”
“She’s more than that to you.”
I am about to reply to him, but then I hear a clearing of a throat on the stairs and I turn around to see the most stunning vision that I have ever seen.
Lucy is stood there, wearing dark denim skinny jeans, black high-heeled boots, a black vest top that clings to her curves, and a black fitted jacket. Her hair is hung down in loose waves, stopping just before the curve of her breasts.
I look at her face, her lips, her eyes, all free of make-up, and she has honestly never looked more beautiful. Her eyebrows aren’t pinched together in question, her forehead isn’t creased with worry lines, and her mouth isn’t in a straight line. She’s smiling, looking fresh-faced and happy.
Like the old Lucy used to look, before I went and left her to the wolves that tried to rip her apart.
“Damn,” I hear Sullivan say on a breath behind me.
Damn indeed.
I watch her as she makes her way down the stairs, her eyes never leaving mine.
Fuck. My heart.
As she gets to the bottom, I gulp down the lump in my throat. If we were in another lifetime, I would be picking her up and carrying her to my bedroom like a goddamn caveman that hadn’t had a taste for decades. Instead, I have to control my urge to touch her, to caress her and make her mine, because she doesn’t belong to anyone, and I need to wait until she is comfortable to move things forward.
I see the way she looks at me sometimes. It’s only a fleeting look, but I know she loves me on some level, I just need to hope that it’s more than a friendship thing.
“Hey, you,” she says. “You ready to go?”
I feel Sullivan nudge me from behind and I clear my lust-filled mind and bring myself out of my fantasy of this woman letting me be the one to love her.
“Yeah… Sure,” I stumble over my words as I reach for my car keys that are hung up by the front door.
“Why don’t we walk?” she says.
“Walk to the diner?”
“Yeah. It’s only along the road, and it’s a nice evening,” she says, and if walking is what she wants, then walking is what she gets.
