Page 73 of The Only Thing That's Real
I search my pockets for my phone, I come up short.
“Looking for this?” Matt holds my phone between his fingers.
When I reach for it, he slides itinto his back pocket.
“Dude, I gotta go.”
“To celebrate with Ryan?”
Screw it, I’ll leave my phone. I turn to leave, but Sean is blocking the door.
Well, shit.
Clearly, I’m not getting out of here without a conversation so, I cave. “What do you want to know?”
“You’re happy, aren’t you?” Sean asks.
Happy is an inadequate word to describe how Ryan makes me feel.
It’s been three days since she invited me into her bed. Since then, food tastes better. The sky is bluer. The grass in Central Park is greener. Life is in HD, and full of vibrant colors I never knew existed.
“I am,” I concede.
“She’s helping you through whatever’s been haunting you.” It’s not a question, it’s a statement.
I simply nod.
Satisfied, he signals to Matt and my phone flies across the room, Sean catching it one-handed like a ninja.
“Good. Now get your damn champagne and go see your girl.” He hands me my phone, then pulls me into a hug, whispering in my ear. “You finally found the one, didn’t you?”
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.”
“You’re right, let’s not jinx anything.” Sean leans over to brush his knuckles over the small entryway table, knocking on wood for good luck.
“Superstitious asshole.” I chuckle. “But keep knocking. I can use all the luck I can get.”
Grinning ear to ear, he holds the door open for me, ushering me out of the room with a grand sweep of his arm.
We’ve got our rooms at the hotel, and I’ve got my penthouse here in the city, but I love being in Ryan’s apartment. It’s comfortable. It’s real. It’s her.
Her door guy isn’t the typical portly gray-haired man you see in the movies. Instead, he’s young, attractive, and expecting me, so I don’t have to wait to be buzzed in. But the elevator moves at a glacial pace as I wait impatiently to get to her floor.
Letting myself in, I close the door behind me, leaning my back against it in hopes it will keep me upright, because the sight of her in nothing but an oversized off the shoulder sweatshirt, and her sexy black glasses she only wears at home, take me out at the knees.
Looking up from her computer screen, she smiles at me. “Hey.”
“Watcha doin’?”
“Well, Iwasworking. But it appears the subject material has interrupted me.”
“Is that what I am to you? Your subject material?”
She stands and saunters across the room. When she reaches me, she rises onto her toes, her lips graze mine. “What do you wanna be to me?”
Fucking everything.
“A hell of a lot more than a job.”
