“What an ass,” Oliver says.
“Understatement,” I agree. “And Cillian came over to ostensibly give me a robe.”
“One of his robes?” Lucy asks.
“To keep?” Oliver adds. Both of them appear comically dumbfounded.
“Yes?”
“He’s very protective of his robes,” Lucy says. “I tried to borrow one for a costume once, and it was a whole negotiation.”
“Oh.” I think back to how, our first night together, he’d offered me a robe as though it was nothing. That ache returns, the absence of him in my life howling.
I clear my throat. “I think he got the wrong idea with David being there and assumed it meant he lost our bet, that I was moving.”
“You didn’t tell him?” Lucy asks.
“No,” I grimace. “We hadn’t been talking—well, he hasn’t been replying to my texts—so I wasn’t sure if he’d care.”
“He cares.” Oliver’s conviction makes me squirm with embarrassment, as though I’d missed something obvious.
“Anyway, I told David to fuck off and tried to call Cillian a few times, but it went straight to voicemail.”
Lucy picks up her phone and dials. “Same. Voicemail.”
I rest my elbows on the bar, covering my face with my hands. “I can’t believe I let him walk away,” I groan. Desperation spreads from my chest throughout my body like a stain. “I let him think I chose that piece of shit instead of telling him that I?—”
Love him.
The words catch in my throat. The weight of them is too heavy for my tongue.
I’d been doing mental gymnastics for so long, trying to keep those words far from my thoughts. But I didn’t have to think them, much less say them, for the feeling to be there all the same.
I love Cillian. Love him in a way that is so big it feels...Unreasonable.
The revelation almost makes me laugh.
“I need to find him.”
Lucy nods, a knowing smile on her face. “Oliver, is he at the gym?”
“Let me check.” He pulls his phone out, and I hold my breath. “I don’t see him on the cameras but there’s a class going on, so it’s not impossible he’s there somewhere.”
“Alright, let’s go,” Lucy hops off her seat.
I stare at her offered hand. “Lucy, you don’t have?—”
“I know his hidey holes, can navigate without GPS, and have a spare key to his house. We’ll find him faster together.”
Some of the tension I’d been holding leaves me. “Thank you.”
“Keep me posted,” Oliver says.
“Of course,” Lucy assures, ushering me out.
After more than an hour,we’re no closer to finding him than when we started.
We checked his house, the gym, and a few random places Lucy suggested. Nothing. And his phone was still going straight to voicemail.
