Priority Number One: this baby, who will be mine, and my foremost responsibility to which I am whole-heartedly devoted for the rest of my life.
Priority Number Two: doing the right thing by telling Colin.
Priority Number Three: the commitment to the work I’m doing and have always dreamed of doing, which entails not allowing Priority Number Two to derail Archer’s progress.
All three of these things necessitate boundaries. And I have no idea how Colin’s going to feel aboutany of this, let alone those boundaries.
But…
I’m going to find out today.
Reaching for my phone off the coffee table, I punch out a text message.
Elle Kissinger: Hey! It’s Elle. I was wondering if you were still interested in getting that cheesecake. :)
19
WHEN YOU’VE BEEN WAITING to see someone again forweeksand find out you’re going to see them in only a matter of hours, you lose all mental capacity to figure out what you’re going to do with yourself while you wait. When thatsomeonehappens to be a woman you’ve been in love with for a couple of months, it’s even worse. And if you’re me, you go to the gym and smack around a punching bag for about an hour, if for no other reason than to distract yourself and make sure your physique isn’t lacking in the slightest. Which is what I did. Then I still had three hours to kill.
Ultimately, I didn’t figure out anything else to do to kill time, and showed up at Eileen’s about thirty minutes early. Eileen’s istiny, with only a side bar stretching around one wall, a small table in the center of the space, and two other small tables against the opposite mirrored wall. The set up makes it so I have no way of missing Elle when she arrives. The place is empty, and I order a coffee and sit at one of the tables along the mirrored wall, facing the street so I can watch the entrance.
Sheshows up early, too, by about fifteen minutes, and this has to be a good sign. Like she couldn’t wait to see me either. And this really good day is about to get even better.
I catch her gaze as she’s approaching the glass door, and I don’t know what to make of her expression. Her sable brows are drawn together and her lips are parted absently like she’s deep in thought. When I offer a smile, her face instantly lifts into a pleasant expression, and I stand up to go push the door open for her.
“Hey,” I say as she steps inside.
“Hi,” she returns in an uncharacteristically small voice, like she’s nervous or worried about something, and I release the door so I can place my hand on her back.
“Are you all right?”
“Uh.” At the contact of my hand on her back, she stills right in the entrance and turns her big green eyes up to me. “Yeah.”
That’s a lie, and I know it because I can see the slight, pink puffiness of her eyelids that indicate she’s been crying today. Interrogating her right off the bat isn’t a good idea, so I give her a nudge while I gesture at the table where I left my coffee.
“Go ahead and sit.”
She does, but without saying anything, and something’s definitely wrong.
Sitting across from her, I fold my arms across the table. “What’s going on, Elle?”
She clasps her hands in her lap and leans forward in her chair more like she’s slumping rather than trying to be closer to me. “How are you?”
I arch an eyebrow. “I was fine until I saw just now that something’s obviously bothering you.”
Elle looks back at me for a beat before leaning back in the chair and sliding her gaze sideways. “Oh man,” she murmurs. “This is how it’s gonna go.”
I squint. “Huh? How what’s gonna go?”
Her eyes flick back to mine, startled like she hadn’t meant to say that so I could hear it. “Uh.” She lifts her hands to clasp them at the level of her chest, rubbing them together, and I can plainly see that she’s shaking like a leaf.
Without much of a thought, I reach across the table and hold her hands with both of mine. “Elle. You can talk to me. I won’t bite.”
She looks down at our hands, and her throat pulses twice as though she’s repeatedly gulping. “I’m… I need to talk to you.”
I need to talk to youis probably the scariest fucking phrase in all of the English language, and now my hands are on the cusp of shaking as much as hers are.
“I just said you could,” I repeat as gently as possible.
