A blur of light in her peripheral vision drew her attention to Pavarotti who was doing laps on his wheel. It was good to see him active again. After Casper’s departure, Oliver had peered into the hamster’s cage and said, ‘Looks like it’s just you and me now, kid,’ and Pavarotti had barely moved since.
Paige hadn’t expected the rodent to understand such a cryptic phrase but clearly, he’d picked up what Oliver had put down and wasn’t best happy with the situation. In fact, if it was at all possible for a hamster to look glum, Pavarotti had looked glum, his normally jaunty quiff droopy as he sat near the bars of his cage, his beady little eyes trained on the distant door as if he was expecting it to open at any moment and for Casper to bound in barking.
And she’d known exactly how he felt.
This week hadn’t started well and it sure wasn’t ending that way either. Between the teeth-aching politeness between her and Oliver since snog number two and the Bella and Chase fiasco which had unfolded with her Just Desserts peeps, Casper leaving had been the mouldy, rotting apple core on top of the mud pie that had been the week.
Oliver hugging her in the doorway had been nice – comforting nice, not aprelude to something elsenice – to start with anyway. But it had quickly sent a buzz through her veins and a flood of heat pooling in her belly as it morphed into something decidedly not nice. Something which she was sure he’d also felt if the way his heartbeat had suddenly thrummed a little harder against the wall of his chest.
So, the arrival of the duck had given her the perfect opportunity to step away without either of them having to acknowledge the intimacy.
She’d give anything to be hugged again now as the yawning gap between them echoed the yawning hole inside her. Oliver was out of the question – she was just too damnawareof him – but she knew her co-conspirators, who she’d messaged earlier today about the Casper development, would be up for a huge group hug.
Sure, she’d be seeing them all soon in New York when her, Sienna and Astrid planned to surprise Bella at the pre-opening party for Chase’s gallery but she wanted to be wrapped up in their love now, damn it.
It was at times like this she was insanely jealous of the other three. All living in the States meant they were actually able to get together face to face. On a whim if they wanted. Hell, Bella and Astrid (thanks to her uncle’s apartment) were both in New York! Sure, video calling was a good alternative but it wasn’t the same as actually being with them.
Although, right at this moment, it was probably Bella that needed the group hug the most. There’d been much jubilation when the hatchet job article had appeared in print, thrusting Chase into a very hot spotlight but it hadn’t lasted long. Bella had discovered some inconvenient truths about Chase that had set her in a real spin.
Mortified, they’d all put their heads together and come up with a plan to fix things. Paige had everything crossed that it would work because Bella’s guilt was real. And hell, if she didn’t she know all about that? It seemed like Paige wasn’t the only one learning that things weren’t always so black and white.
The strains of ‘When You Wish Upon a Star’ dragged her attention back to the movie although with Jiminy receiving his golden badge it was just about done now and she’d barely taken any of it in. Beside her, Oliver’s hand slid to the empty couch cushion between them as it had done several times tonight.
She supposed given Casper had been there every night for the last month, it had been reflexive, his quick withdrawal each time, when his hand had found nothing but couch, squeezing at her ribcage. But, as the credits rolled on the screen, he didn’t remove his hand, his fingers absently smoothing the cushion andugh, now it was her heart being squeezed.
It was just so damn sad.
Without thinking, Paige slid her hand across and placed it over the top of his. She didn’t know why, it just felt right. Like the hug in the doorway.
Solidarity.
But then his movement stilled and he looked from the screen to where her hand was laid over his before slowly lifting his gaze and, just like the doorway, the buzz was back. Paige’s breath stilled in her throat as those blue eyes lingered on her mouth before they locked on her hazel ones and everything faded – the music, the flicker of the television, the lights from the hamster wheel.
Even the race of her pulse became a dull beat in her ears.
It was a strange moment. Something that started on impulse and had been meant for comfort but was already teetering on something else entirely. Her blood throbbed with awareness of him, eachlub-dubof her heart pushing the throb to every nook and cranny, every cell, every millimetre of her skin.
Oh crap. Thiswasn’tsupposed to be happening again.
Paige forced a lacklustre smile across her mouth, allfriendlylike. All,nothing to see here. He returned it with equally lacklustre conviction. ‘It’ll take a while to get used to, I suppose…’ Her voice was stupidly husky and she swallowed against the tightening in her throat.
‘Yeah,’ he murmured, his gaze not leaving hers, his voice rasping at just the right octave to stand every infinitesimal hair on her body to attention in one sweeping wave.
Her nipples followed suit and a brief thought about her sexually repellent, decade-old sports bra that would have looked perfectly at home on a sumo wrestler, flitted quickly away as Oliver turned his hand over beneath hers, his palm hot as his fingers slipped between hers and furled tight.
‘Thank you,’ he said.
Paige swallowed. ‘What for?’
‘ForPinocchio.’
Because she’d brought it up? Because it had been a distraction? Because she’d kept him company? But those questions faded to black as he slowly,slowlylifted their conjoined hands off the couch.
She supposed she could have stopped him. Pulled her hand back. He didn’t exactly have her in a vice-like grip. She could have opened her mouth, used her words.
But she didn’t do any of it. Shecouldn’t.
She was transfixed by the slow ascension of their hands across the gap, the glow from the flickering TV strobing shadows along her arm. Anticipation crackled through her blood like an atmospheric charge just before a storm,hummingthrough her veins. As he drew her hand nearer, her body automatically followed, his action nudging her a little closer.
