“No kidding.”
I glance at the trail winding below us, disappearing into mist and cloud as we climb. “Why aren’t you up there warming up?”
She gives me a slow once-over, eyes flat. “Maybe I didn’t want to see you.”
Yep, I deserve that,but it doesn’t make it hurt less.
I rub the back of my neck. “Alaina, I want to apologize.”
“No.” She groans. “Stop fucking apologizing.”
“I’m sorry,” I say anyway, because I mean it. “I want to make it better, but it seems I’m only capable of making it worse.”
She exhales hard, her shoulders loosening just slightly. “Okay, how about we be adults about this? Iamone now, too, if you haven’t noticed.”
A breath of a laugh escapes me, unbidden.Still the same sassy little thing.
“The facts are, I kissed you,” she states simply, and it sounds rehearsed. “And that wasn’t okay. I’m sorry. How about we just act like it didn’t happen? And then you can drop the guilt-filled looks? I can’t handle them anymore.”
“Alaina…”
The gondola groans as it climbs, rain battering it on nearly all sides as it rises into the gray. The trees are gone now, and the track, the mountain, everything has disappeared. All that’s left is mist, clouds, and the thrum of the storm pressing in on all sides. Andher.
She’s only a few feet away, but it might as well be miles. I lost her somewhere between that first kiss and now, and I don’t know how to get her back.
“We’ll just be normal,” she says decisively, turning to face the window. “For Dane’s sake.”
I take in her profile, her delicate features edged with anger and hurt.
Impossible.
As much as I want her back in my life, however that looks, there’s no way I can simply forget the way we fit together. The way it felt to kiss her, and for her to kiss me back.
“It’s only a few more weeks,” she adds.
My stomach bottoms out.
That’s the real problem, isn’t it?
Dane said she’s not okay, and I believe him. Hell, Iseeit when I look at her, which is always.
Breathing is automatic for most people, but not for her. She fights for every single inhale, and I’ve managed to make the fight that much harder by being thoughtless with her. Careless. This space between us is karma.
My gaze roams down the slope of her neck, and my gut twists again.
The hickey blooming on the right side of her throat glares at me like a fucking neon sign, another little piece of karma.
She lethimclose.
Delacroix. That arrogant, reckless asshole who treatsthe circuit like his personal playground. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve seen him making out with fans or half-drunk in some club, grinding on anything that moves.
And now Alaina is one of his trophies?
My unbearable concern for her pours out of me as unadulterated rage.
“What the fuck were you thinking, making out with Delacroix? He’s going to blow your cover. How can you be so irresponsible?”
She whips around, facing me off with a fierce glare. “That isn’t your fucking problem.”
