For every number that illuminates on the control board, counting down our plunge to reality, an image from the time he showed up at the apartment in the middle of the night with bourbon on his lips and sleep lines on his face flashes before my eyes.
Had we known our entire world was going to change when we woke up the next morning, we might have spent our time alone together differently.
Or not.
We might have just made sure it lasted longer.
“You can sleep in my bed,”I’d offered before Lydia and Talent took his car keys and fled, setting off a series of events that would alter everything.
“Will you be there?”he asked.
I can still feel the way Wilder’s muscles flexed beneath my palms, the force of his passion between my legs, and the sweet sting bourbon left where his lips touched me. Wilder’s eyes close slowly and his lips part right before he comes, and then it’s like he can’t get deep enough—but he’ll die trying. His fingertips left bruises up and down my thighs, and it’s our little secret, but the kiss on my throat ruptured capillaries.
“It kills me.”
The pendulum comes to a sudden stop with the elevator, inhibition, and my racing heart.
Wilder was still in my bed when I tiptoed out of the room to let the dog out. The sun had pierced the horizon, and the grass outside was wet and stuck to the bottom of my shoes. My last thought before Lydia and Talent came speeding down the street in Wilder’s Mercedes was,Lydia will kill me if we track any of this grass inside.
No one said anything about the grass caked on the bottom of my shoes as we gathered inside my bedroom with the only television we had and watched the news unfold. Inez was dead, and the truth about Hush was on the verge of being blown wide open.
Wilder and I didn’t get the chance to talk about the night we’d spent together. While Lydia tried and failed not to cry in front of everyone, and Talent tried and failed to hold her together, we shared a look that said, “If you don’t tell, then I won’t tell.”
And that was it.
Until this.
Untilit kills me.
“Camilla, listen,” Wilder starts.
We’re meant to go down to the parking garage, but I pressed the wrong button and we’ve stopped at the lobby. Dog bolts as soon as the elevator doors open, and I’m so distracted by the way Wilder’s lips wrap around my name, I drop the leash and lose sight of him. I contemplate pushing theclosebutton to hear the next part of Wilder’s confession, but God forbid something happen to that dog on our watch. We follow the chime of Dog’s ID tag rattling against his collar to a short hallway behind the main elevators.
In case of a fire, use stairwell, a sign beside a set of double doors reads.
Scooping Dog up from the floor, I tuck him under my arm and say, “I bet you don’t act like this with Lydia.”
Wilder shoves the push bar, holding the door open at his back to let me pass into the stairwell ahead of him. “That dog is an asshole, and he’s the only thing Lydia’s nice to.”
“Lydia’s nice to everyone, Wilder.” It’s not a whole lie. Lydia’s generally indifferent about most things, including people.
“Is she?” he asks skeptically.
The fire door slams closed behind Wilder, and a neon exit sign hangs above his head like an aura. The walls are stark white, and the concrete steps and landings capture the chill in the air.
“Well, she isn’t mean.”
“She’s not?”
We travel down three flights of stairs before coming to another set of double doors leading to an underground parking garage. The valet station is closed, but Wilder runs in to grab his key fob from the wall of hooks. With the exception of Wilder’s Mercedes and Talent’s BMW, there’s not another vehicle in sight. Fluorescent lights hum from the ceiling, casting dark shadows in corners and behind concrete columns, and our shoes squeak against the polished floors.
“Where did Giovanni park?” I ask, holding Dog against my chest as if they’re hiding in the spots where the light doesn’t touch and watching.
Wilder shuffles out of his jacket and drapes it around my shoulders. It feels like he’s poured sunshine down my back, turning up the heat when he slides his arm over my shoulders to guide me toward the passenger side of his car. He unlocks and opens the door, standing as a shield between the open garage and me.
“Since they came through the front door,” he says with an edge to his tone. “I don’t know.”
“Where do they usually enter the building?” I ask once Wilder’s joined me inside the car.
