8. Some Things Haven’t Changed

Leonie

Outside of my room, Dom was dressed in the clothes he had worn last night with a newfound hoodie folded over his arm. Issy was nowhere to be seen.

“Where did you get that?” I asked, filling a glass of water at the sink.

He grimaced down at his hand-me-down. “It’s… One of Issy’s friends left it after he stayed. She says it’s been washed. She best not be lying.”

I laughed, took a big gulp of my drink and grabbed my car keys from the side where the phone had fallen last night. I really tried not to think about it. If he saw me staring, he’d probably be a dickhead and mention it.

“No, no, no,” he said, waving his keys already in his hand. “Last time I got in your car, you thought the curb was your boyfriend you were humping it so much.”

I swallowed my drink, trying to force down my laughter. “I was eighteen at the time.”

“Some things haven’t changed in eight years. I doubt this is one of them.”

Okay, he might be correct. The thought of parallel parking often had me just driving home.

“And you still have that death trap of a car,” he moaned. “You really need to upgrade that thing or at least have my mechanic give it the all clear.”

I went to speak, but he cut me off.

“I’m driving,” he said, grabbing my handbag from the side and walking to the door.

Normally, I would argue more. I was the designated driver for most occasions. I liked knowing I could drive myself home.

But Mia had mentioned Dom had a new car and that it was sex on wheels. She said it was Dom in motor form. She detailed the sex she planned on having in the backseats.

He never posted it on his Instagram. That was reserved for his photography and Ghost.

I followed him out and down the elevator in silence. But when I saw the black, vintage car parked outside, I couldn’t help but ask, “What is it?”

“It’s a 70s Ford Bronco,” he said with the same easy smile he had whenever he spoke of his cat.

I really hoped Mia wouldn’t try to take Ghost. She didn’t deserve him.

The car was high and I had to jump, holding on with both hands, to get in the passenger seat.

“It’s beautiful,” I said, and then, looking into the back seats, I imagined exactly what Mia had been so excited about.

He’d pull her to lie beneath him, run an affectionate hand over her cheek, whisper that he loved her and then give it to her as hard as I wanted it.

My mouth tasted bitter.

I needed to discuss something different. My words had other plans.

“Shall I drop by yours? Mia might not be in, and I can grab some of your things if you don’t want to see her.”

He contemplated as he pulled away, running his hands over the stubble of his chin. Damn, I didn’t know what it was about men driving. Maybe it was the power they had behind the vehicle, the focus of the drive. Whatever it was, Dom bloody had it. It didn’t help that Mia wasn’t lying about the car. It was masculine, powerful, deadly.

Eventually, he nodded. “I could do with some boxers.”

Not exactly the drawers I planned to go rummaging in.

“I was thinking more like… Ghost.”

His eyes crinkled with wicked amusement as he looked me up and down. “Leonie, I thought you walked away from the life of crime you were fated to have. Yet, for me, you’re willing to commit a felony?”

“It’s hardly a felony,” I said. “He’s your cat.”

He was deep in thought. “Yes, he is.”

“Will you rename him now that you’re not together?”

Silence as we pulled up to a red light. I shouldn’t have mentioned the breakup or Mia twice in two sentences.

But he didn’t seem all that bothered. “As much as I didn’t like the name when she picked it out, he suits it now. He’s so quiet and sneaky; he is a ghost.”

I nodded and felt the smile on my face before I even realised he had done it again. Softened.

Back to the boy who had looked under my bed for monsters. Given me his ice cream when a bird shat in mine. Helped me with algebra when I nearly gave up in a huff.

“You hated the idea of a cat at first.”

“I don’t hate anything,” he said, focused on the road. “Hate is such an extreme and exhausting emotion.”

“You hate me.”

The quiet words were out before I could stop them, contemplate them, or even think them.

That was the issue being around him. So eager to please, to fill the silence, I became a different version of myself. It had been the same when we were teenagers, back when we were friends.

He laughed once, a deep noise from his throat. “You hate me.”

I’d said it before. Damn, I said it last night to Jared.

“I hate the way you treat me,” I said slowly, knowing with each syllable what I was saying left me open like a knife wound. He was right. It was an exhausting emotion.

“And how do I treat you?” he asked, still amused, his lips twitching as he looked left and right, glancing at me as he did.

I breathed in deeply. I might as well continue with the honesty. “Either like I don’t exist or like I’m dirt on your shoe.”

“Dirt on my shoe,” he repeated, considering it. “And how would you like me to treat you?”

That was a good question. I didn’t want our friendship from back when we were teenagers. As much as I missed it, even now, ten years later. I didn’t want him to continue to ignore me, either.

“Like how I am with Is?”

“No,” I said quickly, unable to hide my disgust.

“Like how I was with you last night?” His hand gripped my thigh with the same force it had in the hallway.

I swallowed. “No. I’m no one’s rebound.”

“Could be fun, though,” he said, looking both ways at a junction.

There wasn’t a second I doubted that. It wasn’t a question.

The real question was how furious would Issy be if she ever found out?

How would I see him at every family event and ignore him like I had, knowing what it would have finally felt like for him to be between my thighs?

If I needed to get laid — which, clearly I did — I needed to find that affection with anyone else.

Even Jared.

We weren’t far from his house, going further away from town, closer to Dom’s home.

But I hadn’t told him the way.

“How do you know where we’re going?”

He retrieved his hand and sat back in his seat, focused on the road ahead.

We were going the right way.

“You know where Jared lives.”