Chapter 45

45

DES

L ater on, when we're both lying in bed stretched out with hands behind our heads, I'm only too aware there's one thing we haven't discussed. The blinds are closed but a ghostly light is seeping around the edges—the kind of thing that happens in every apartment in Manhattan. A low hum and click tells me the air is switching on, and Mitzi is a hot weight against the side of my leg. She shouldn't be in here but for some reason I've become completely soft and couldn't leave her outside our bedroom tonight. Our bedroom .

"We should have gone out to celebrate," Alex says.

"What could be better than a bottle of red wine and an episode of NCIS ?" I say, and he laughs.

"I love that that's our thing," he says.

He's quiet for a minute or two, and then says, "Thank you for everything today. I've lived here my entire life and I had no one to turn to in a crisis … except you. My parents would have turned being fired into a disaster and blamed it on me, whereas it turns out I'm pretty blameless here; I just got unlucky. Or at least that's what the lawyers are saying. God, it was such a relief to have that conversation."

Groaning, I roll into him, and he adjusts his arm so I can rest my head on his shoulder. I've caused him trouble in so many ways, first with his family, then with his work. I even talked him through a whole list of tech companies, for Christ's sake.

"This is amazing, too," he says.

"What is?"

"Just lying here with you."

Fuck. I do not want to ruin how lovely this moment is right now.

Kissing his collarbone, I prop myself up on my elbow.

"There's something I need to tell you. It might spoil tonight, but I can't not talk about it either."

The corners of Alex's mouth turn down, and he rubs his hand up his chest. "Did you sleep with someone?"

It's funny that that's the first place his mind went when it's the last thing I'd have wanted to do. My stomach churns, but I also get it. My relationship history is terrible, and it'll take time before we get on a more comfortable footing. In the meantime, I want to give him all the reassurance I can.

"Can I just say that would have been impossible for me? In fact, it's been unthinkable since that first time on my couch when I watched you come apart in my hands and I knew you were the only man I wanted to see that happen to. Alex, I know I've hooked up a lot in the past, but it wasn't from some great desire to sleep with loads of people. The opportunity was there and I like sex. But it's different doing this with you." I bury my face in his neck. "And I love it."

When I lift my head again, pink has crept up his cheeks, and his arm comes up behind me to rest on my head as he plays with my curls. His abs flex under my hand when he lifts up and kisses my lips, and I groan, following him down. Goddammit.

"Let me talk, if I get distracted I won't say what I need to say." I suck in a deep breath. "Samsung want us to set up an office in Korea. Jo asked me to go out there and head it up. At first, I said I'd think about it. I've never thought of leaving New York and I wasn't going to do it, but when everything seemed to be falling apart with you I felt I needed to get out of the city. We don't have a lot of options in the business right now with people who could do something like this … so … I said yes."

His jaw drops. "All this happened since I went back home?"

"Yes. Looking back on it, that's so impulsive, but things move fast in startups, and you have to roll with them. James offered to go instead of me and I …"

He blows out a long breath.

"To be fair, Jo might not have talked to Samsung yet. I still might be able to get out of it. It might be possible to find someone else."

"But it's a good opportunity for you, yes? To set something up like this in another country?"

"Yeah. The break I got when I joined Williams Security to be her number two alongside James was great anyway, but to help her grow a global company, so young … it's an amazing opportunity for me."

"Then you have to do it."

"I don't have to do it, Alex. What about us? What we have is so good. I'm not risking this."

His face is solemn, thoughtful, as he turns his head away from me to look at the window, lashes dark against his pale skin.

"How would you feel about me coming with you?"

"Coming with me?" My heart stutters in my chest. "Are you serious ?"

"I mean … Yes. It sounds amazing and what's keeping me here?" He sweeps out a hand. "The last few days have underlined for me how toxic the whole thing is with my parents. Maybe if I leave and you and I are together for a couple of years, then their attitudes might shift, but my dad … yeah … he might never come around. Before today I might have said my job at East River, but now that's gone up in smoke. It doesn't feel like I'm losing anything at all."

"Your grandma?"

He presses his lips inward when I say this. "Yeah, yeah. Leaving Nana would be …"

"And Betsy," I add, and he laughs and it lightens the moment a bit.

His legs are a solid outline under the thin sheets, and I move my thigh into his. To have him there, to not be missing him if I was there and he was here. My chest is full of light.

"Would you want me to come?" His voice wobbles like he's unsure what my answer's going to be, and a laugh bursts out of my chest.

"Are you kidding? It would be amazing . Holy shit." I bury my face in his neck again, push my whole body into his side and fling a leg over his. "Are you sure ?"

"I'm so sure, to be honest," he says, and I pull back to study him. "Nana notwithstanding, I've been treading water for the last six years, even in college. I was too terrified to do anything there, and living at home to save money … what was I thinking? Why was I not out having the time of my life? This is New York for God's sake. I'm twenty-four and it's like I'm already on a dead-end treadmill. My life in a cube mapped out for the next forty years."

He turns his head on the pillow toward me, and I'm so fucking surprised to see something burning behind his eyes.

"It could be good, Des, really good. If I was here, I'd feel the need to go home and see my parents every week or two weeks, and I'd be weathering their disapproval and no doubt attempts to ‘bring me back into the fold,' whatever that means. I'm not sure I can go through it all again."

My little adventurer. "What about your sisters?"

"I'll find another way to support them—money or Zoom calls or helping them escape. You were right, they shouldn't be living there." He turns his head and stares at the ceiling again. "You know when something snaps in you, and you just know you're not doing that thing ever again? Well, that's how I feel. It was a huge mistake to go back home after college."

"Seoul won't be like New York. It's nowhere near as open."

"Yeah, but you're forgetting the suppressed environment I've just left. It will be an adventure, and I'll be doing it with you. It sounds like heaven."

"I am not heaven to live with, believe you me."

He grins and nudges me with his leg. "You're forgetting that I know what you're like to live with, Des. The idea of starting again somewhere new, with you … I want to change my life and not just because of you, but because it's time, because I've squandered the last six years."

I wrap my arm around his waist and tighten it into a hug. "Don't think like that: Nothing is ever wasted. You got a degree, you saved money, you gained experience. You met me. It's easy to think there's a magic better out there, whereas the better life is often sitting inside us just waiting to be unlocked."

He laughs. "What cereal carton did you get that great philosophical insight from?"

Tutting, I say, "Shut up, you. I'm older than you, is all. When you're my age you'll find that …"

His fingers dig into my side as his arms tighten around me, and I let out a loud shriek he recoils from, but then he rolls me over and pins me down into the sheets and torments me some more. Mitzi jumps off the bed with a soft whine.

"You're upsetting the dog!" I gasp-shout, trying to wriggle out of his grasp.

But he just laughs. "This is a turn-on actually," he says, and oh! that is the best idea, so I stretch up to kiss him. That should stop the torture. He responds by pressing his hips into me and deepening the kiss, hands leaving my waist to invade my hair, and the weight and heat of him makes me groan.

When he pulls back again, another secret I haven't shared pops into my head. "Your grandma invited me to lunch to encourage me to make things up with you. She told me to be less demanding, and to forgive you your little hiccups."

He smiles. "That's very kind of her."

"She was right. I think she was trying to put things right, to make amends for outing you."

"Yeah, we've made our peace, I think. Am I allowed to call you Mr. Demanding in future?"

"If you like." I squeeze his waist. "There was a reason for it."

He frowns.

"There was a reason she outed you with your father. Nate was gay."

His eyes widen. " What? No way , Des. They had the happiest marriage. It's looked on in our family as this shining example of how to do married life."

"That's what she told me, so maybe you need to talk to her about it. It's her story to tell. Suffice to say, she did it because she didn't want you to suffer like he did."

"Holy shit." I can see the pain in Alex's face as he takes this in. "Maybe that explains a lot," he says.