“No hairdryer?” He sips his coffee as I put the lid on mine.
“I didn’t want the noise to wake you up.” More heat creeps up my neck and across my cheeks. “I try to be a… uh… considerate hostess. Don’t worry about it.”
He looks pissed. Pissed right off.
The vibe gets my heart pumping hard.
“I’ll drive you to work,” he tells me.
“Oh, that’s okay.”
“Don’t be a fuckin’ martyr. Take five and get the wet out of your hair.”
“Um, it’s okay, I…”
“Blow-dry your hair, Violet. It’s fuckin’ cold out there.”
“Okay,” I whisper and grab my regular one from the bathroom and set it up in the kitchen.
He frowns.
He’s wondering why I’m running it in the kitchen instead of the bathroom. Slightly lower chance of not waking Ray up.
I turn my head upside down and blast it for a few minutes, then duck into the bathroom to go with a ponytail because my hair is still a little damp and because of how I dried it, it’ll be too poofy to leave it down.
“Ready?” He asks as I emerge. He’s hand-washing his coffee mug. He sets it in the dish drainer, and I watch as he moves to the front door and grabs his leather jacket from the coat tree. He shrugs it on and holds out my coat. I let him help me into it before I grab my purse and my travel mug, muttering out a meek ‘thank you’ and internally chastising myself for it.
The elevator ride down is fraught with tension – his and mine – as I try and fail in efforts to avoid looking at Killian’s flexing jaw muscles as he stares at the elevator lights with his teeth tight together. Before we get to the ground floor, his eyes find mine and the look in them makes my heart pound in double time. He looks furious and I don’t like this feeling – like something bad is about to happen.
I know I’m overreacting, being stupid because of the affect Ray has had on me, so I dig deep and try to pull up some cool.
The doors open with a ding and he waves for me to go ahead as he holds the elevator door, so it won’t close on me.
I move ahead of him and once we leave the building, having no idea where he is parked, I search the parking lot to see which car looks like it doesn’t belong.
I stumble.
So much for pulling up some cool.
“Here.” He puts his hand to the small of my back and leads me to a white sportscar.
A definite hot guy car. Ray talked about Killian a lot over the years. He told me Killian was from his old neighborhood but had moved on and taken his bookie business to the next level. And then the next level again. Ray talked about how he owned multiple off-track betting sports bars. Ray bragged that he was a millionaire by twenty-six and that he dates models. He insinuated Killian was part of the crew he grew up around and pointedly said, more than once, that “Kill Coulter fucks people up who cross him.”
Everything inside of me tells me not to get into this sportscar. But I don’t know how to get myself out of it, so I get inside after he opens the passenger door. A gentleman. Just before he opens the driver’s door, I take a deep breath, filling my lungs with air.
I sit with my hands folded in my lap and fail in my efforts to not stare at how his hands move as he drives the spotless and fresh-smelling car. Ray is always leaving a mess in my car.
“Where to, Violet?” he asks.
“Hm?”
“Where’s your office?”
“Oh!” I shake off my daze and tell him where I work.
We’re evidently going the wrong way, so he pulls a U-turn.
“Sorry,” I apologize. “Should’ve said sooner.”
“No biggie,” he replies softly.
“Sorry,” I repeat.
“Violet.” We stop at a red light; his eyes are on me. “Not a big deal.”
I pull my lips tight. I keep overreacting and I’m embarrassed.
The light feels like it takes forever. There’s a weirdness in the atmosphere. I feel his eyes on me and I keep mine firmly fixed on the stoplight, glowing red, setting off an alarm inside me. Like a warning.
“You’re not wearing an engagement ring,” he observes.
The light turns green and we’re moving again.
I stare at my hands. I’ve got a birthstone ring on my right ring finger. My left hand is naked.
“No. We, um, never got that far.”
“Haven’t?”
“Pardon?” I look at him.
He’s frowning.
“You haven’t gotten that far, or you never did get that far?”
My lips part but nothing comes out.
“Never got that far indicates you won’t go that distance. Your phrasing makes it sound like you and Ray are history instead of makin’ plans.”
My body jerks in response and I feel like I might vomit.
Shit. Shit.
“I don’t blame you,” he says. “Guy’s a fuckin’ loser.”
I swallow, unsure of how to respond to that.
“You’re not defending him. This tells me a lot. A woman has every right to be pissed at me for badmouthing her man. You’re not pissed. You’re flipped out.”
Moments pass with nothing but awkwardness. We’re almost to my job. My hands are sweaty. My throat is dry. Not to mention that my heart is galloping in my chest.
Killian speaks again, “You think me ‘n Ray are friends so you can’t say anything, but it’s obvious what’s happening with you two. You’re in the middle of breaking up and he lied about it last night. Tried to play it off like you two are good.”
I blow out a breath.
“Am I right?”
“Well...”
“You on the verge of gettin’ rid? Anything you say to me is between us, Violet.”
My mouth fails me. Again.
I am making an idiot of myself here. How does he know this? If it’s that obvious to a perfect stranger, why isn’t it obvious to Ray?
Awkward silence follows until Killian stops at the curb out front of my office building and leans over toward me, making me jerk tight. He opens the glove box and pulls out a little leather bifold.
“We grew up on the same turf, we have that history. But Violet… I’m not his friend. You see me in three years?”
I shake my head.
“No, you haven’t. Because he’s not my friend and I have no loyalty to that fuckin’–” He lets that hang.
Our eyes meet and I try to tear my gaze away, but I can’t seem to do it. Green eyes are burning into mine, holding me in an invisible but steel grip. His nostrils flare.
“Don’t stress. I won’t say anything to that guy about this little conversation. Here.” He pulls a business card out of the leather bifold and places it in my hand. “Use it if you need to.”
I blink at the card, feeling like my throat is dusty. I need to get out of this car, now, before I say things I shouldn’t. Before I fall to pieces.
“Thank you for the ride. And for being so nice to me.” I quickly get out of the car and shut it, then rush toward the door, tripping on a sewer grate but catching myself before I take a complete tumble. My coffee, however, does a slosh out of the mouth-hole of my cup and singes my hand as well as soaks Killian’s card, which falls. I all but tackle it before the wind can carry it away. I cringe at the burn and put the soggy business card into my pocket before I hurry toward the entrance, swiping my burning and wet hand across my coat. As I get to the revolving door, I glance over my shoulder and see Killian is idling at the curb, still, eyes aimed at me. He’s seen it all. The fumble, the fight to keep composure, and the overwhelming urge to rescue that business card.