Home > Attachment Theory (The Brodie Brothers, #2)(2)

Attachment Theory (The Brodie Brothers, #2)(2)
Author: Kayley Loring

I reach for the other one too.

“Oh. Okay. Thank you. I’m parked right out front. On the street.”

“Cool. I’m Dylan.”

“Scarlett.” She takes a sip of coffee as we walk through the automatic doors and then gives me a side-glance. “Weren’t you in line to get food?”

So she did notice me…

“Was I? I forgot what I was doing the moment I saw you.” I flash her the Dylan Brodie trademark half-cocky, half-boyish grin.

She looks down into her bag and fishes out her keys.

I see no wedding ring.

I also see no sign of a reaction to my very clever line and trademark grin.

“Well, I’m right here, so…” She unlocks the doors to a shiny black Volvo station wagon with her key fob. “Would you mind putting those in the back seat?” She opens the door to the back for me.

The window is cracked open, and there’s a child’s car seat on this side. Some kind of organizer thing’s strapped to the back of the passenger seat, and it’s crammed full of kid stuff.

She has a little kid.

A boy, from the looks of it.

“Sure.” I carefully place the two bags on the floor in the back. There are two dog crates in the cargo area. A Labrador puppy is on its hind legs in one of them, with all the longing for my attention that Scarlett apparently lacks. In the other crate is a Basset Hound who’s barking at me, and it feels like he’s telling me to get away from his woman, but I could be wrong.

When I step away from the car, she shuts the door and studies my face. “Do I know you?” she asks, at the same time that I say, “Are you married?”

“Divorced,” she replies abruptly.

I nod. I like that answer. “I’m pretty sure I’d remember if we’d met before.” I lift up my baseball cap to comb my fingers through my hair. Not in a model-y way—in a super casual maybe you recognize me from my many film and TV appearances where I comb my fingers through my hair thoughtfully like this kind of way.

“Yeah, well. You couldn’t even remember that you were standing in line for the deli just now, so…” She smirks.

So she did hear me…

I’m about to ask her out when she says, “You really do look hungry.” She opens the car door again, reaches into one of the grocery bags, and pulls out a protein bar, handing it to me. “Eat this.”

“Okay.” I take it from her.

We lock eyes, and I feel it. The flicker of her eyelashes. Her gaze dropping to my lips for a split-second. Right here on Beverly Boulevard, in the middle of the day—the moment she decides she wants me.

“I should go.”

Or maybe not. “Let me take you to lunch.”

“Uhhh…”

“We can eat here or down the street.”

“I can’t leave my dogs in the car for much longer.”

“We could get takeout and go to the dog park.”

“I have to take them to the vet. I have an appointment.”

“Dinner, then.”

She wrinkles her brow. “How old are you? Like, twelve?”

“Twice that. I’m twenty-four. How old are you?”

“About a hundred times older than that.”

“Well, you’re in amazing shape for a twenty-four-hundred-year-old. What’s your secret?”

“I have a number of secrets. Not going out with guys under the age of twenty-five is one of them.”

“I’m twenty-four and a half.”

“Not going out with anyone who’s young enough to actually want people to think they’re older than they are, more specifically.”

“So give me your number, and I’ll call you in half a year.”

She shakes her head, smiling. She just can’t stop smiling now.

I pull my phone out from my back pocket so she can put her number in there. Before I hand it over to her, an adolescent girl in a passing car yells out, “That’s So Wizard! I love you!!!”

I give her a nod and a wave as she squeals down the street.

I was twelve when I played Shane Miller’s little brother on the Disney Channel’s former hit That’s So Wizard! I get tons of followers on Instagram commenting on how little I’ve changed since then. Which is slightly disturbing. Because I’m a fucking grown man now.

A grown man who’s trying to convince a beautiful divorced mother to go out with him.

She doesn’t take my phone.

“You’re an actor.” She sounds so disappointed. “That’s where I know you from.”

“I mean. You might recognize me from my modeling work. So—dog park? I’ll get my car.”

“I have to go.” She shuts the car door again. “Thanks again for the…” She gestures in the direction of the back seat. “And for…” She looks down at her shoes.

“You’re welcome. Scarlett.”

She takes another sip of coffee as she circles around to the driver side of her car.

“See ya,” I say, super chill because I know when to back off, and I guess she’s not a fan of classic lighthearted paranormal family oriented sitcoms.

“Yeah, thanks again… Again.” She opens the door and stares at me for a beat. “I have to go.” It sounds like she’s trying to convince herself of this.

That makes me a little happy, I guess.

“See ya,” she says with a little wave before getting into her car.

I wait on the sidewalk until she pulls out into traffic and drives off.

Here I go again, on my own, back into Erewhon, to order lunch.

Alone, alone, alone.

But I’ll save this protein bar for later.

No one has ever given me a protein bar before.

I was right.

Talking to the woman in the red dress did make everything okay, for a little while anyway.

 

 

1

 

 

Scarlett

 

 

* Around three years, forty-five thousand cups of coffee, and zero sexy shoelace-tying incidents later *

 

 

“Did I lose you, Scarlett?”

My therapist and mentor, Dr. Keller, is the one asking the question. Her gentle voice and German-by-way-of-London accent is the only reason I know it’s not the voice in my head talking. Did I lose myself? Sometimes it’s a hesitantly whispered question, sometimes it’s the screamed refrain of the only song my imaginary punk mom garage band has written. The imaginary band is called Imaginary Punk Mom Garage Band because I’m not creative enough to come up with anything better than that. The song has no title, and it goes: Did I lose myself?/Did I brush my teeth?/Did you brush your teeth, Noah?/Where are my fucking keys?/Are these dishes dirty or clean?/That’s due tomorrow? Why didn’t you tell me last week so we’d have more time to work on it?!/Did I eat lunch today?/Where the fuck is my phone?/Go to bed, Noah./Shit, I need to buy a new bra./Did I lose myself?/I am so fucking tired./FUCK YOU, ADAM!!!!

There’s no melody either. It’s just a really tired voice in my head screaming into a microphone.

I see Dr. Keller once a month now, just to check in. Sometimes we talk about the patients I’m treating, and sometimes we just talk about me. Today feels like a Me day. I’ve been sitting here on her sofa for five minutes, I guess. I don’t know. I spaced out.

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