“But what?” Sacha snapped, already hating himself. “Go to work, Jonah.”
Jonah stared, both brows rising in tandem, hurt colouring the uncharacteristic irritation in his emerald gaze. Surprise, too. Sacha’s harsh words had shocked him as much as they had Sacha. “Are you—?”
Sacha glared.
Jonah shook his head. “Forget it. I get the message. Have a good day, Ivanov.”
He left, ending their encounter so abruptly it took Sacha a moment to remember it was all his fault. That the frigid gust of wind that blew through the café door in Jonah’s wake wasn’t an accident.He’dengineered it. Forced it. And now he was alone again and everything was supposed to be easier.
It wasn’t. And he was having a hard time recalling how and why and when he’d come to the conclusion that it would be. His brain felt glitched. As if it had short-circuited and blasted Jonah with the consequences too fast for Sacha’s heart to catch up. Or he’d dreamt the whole thing and he was about to wake up on his couch with his laptop keyboard imprinted on his cheek.
He dreamt about Jonah a lot.
12
“Pick up, pick up, pick up.” Jonah paced his office, phone pressed to his ear, willing Lily to just answer her phone already. He’d called her three times and her voicemail, however cute, was starting to irritate him beyond belief.
“Hey there, stranger.”
“Finally,” he ground out. “Where’ve you been all morning?”
“Um, I don’t know. Asleep? It’s still the middle of the night in California.”
“Balls. I’m sorry. I forgot you flew out yesterday. I thought it was tomorrow.”
“That’s okay. My schedule changes so oftenIcan barely remember it. What’s up, boo? You sound stressed.”
“I’m not stressed.”
“You’re blowing up my phone on a weekday for a chat? What happened? Is there a Tube strike or something?”
“I don’t use the Tube.”
“Well, you should. That way you’d get to see all your hard work out in the wild. I saw your Superdry billboards in every station from Kensington to Hampstead while I was home.”
“I don’t need to ride the Tube to see my billboards. I walk places too.”
“No, you don’t. You use the gym in your building and take cabs everywhere. Don’t lie to me, Jonah. I know you too well.”
Jonah wasn’t in the mood to point out that Lily was rarely home enough these days to know what his actual habits were. He’d called to sound off about Sacha, not bicker about his non-existent pedometer. “When are you coming back?”
“Christmas Eve. Why? Do you miss me?”
“You know I do.”
“Then you should answer your Skype calls. I’ve buzzed you twice this week.”
“I’m sorry. It’s been crazy at work.”
“And?”
“And what?”
“Jonah,” Lily drawled. “It’s arse o’clock in the morning over here. Please don’t tell me you really have called just to talk about the weather. What’s the matter?”
“Nothing’s the matter.”
“Liar.”