My pulse slows, relief unspooling through me as I tell him the truth. “I’m glad I’m with you, too.”
Alex pulls back enough to look at me, his eyes clear and bright, sparkling in the glow from the twinkly lights strung around his Christmas tree. “I’m always glad when I’m with you, Ted. Even when everything is shit.”
He curls his hands around my neck, his thumbs sweeping along my jaw, and I list toward him. Heat curls through me. “I… feel the same way.” I can barely form a sentence. My whole body is a live wire.
I slide my palms up his chest and press myself against him. I wish I could blame the drinks or the depressing reality of my first divorced Christmas, but I can’t. I’m touching Alex because I’m desperate to.
His hips rock toward mine. His gaze drops to my mouth. “Ted,” he whispers roughly. There’s an edge in his voice, a plea.
“I’m sorry.” I try to pull back. “I shouldn’t—”
“You should,” he mutters, dragging me back against him.
It’s the only permission I need, before my body finally gives in to what it’s been fighting for months now.
I press up on tiptoes, so we’re eye to eye, sink my hands into his hair, and brush his lips with mine, so faint, I’m not sure it happened, but then Alex leans in and meets me, his mouth brushing mine, too, minty warmth gusting over me, and I know it’s real. A whispered, frightened, momentary kiss.
My nose grazes his. Our foreheads meet. Silence hangs in the room.
Kissing Alex felt so right. And yet suddenly, I’m petrified it was the wrong thing to do.
Alex curls his hands around my waist, tucking his head into the crook of my neck. “Ted,” he whispers.
My heart’s pounding in my ears, and maybe it’s warped my hearing, but I don’t think so. He sounds like he regrets it.
We shouldn’t have. We’refriends. Friends don’t kiss. They can’t. Not if they want to stay friends. And there is nothing I want more than to keep Alex Bruscato as my friend.
“Night, Alex.” I hug him as platonically as I can, then wrench myself away, throw open the door, and start power walking home.
My phone buzzes with a text two minutes into my walk. It’s from Alex.
Let me know when you’re home safely?
I feel like I just swallowed a rock. I should be relieved—on the rare occasion he hasn’t walked me home in person or on a call, this is what friend Alex has texted his friend Thea. He’s being a good friend to me.
Why, then, am I so sad that he’s given me exactly what I want?
CHAPTER 25NOW
August 5, third day of “vacation”
The first night of vacation, the one-bed situation led to a one-bed argument, a not-too-pleasant hiss-whispered debate in our bedroom, after beating Jen and Ethan at euchre. I reminded Alex he gets an eighty-year-old’s back when he doesn’t sleep on a good mattress. Alex countered that the mattress seemed like shit anyway. I argued that I’d be sleeping on the floor if he tried not to sleep in the bed. Alex threatened to chuck me in the bed if I tried it, which did my raging lust for him no favors whatsoever.
Eventually, we compromised—after everybody went to bed, we’d steal the couch cushions from the living room sofa, put those on the floor in our room, and take turns sleeping on them, then wake up early enough to put them back before anyone else was awake and could notice. I slept on them the first night, after winning rock paper scissors to decide who got the floor. Alex slept on the cushions on the floor last night.
And today, I can tell he’s paying for it.
I doubt anyone else can tell. He’s been kicking a soccer ball with Mia across the sand, and half an hour ago, he was lifting her above the waves. Now they’re crouched at the surf, poking around for sea creatures. Lines of pain bracket his mouth, and there’s a notch carved between his eyebrows.
But he’s toughing it out, for Mia.
A wave of longing tugs at me with a force that feels as elemental as the waves receding from the shore. Alex being a good dad is so damn hot.
I force those lusty thoughts away, as I remind myself I’m sitting feet away from his ex-wife and my ex-husband. Then I refocus on Mia and Alex, the joy that creeps across Mia’s face as she shows him something, when he meets it with curiosity, energy, just as much enthusiasm as she gave him.
I’m watching them behind my sunglasses, over the top of my book, when Mia turns, then yells, “Mommy! Come here! I found something!”
Jen peers up from her book, smiling. “Coming!” She drops her book, tugs at her sarong, making sure it’s tight at her waist, and crosses the sand toward Mia.