After dinner, I arrived at my apartment building with a desperate need for a bottle of wine and a bubble bath soak. After leaving the battlefield of love at Mima’s, I always ended up needing to decompress. It began raining after I left, and of course there was no umbrella to be found in my car.
As I hopped out of my car, I grabbed my purse and keys, then held my coat over my head as the rain hammered down on me. I hopped from puddle to puddle, getting soaked as my body became chilled from the deluge. As I rounded the corner of the building toward the front steps, I paused for a moment when I saw a poor man sitting there, getting soaked from head to toe with his head bent down as he tried to shield himself from the rain with his hands. A terrible attempt at a shield, if I did say so myself. His blond hair lay plastered to his forehead as he shivered in the cold.
He looked... pathetic.
Pathetically rich, that is.
I looked to his feet and saw designer Gucci shoes. Holding his pants in place was a sparkle of gold from his matching Gucci belt.
“Did you get locked out?” I asked, feeling bad for the well-dressed schmuck who was probably seconds away from catching pneumonia. “Or do you need me to knock on someone’s apartment door once I get inside? Our buzzing machine has been on the fritz all week long and—”
My words died away as the strange, soaking-wet man lifted his head to look at me. The world became dizzying as those eyes locked with mine.
Those eyes.
Those devilishly delicious blue eyes.
My heartbeats came to a crashing halt as I stared into the eyes of the first and only man I’d ever loved.
Landon.
What is he doing here? Why is he here? How does he even know where here is?
Every inch of me began to shake—not from the harsh rainfall but from his presence. My lips parted, but no words fell from my tongue.
Why did I feel sick? Why did I want to run? Why couldn’t I stop my heart from losing its mind? After all the years that had passed, after all the work I’d done to break free of that man existing in my mind, he still somehow controlled my heartbeats.
What’s happening right now?
He stood to his feet and stuffed his hands into his obviously tailored pants, which were sticking to his thighs like stockings.
His lips parted and his voice shook as only two words fell from his lips: “Hey, Chick.”
Hey, Chick.
That was me—at least the me I used to be whenever he was near. I was his Chick, he was my Satan, and we used to be so hopelessly in love with one another.
Him saying those words felt like a light switch being turned on. Just like that, I was sent back in time. I was seventeen again and completely confused about every facet of my life. I remembered the first time we kissed. I remembered the first time we’d made love. I remembered the way our bodies entwined. I remembered it all, and it came rushing back to me, knocking the air from my lungs.
I spoke the only word I could muster as I wiped the raindrops from my face: “No.”
* * *
No.
No, no, no, no.
That was the only word I managed to say to Landon as he stood there on the outside steps of the entryway. I walked right past him and into my apartment.
My heart sat in my throat after the very short-lived interaction. My mind was still spinning from the idea that he’d been sitting on those steps in the pouring rain. How long had he sat there waiting before I arrived, and why did I feel like my sweet, sweet friend Raine had something to do with him learning where I lived?
Me:You are officially on my shit list.
Raine:I was waiting for this text message to come through, but you can’t blame it on me. I’m hormonal and eight months pregnant. When Landon asked about you, I couldn’t control my tongue.
Not shocking. Raine had never been able to control her tongue. Ever since we were kids, she’d been sticking her nose in other people’s business. One of her most-used phrases was “I don’t want to get involved, but—”
I knew her and Hank had kept in touch with Landon throughout the years, but Raine hardly ever brought him up because she knew how hard it was for me. I supposed she didn’t think it would be a big deal to, oh, I don’t know, give him my address so he could stalk me a little bit on a rainy Sunday.