Never Tied Down (The Never Duet #2) (9 page)

   She was looking around the pizza place, obviously trying to avoid eye contact, but I let her.  I wanted her to be comfortable, so if it took some time to warm her up, so be it.

   The waitress came and Kalli ordered a beer, which I loved.  I loved that she could hang.  She liked her girly cocktails, but wasn’t afraid to drink a beer with her pizza.  I ordered the same.

   “So, how long have you been in LA?”  I tried to open up the conversation with something light, something that felt like normal conversation.

   “About four weeks.  I started my new job about a week after I came to town.”

   “How are you liking it so far?”

   “It’s pretty crazy,” she said, her sweet laugh mixing with her words.  “I never thought I would live here.  We talked about that once,” she said, her hand motioning between us.  Then she shrugged.  “But the time was right and the job is amazing, so I made the leap.”

   “Even though you knew I would be here?” I asked, my smile widening, eyes locking on hers.  I watched her throat dip as she swallowed. 
Jesus
.

   “Even though.”

   “I can’t tell if you think it was a mistake or not, coming here and having to see me.”

   “If I thought it was a mistake, I wouldn’t have come looking for you.”

 
Jesus.

   Her words shot through the air and hit me right in the chest, followed by a sweet burn I’d been longing for.  Her, here, admitting she wanted to see me.  It was the most beautiful torture.  Beautiful because it was what I’d wanted for so long, ever since I’d met her, for her to want me just as much as I wanted her.  Torture because she was still so fucking far away.  Sure, she was sitting at my table, about to eat dinner with me, but she wasn’t nearly as close as I needed her.

   We’d work on that slowly.

   “I’m glad you did,” was my response.

   She smiled and took a sip of her beer, her eyes wandering again.  The waitress returned and I ordered us a pizza.  “Can you also please make sure you bring a fork for her?  She likes to eat her pizza with a fork.”  The waitress smiled then walked away, and Kalli was laughing.

   “That was a little uncalled for,” she said when her laughing tapered off.

   “What?  I just want you to have everything you need to eat your pizza.”

   “You just wanted an opportunity to make fun of me.”  She said the words with a smile so I knew she wasn’t offended.  She was also right, so I gave her that.

   “You’re still the only person I’ve ever met who eats pizza with a fork.”

   “I can eat it without,” she said, as if she were challenging me.

   I shrugged.  “I think it’s cute.”

   She blushed, and that was cute too.

   “So, what have you been up to these past few months?  I always thought about you, but wasn’t sure you wanted to hear from me.”

   The smile she’d been wearing dimmed a little, which I hated, but I liked that she answered me anyway.

   “I took some time off… after… but then I just tried to stay busy with work.  I was staying either on location or with Megan and Ella, just working as much as I could.”  She paused for a moment and looked as though she was fighting an inner battle.  Her hands were on her glass, turning it, as though she couldn’t keep her fingers still.  “I tried to distract myself from losing him.  I couldn’t go back to my house, couldn’t really do anything that reminded me of him.”

   “I never got a chance to tell you how sorry I was, Kal.”

   I watched her stiffen at my words, but then slowly she let out a breath and I watched as some tension physically left her.

   “I don’t know when it will get easier to talk about him, but it’s still really difficult.  And even more difficult is knowing I was the reason you never got to tell me you were sorry.  Because I pushed you away.  And
I’m sorry
for that.”  Her eyes finally met mine and they were simply begging for forgiveness.  I took a chance and reached for her hand, just gently laying mine over it, trying to calm it from its frantic movements.

   “You have nothing to be sorry for, baby.  Absolutely nothing.  You did what you had to do in order to survive, I get that.  And I’m glad you’re here, now, giving us a chance to talk.”  I rubbed my thumb over the back of her knuckles, gently, but then pulled away, not wanting to push it. 

   The air between us was charged, but we were both silent for a few moments.  Finally, her voice broke the silence.

   “You were always so sweet,” she whispered.  “I’m glad to see some things never change.”  Her smile was back and it was blindingly beautiful.

   “So, you’re liking LA?” I asked, trying to bring the conversation back to a safe zone.  I took a drink and watched as her face scrunched up.

   “I like the weather and the job, but I still don’t feel like I fit in very well.”

   I laughed.  “I like the weather too, but it’s fall.  Wait until spring and summer roll around.  The heat gets brutal.”

   “Yeah, November in LA is a lot like late summer in Washington,” she said, laughing along with me.  “Are you still in the same apartment?”  Her eyebrows rose with her question.

   “Um, yeah.  I never really got the urge to leave, so I stayed.”  I didn’t tell her the only reason I stayed was because she’d been there, in my bed, with me.  It was the only part of her I had left, the only piece of my life she’d touched, and I wanted to hold on to it as long as I could.

   “Sometimes when you’ve got something you want, you’ve got to hold on to it.”  Kalli’s voice was thoughtful and soft, and I’d be damned if she wasn’t looking right in my eyes as she said those words.  That one sentence, that one remark, lifted me up and gave me hope for something more.  It also solidified my game plan.  I wanted her and I wasn’t going to let go of her again.  This time, I wasn’t going to fade into the background and hope she eventually came around.  I was going to be gentle and considerate of her emotional state, but I wasn’t going to let her make decisions that tore us apart.  Not anymore.

   She looked back at her glass, started spinning it again, and bit her lower lip.  “So, how are things with Lexi?”

   “Lexi?” I asked, my head rearing back, caught completely off guard by her question.

   “I saw you with her on the news.  She looked really happy.”

   I could feel my eyebrows bunching in confusion, mouth gaping open, looking for any kind of explanation for her statement.  After a few moments it dawned on me.  Lexi.  The movie premiere. 
Shit
.  It had been weeks since that happened and the gossip had died down shortly after.

   “Kal,” I said, reaching out to her again, “I was never with Lexi.  Her publicist and my agent set us up on that stunt.  I didn’t even realize what was going on until I was on the red carpet with her.”  I squeezed her hand gently, trying to urge her to understand.  I could feel the tiniest burn in my chest, anger suddenly hot inside me, at the idea of Kal watching Lexi and me on TV, thinking we were an item.  “I promise, Kalli.  There’s nothing going on between us.”

   She didn’t take her hand away, but she dropped her gaze from me, looking back at the table.

   “It’s none of my business if you’re with her, Riot.  You make a great-looking couple.”

   “We’re not a couple,” I said, my voice deeper, more insistent.  “Kal, look at me, please.”  She slowly raised her eyes to meet mine, but she looked sadder than she’d been just five minutes ago.  After everything she’d been through, I was pissed that Lexi had caused her more pain needlessly.  “We’re not together.  We never have been.  I haven’t been with anyone since you, and I don’t plan on being with anyone
except
you. Ever.”

   I watched her eyes widen at my words, her lips part slightly, heard her breath catch.  I hadn’t meant to come on so strong, had wanted to play this evening cool, become friends with her again, ease my way back into her life.  Claiming her hadn’t been on my short list of things to do.

   She finally let out the breath she’d been holding, but she only nodded slightly, pulling her hand from mine to take a drink.   She was retreating and all I wanted to do was grab her, shake her, kiss her, and prove I was hers.  Only.

   “Babe,” I said quietly.  “Look at me.”  Her eyes found mine almost immediately.  “I’m not with Lexi.  I’m here.  With you.  I’m all yours for whatever purpose you want.  You want to be friends?  That’s cool.  You want to be more than that?  I’m down with that too, dying for that.  But I can’t let you sit there thinking I’m with someone else.  That I could have moved on so easily from you.  I couldn’t.  I didn’t.  I haven’t been able to think of anyone else but you, let alone date someone else.  I’ve just been here, biding my time, trying to give you the space you wanted.  But I never let you go, Kal.”

   “Okay,” she whispered, after a brutally long moment of silence.  She took in a deep breath, then let it out.  “I haven’t been with anyone either.”  Her words were small and quiet, but she might as well have written them across the sky, laid them out in the stars, for what they did to me.  My heart thundered in my chest and any oxygen I’d taken in disappeared.  “You have to know,” she continued, still quiet as summer rain, “I didn’t make you go because I didn’t love you.  I pushed you away because it hurt too much to love anyone other than Marcus.  I know it sounds silly, but loving you, being with you, only made me feel guilty about what happened to him.”

   “It’s not silly.  It’s grief.  Whatever you felt, or feel, you’re entitled to that.  I’d never tell you anything different.”

   “Thank you, I appreciate that.  But I still want to explain.  I owe you that much.”

   I didn’t think she owed me anything, but I could tell it was important to her to get the words out. She looked as though she was ready to burst, keeping them inside.  Right before she opened her mouth though, the waitress brought our pizza to our table, completely unaware of the awkward pause she’d caused us to take in a monumental conversation that was months in the making.  The waitress smiled at me as she placed two forks in the middle of the table.  After she walked away, I folded my arms on the edge of the table in front of me and gave my attention to Kalli, letting her know I was listening, waiting to hear whatever she needed to tell me.

   “When the accident with Marcus happened, the first thing I did was blame myself.  All I could think was that, had I been home, it never would have happened.  Enough time has passed that I’m able to let that go a little.  Not fully, though, because Lord knows I’ll always wonder if I could have saved him if I’d been there.  But,” she said, shaking her head a little, “I can accept that his death wasn’t my fault.  Or yours,” she said, her eyes meeting mine.  “The fact of the matter is, Marky would be really upset with me if he knew I was using his death as an excuse to be unhappy.  So I’m trying to move past it.  And mostly I think I’m doing a good job.  I still have rough days, still miss him tremendously, but I’m coping.”  She gave me a smile and, even though it was small, it could have lit up an entire soundstage, it was so brilliant.  “I’m sorry I pushed you away, but unfortunately, it was just how I dealt with everything.  I hope one day you can forgive me.”

   “There’s nothing to forgive.  But if you need the words, then hear them.  I forgive you.”

   Our eyes were trained on each other and I watched as my words washed over her.  She smiled, but it was sad, then her eyes welled and I knew she was close to tears.  Without thinking I stood and walked to her, grabbed her hand, and pulled her up to me.  She came without any argument and buried her face in my chest.  We stood in the middle of the pizza parlor, our meal cooling, people eating all around us, sharing the first embrace since before her brother died.

   I wanted to rush her from the restaurant, take her to my apartment, and just hold her.  I wanted privacy to show her the comfort I could offer, the comfort she’d kept herself from for so long, but I had to settle for wrapping my arms around her in the middle of everyone’s dinner.

   “I know we’ve been apart, Kal, but I’m here and I never really left.  I’ve just been waiting for you.”  Her face tilted up to look at me and I could see the wet tracks from the tears falling down her cheeks.  I clasped my hands behind her, at the small of her back, holding her in place.  All I wanted was to lean down and kiss her, but I knew the timing wasn’t right.

   “I’m grateful you waited,” she whispered, trying to smile through the tears, so I pulled her closer to me.  When her cheek rested against my chest again, I kissed the top of her head and heard her sigh.  No, I wouldn’t push her.  I’d let her come to me.  It had worked so far.

Chapter Eight

Gratifying Ogling

Kalli

      The alarm on my phone blared and I swiped my finger across the screen, then moved my hand back to rest under my cheek where it had been all night.  I knew it had been there all night because I hadn’t slept.  Not at all.  Not even a little.

   Riot had brought me back to the studio lot, parked right next to my Rover, and we said good-bye.  It was ten whole seconds riddled with angst and tension.  I wanted so badly to scoot across the bench of his truck, pull his face to mine, and remind myself what it was like to taste him, but I could tell he wanted to leave things platonic.  He made no move to touch me, even though I could have sworn he was battling the same desires I was.  If he was, he hid it well.  I left him and my whole body was buzzing with unreleased tension, which kept me awake all night.

   My mind drifted constantly through images of what would happen next.  I saw us on dates, I saw him kissing me, could practically feel his fingers brushing over my skin as his lips pressed against mine.  Then I would blink and realize I was still in bed and still awake, very much unkissed and entirely untouched.

   The last time I’d spent the night awake and daydreaming about a boy I’d been seventeen and the captain of the football team had asked me on a date.  I was all aflutter with anticipation and hopeful wishes for a romance to rival fairy tales.  And even though our history was far from fairy tale status, I still hoped there was a happy ending waiting for Riot and me.  What that happy ending would entail, I wasn’t quite sure.  But as long as we were both happy I didn’t think it mattered much.