This Changes Everything (22 page)

H
olding her overnight bag
, Cleo unlocked the door to her apartment. It was Saturday morning. Because Trixie had said she would be home well before noon, Cleo had packed up and moved out by nine. Now she was home, finally home.

Home smelled stale. She dumped her bag on the couch and walked around opening windows. All three of them. She was glad to be out of Trixie’s house for social reasons, but she’d miss the space and the view.

Nice of Bev to dog-sit for a few hours until Trixie got home. The dogs would be all right left alone on the sun porch, but they really preferred company, especially Zeus.

She could relate. But she wouldn’t mope. Living alone had its perks, and even if she got lonely, she was used to it by now.

After a few trips back to the car, all her things were back where they belonged. Her clothes, her music, her toothbrush, her mangled heart.

She sat down and tried to lose herself at the piano. After an hour, she gave up composing and opened her computer. She checked her sales on iTunes, compared income to expenses, bought some new shoes.

Finally, it was twelve thirty. Time to teach, something to keep her busy. She set off for her piano lessons with grim determination. Halfway through teaching her first pupil, she realized she hadn’t eaten anything since gulping down half a banana in Trixie’s kitchen. That got her remembering the last good meal she’d eaten—a week earlier, listening to Sinatra at Sly’s side.

Her student, a nine-year-old girl with enviably long fingers, stopped playing “Greensleeves” and said, “I can hear your stomach growling.”

“Think of it as a cello accompaniment.”

“It’s really loud,” the girl said. “And you look funny. Are you OK?”

“I’m fine. Thanks for asking. Let’s hear that again, all right?”

On her way to her second lesson, she got a chicken sandwich at the Jack-in-the-Box drive-thru, not caring that she hated everything on the menu, just shoving it into her mouth to make the hunger pangs stop.

On her way to her third lesson, she got a call from that pupil’s mother, canceling for the week.

“Stomach flu,” the woman said, but Cleo figured her son hadn’t practiced again. Any eleven-year-old who got gastroenteritis as often as that kid did would be hospitalized by now. It had been so long since he’d been available for a lesson, Cleo couldn’t even remember what he looked like.

Now it was two hours until her lesson with Bev. She thought about canceling on account of a recently acquired stomach ailment. She could say it was going around. Rubbing her stomach, she looked at herself in the rearview mirror. She definitely felt sick, but it wasn’t the kind of thing you caught from an eleven-year-old boy. A thirty-five-year-old man with bedroom eyes and a dimpled chin, yes.

She’d caught that one bad.

So she went home and took a second shower, got dressed in tight black clothes and leather boots that made her feel sexy and angry and powerful, swallowed a handful of Tums, brushed her teeth, tweezed her eyebrows, and got back into her car to return to the leafy upper altitudes of Oakland.

Because she wasn’t an idiot. She knew who was going to be there. Bev hadn’t rescheduled her piano lesson because of the baby’s gym class. Trixie was behind it.

Cleo strode out of the apartment building to her car and flung herself inside. Keeping busy hadn’t helped. She couldn’t stop thinking about Sly. Even when she wasn’t thinking about him, she was feeling him. Her skin remembered what it felt like to be close to him. Her nose dwelled over his scent. Her tongue trailed over her teeth the same way his had done, slow and confident.

He’d adopted a dog.

He’d then he’d bought a Volvo for his dog.

“I hope they’re very happy together,” she muttered, coating her lips with another swipe of fuchsia lip gloss.

Starting a family with a human woman was light years away from where he was right now. By the time he was ready for anything like that, with anyone, she’d be dead.

And he hadn’t come close to groveling. Blaming his phone for not talking to her—please. He wasn’t the one. She had to forget him and move on.

Blasting Philip Glass over the speakers as if he were the hottest new pop star, she drove to Bev and Liam’s house. When she pulled into the driveway, she noted it was suspiciously empty. Had Trixie been crafty enough to make everyone park at the end of the street so Cleo wouldn’t get suspicious?

Probably.

Squinting down the road as she walked to the front door, Cleo ignored her pounding heart and told herself she could handle this. She could handle anything. They were bound to see each other sometime. They were friends who’d slept together, nothing more. Nothing more to him, anyway. Her feelings were her own business. If he didn’t want to be pressured into a relationship he wasn’t ready for, he wouldn’t remind her of what they’d done, what she’d admitted feeling for him.

She pushed the doorbell. Almost instantly, Bev opened the door. Her dark hair was pulled back into a high ponytail but hung off-center as if someone had been pulling on it. She gave Cleo a quick smile, then turned away to catch a crawling baby who was dragging a large Birkenstock sandal.

“No you don’t, Merry. Uncle Markie was looking for that. He can’t walk around in one shoe.” Bev shot Cleo a smile. “Come on in. You’d better keep your boots on. My daughter has a fetish.”

“I can relate,” Cleo said, scanning the living room for other people. Her pulse was still overreacting to the journey from the apartment to the front door. She’d expected something other than a couch covered with stuffed animals and a floor littered with plastic blocks. Cocktails, strippers, Elvis—not sure, just something Trixie had worked up.

Bev shoved her feet into some clogs by the front door. “I’ve still got to bring Merry over to Trixie’s. Really quick. Sorry I’m running late. Liam was in LA and I was up with the baby. When she’s not stealing shoes, she’s breaking out of her crib and playing piano at three in the morning.”

Cleo smiled down at Merry, who was busy squatting below her, clutching her boots with both chubby hands and pulling with all she had. “Maybe she could get a job at a nightclub. Bring in some extra funds.”

“Great idea.” Bev scooped up Merry and hauled her to the front door. “I’ll be right back, OK?”

Merry’s head pivoted to hold her gaze on Cleo’s feet as her mother carried her out of sight.

The door shut behind them, leaving Cleo alone with the toys, laundry, and solo Birkenstock. Pulling sheet music out of her messenger bag, she turned toward the piano.

Sly stood next to the bench, hands in his pockets, staring at her with dark, piercing eyes.

“Don’t go,” he said.

A
drenaline surged
through Cleo’s veins. “I knew it! I knew you’d be here. I knew it.”

He didn’t move. “Yet you came.”

“I knew she’d do something to get me up here. I left early enough this morning so I could avoid her, but when Bev asked for a lesson at six tonight, such a coincidence since it was the same day Trixie and Hugo came back from wherever they were after Vegas, I just knew—”

She spun away from him and headed for the door. Being alone with him wasn’t what she’d expected. A dinner party, a family BBQ, a group. Not him alone.

“Don’t go. Cleo, please. Hear me out.”

She opened the door. “Where’s the new Volvo?”

“Down the street.”

“Thought so,” she said.

He came after her. “I’m sorry about Thursday. And everything else.”

“Everything?”

“No. I didn’t mean that.” He reached over her head and pushed the door shut.

She could smell his cologne. A scent memory from their lovemaking in Las Vegas nearly knocked her over. “You’re kidnapping me?”

He braced both hands over her head and crowded her against the door. “Yes.”

Her heart was pounding in her throat, blocking her airways. To avoid his gaze, which would see too much, all the longing and the doubt, she squeezed her eyes shut.

Which only heightened her sense of smell.

“Are you listening?” he asked.

She shook her head. Impossibly, she imagined she could hear him smile.

“I bought a new phone,” he said.

“I don’t care.”

“I know.” His breath was soft on her cheek. “I screwed up.”

“It’s not your fault you don’t want the same things I do. It’s good to get it out in the open before we take this too far.”

“Are you going to conduct this entire conversation with your eyes closed?”

She nodded.

Now she knew she could hear him smiling. Something about his breathing changed as it moved through curved lips. “You know what I think?” he asked. “I think you’re the one who’s afraid of where this might go.”

“Now you’re just getting desperate,” she said.

“You bet I am. Desperate to have you.”

Her heart thudded in her chest. She’d make a run for it but her knees were weak. She’d probably fall down and then he’d really have her where he wanted her.

Damned if she wasn’t tempted.

“I’m not afraid of… you know,” she said.

“Love?”

“I told you that I thought my mom was right all along.”

“You’re saying you love me?” he asked.

She pinched her lips together and reminded herself about groveling.

He whispered in her ear, sending shockwaves down her spine. “I think you do love me. That’s why you’re here.”

“Big deal. I’ve told you that before.”

“This is different.” His lips grazed her temple.

“Is it?” Her voice sounded too high. “Why, just because we slept together?”

“Because we both wanted it so bad. For so long.” Brushing her hair to one side, he dropped kisses along her neck and pressed his pelvis into hers. The door was as hard as he was. “And still do.”

“I want more than sex.”

“Sure you do.”

“I do.” Opening her eyes, she put her palms on his broad chest and pushed.

He held himself at arm’s length, leaning into her hands, staring at her. “So do I.”

“You want sex and TV and beer and good times,” she said.

“Don’t you?”

“I want more than that.”

“You’re trying to scare me away,” he said. “It’s not going to work.”

“I’m serious, Sly. I want it all. I want all the things you don’t.”

“I’ve been thinking. Marrying you wouldn’t be so bad.”

“Oh, thank you. I’m overwhelmed.”

“And it would be interesting to see what our kids looked like. DNA from so many continents. I wonder if any would be as blond as you.”

Tears were burning in her eyes. “Don’t joke. Don’t.”

He caught her face in his hands. “I’m not joking.” His mocking smile vanished. “I’ve never let myself think about it before. Once I did, I couldn’t stop thinking about it.”

“You’re thirty-five. Pretty late for it to cross your mind.” She broke away from him and stumbled across the room.
Wouldn’t be so bad
, she thought as she picked up her bag. “I’m sure it’ll pass.”

“You’re trying to make this about me,” he said. “But you’re the one who’s afraid. You got hurt before. It’s natural you want to avoid getting hurt again. Which is why I’m going to be patient.”

Sheet music fell out of her open bag. Hands shaking, she scooped up the booklets and shoved them back inside.

Was he right? Was she panicking?

Had he really imagined their children’s faces?

While she dropped more sheet music to the floor, the door flew open and Liam strode in with a garment bag over his shoulder. Trixie’s oldest son and Bev’s husband was taller than Sly. Blond, good-looking, intimidating. A former Olympian, Cleo had heard.

Liam flung his bag onto a chair and turned on Sly. “Just the man I want to see.”

“Liam.” Sly held out his hand. “Nice to see you again. Bev let me in—”

Liam ignored his outstretched hand. “You were there. In Vegas.”

“We both were,” she said quickly.

Liam kept his gaze on Sly. “Last week, your uncle and my mother got married. To each other, in fact.”

Cleo moved to Sly’s side so they could present a unified front. “Don’t worry. They’re not serious.”

One of Liam’s golden eyebrows rose. “Not serious?”

“We think it was just a ruse to get us together,” she said.

Liam’s second eyebrow shot up. “Is that what you think?”

“It was an old Taco Bell,” Sly said. “There was Elvis. Playing a ukulele.”

Liam flinched. “Have you seen them?”

“Not since Las Vegas,” Sly said.

“I was just over at my mother’s house,” Liam said. “Bev told me to go over there from the airport instead of here, saying her piano teacher needed a few minutes alone with Sylly Minguez.”

They didn’t say anything. Cleo could feel her face heating.

“You know who really needed a few minutes alone?” Liam bent over, picked up a pair of blocks, and fit them together. “My mother and her new husband.”

Sly smiled. “Hugo’s over there?”

“Oh, he’s over there. And so’s his recliner, flat-screen TV, and impressive collection of
Star Wars
memorabilia.”

She and Sly exchanged smiles.

“That was fast,” Sly muttered.

“You knew,” Liam continued, his voice flat. “You were at this
wedding
.”

“We were indeed,” Sly said. “Elvis too.”

“You think this is funny?”

“I think it’s great,” Sly said. “And so should you. Hugo is a good guy. Your mom seems to think so too. They deserve to be happy.”

“This isn’t about being happy,” Liam said. “It’s about sneaking around. Did you tell your family about the wedding?”

“Not right away,” Sly said.

“But you told them.”

“They already knew,” Sly said.

“I didn’t,” Liam said. “I would’ve liked to. Did you tell Mark?”

Perhaps out of loyalty to their friendship, Sly didn’t answer.

Cleo didn’t have the same restrictions. “He’s the one who convinced us it was fake.”

“Once we got back home, it didn’t seem real,” Sly added.

Liam set the blocks on top of the piano. “Is your uncle the type of man to go through an actual wedding ceremony for the hell of it?”

Sly cleared his throat. “No.”

“Neither is my mother,” Liam said. “You wouldn’t know that, but Mark should. The woman is obsessed with matrimony. It’s like her religion. She’d never lie about something so important to her.”

They stood there in silence, an awkward trio with sheet music and plastic blocks littering their feet.

“She says I would’ve blamed you,” Liam said. “My mother. She wanted to tell me herself when they got home.”

Cleo and Sly remained quiet.
Ten points for Trixie
, she thought.

“Come on,” Liam said, nodding toward the door. “She’s opened the champagne. We can’t let them drink it all by themselves.”