Weekend Wife (Sassy in the City 1)

“As a side note, I defied my parents and found Rose living in Florida with her adult son. I booked myself a first-class ticket out of LaGuardia with my father’s credit card and flew down there for Christmas break. I did that every year through middle school and high school and they never said shit about it.” The memory did make me smile. “Rose made me chocolate chip pancakes every Christmas morning.”

Leah’s face softened as she realized now why I’d started coming to the diner. “Oh. That sounds like a wonderful way to spend Christmas.”

I’d sliced open my chest and shown Leah my heart. Yes, she was gazing at me like she wanted to scoop up the little boy that I’d been and hug me. But there was also admiration in her expression. And neither of those responses made me uncomfortable. I didn’t want to toss off an asshole comment and shut down the conversation.

I trusted her.

It was a fantastic feeling.

Which meant I needed to tell her I was intending to tear down the theater she loved if I wanted any chance of this being something.

But later.

After we got back from the Hamptons.

“It was.” I kissed her knuckles and stepped back. “Now how about that drink?”

She pursed her lips together, like she was going to say something else.

I waited, tense.

But she just smiled. “I’m not packing your stuff. Don’t think I am.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it. I am perfectly capable of packing for myself. Loner, remember?” I gestured around my apartment. “I take care of myself.”

Leah’s eyebrows shot up. “You clean your own apartment?”

Well. “Okay, so not that. I have a cleaning service. But, I make my own bed. Does that count for anything?”

“I’m impressed.” Leah moved to the doorway. She turned, hair spilling down her back, her lean legs still bare beneath her sweatshirt. “I like talking to you. Just in case you were wondering.”

My gut clenched. “I like talking to you too.”

The rest of the night we stuck to banter, with Leah extolling the virtues of why she loved the movie Overboard as she stood in my closet and watched me pack. “How can anyone not love Goldie Hawn?”

“I do appreciate Goldie Hawn.” There was no way in fucking hell I was going to admit I’d gone home after work that day she’d explained her “Hi, Grant!” routine and had watched the movie. Nope. Never going to happen.

“How is it her character is such a bitch in the beginning but you still just find her hilarious?” Leah was sitting on the closet floor leaning against the doorframe. Her knees were up and tucked under her sweatshirt. Occasionally she would reach out and touch the hem of one of my pairs of pants that were hanging to the left of her.

“I don’t know. Good acting, I guess.” I opened the drawer that housed my socks and pulled out what was necessary. It felt intimate as hell to have her watching me pack. Plenty of women had seen me unpack in a hotel room, but no one had been in my closet while I packed.

At least Leah wouldn’t be lying about half the things she might say to my parents. She probably knew more about me than ninety-five percent of people in my life.

That thought had me slamming the drawer shut.

Now that was a fucked-up statement.

At least I could reassure myself she knew nothing about my work. It seemed important that I remain elusive on some level otherwise I’d really be in trouble.

Again, a fucked-up statement.

“Do you think it’s possible to forgive someone for lying about something as huge as who you are? Like she forgives Kurt Russell even though he gave her a completely false identity in order to have her clean his house. Could you forgive someone for that?”

That was a hell of a lie. “My gut reaction is hell no. How about you?”

“I don’t know. It depends on the context.”

Maybe she would forgive me then for withholding the information that I was trying to buy the theater. To tear it down. That wasn’t horrible in the grand scheme of things. More like an omission, not an actual lie.