“Why not?” he asks, simply.
I can see in his eyes he doesn’t accept this as a firm no. He wants to find out my reasons so he can refute all of them, talk me right out of my good sense. I know his game. I desperately wish I could throw caution to the wind and get swept up in him tonight, but it’s not worth the cost. No matter how much I want to say yes, I need to say no.
“You know why,” I answer vaguely. “We both know why.” I hear the resignation in my own tone, so he must hear it, too. “The answer is no, Rafe.”
He watches me for a moment, studying, taking the temperature of my refusal. His eyes drift away to our empty glasses on the table. He eyes mine the longest, then looks back at me, the corners of his mouth tipped up, but an unconvincing measure of amusement in his eyes.
“I should have kissed you,” he states.
Offering back a faint smile of my own, I pat his hand. “It’s good that you didn’t.”
He lets me scoot away, but I can see he’s none too thrilled. “I’m getting a bit tired of this dry spell,” he says, almost conversationally.
I pause as I get to my feet in front of the booth, smoothing the back of my dress down and glancing back at him.
Since I don’t speak, he continues. “I’ll call a car to take you home. I think I’m going to hang out here a bit longer.”
The feeling inside like my rib cage is collapsing in on itself is all the proof I need that this night was a bad idea. Countless times Rafe has brought countless women to the restaurant, and knowing he was going home with them has never felt like this—not even the first time. But now, because he has snuggled me in his fucking booth, because he has touched me, even tasted me, now when he tells me he is going to fuck someone else… well, now it’s collapsing rip cages and my heart tumbling from its cavity into a scorching sea of acid.
I’ve never in my entire life been threatened into having sex, and I can’t believe I’m considering changing that right now.
That’s not fair. I know he doesn’t mean it as a threat. It’s a warning. There’s a difference. He isn’t trying to force me to change my mind, he’s only being fair, paying me the courtesy of honesty, giving me a choice. I have played the part of his date tonight, I’ve turned him on enough that he wants someone to go home with, and now I’m telling him no. Like a tease. Rafe doesn’t play with teases. I’ve seen a couple girls think they could dangle the prize and get him to chase them, and I’ve watched them lose his interest instantly when they tried to play that game.
That is not my motive, not even remotely, but the result is the same regardless. Rafe wants to fuck someone, and if I’m unwilling to be that someone, the pretty little Russian who eyed him up like a juicy steak will surely accept the invitation.
I realize I’ve been standing here for too long. Quiet for too long. The glint in Rafe’s eyes changes, becomes a little more guarded. That knocks even more wind out of me than the heart-eating acid situation, so I force myself into action.
I nod my head, even though my chest feels tight and my lungs can’t draw enough air. “Okay. Actually, um, I can call my own car, so you don’t have to worry about that. Thank you for bringing me out tonight. I had a really nice time.”
Before I fall to pieces over one thing or another, I offer a tepid smile, grab my purse, and make my way toward the front door. My legs feel unsteady, the heels too high, and my inside are quaking, but I tell myself it’s fine. It’s fine, it’s fine, it’s fine. It has to be fine, because I’m the one that made this decision. He just took me out and invited me to spend the night with him, and once more, I said no.
It’s too late to be weak and say yes. I can’t go back now. Pride isn’t even the whole problem, it’s just common sense. It’s only possible to be trapped in a situation before you’ve left it. It’s only possible to give into a moment when you’re still in that moment.
The moment has passed, and going back to that table now wouldn’t be a moment of weakness or a bad decision made in the heat of the moment—it would be a choice.
If I thought there was even a slim chance he would come to me tomorrow wanting more, wanting a relationship, maybe I could make that choice.
But if he wanted that, he wouldn’t have just told me if I didn’t get him off, someone else would.
My shoulders sag with the weight of reality, but this is my fault for allowing myself to get swept up in him. Rafe has never misled me about who he is or what he wants. I’ve told him I enjoy being single too, so he probably suggested we could hook up because he thinks neither of us wants a relationship.
Rafe is completely honest about who he is, and I’m not going to be the idiot girl who lies to herself and sets herself up for disappointment.
I’m going to be the idiot girl who goes home alone, then lies awake imagining him fucking someone else.
Hooray for good fucking decisions.
7
Rafe
Christmas Eve.
It’s been ages since I last spent one in Vegas. As soon as my mother could conceivably leave town after my father’s death, she did. She hasn’t been back since. Not for a birthday, a holiday, a surprise—there’s nothing that can get her to step foot back in Nevada, and the birth of my son combined with Christmas is no exception.
Ordinarily, kids don’t factor into my holiday plans, so I go to Florida and spend the holiday with my mom. Rather, I spend the holiday on the beach, and who the hell can complain about that?
Now that Laurel is irrevocably tied to Vegas and I’m irrevocably tied to her, I suppose I’ll be spending the rest of my Christmases here. Sin has family in California, but they’re a bunch of self-righteous assholes, so I don’t see them carting Nicholas and Skylar off to Cali for holidays. Sin isn’t the type who needs people in his life if they don’t like him, and Laurel isn’t the type to force him just because they’re family.