“Yeah,” he muttered.
“What’s going on?” Duncan demanded.
Chloe lost her mood and smiled happily at Duncan. “Oh, it’s the sweetest thing in the world, Bowie.”
Then she launched in.
Judge caught Genny watching him.
She lifted her brows.
He shook his head.
She sighed, but she did it on a small smile.
Then they all listened to Chloe’s sharing.
Rix
Five and a half hours later…
* * *
“Hey,” he called.
He knew it before he saw it.
But Alex lifted her head from his chest, trying to hide her hand dashing tears from her eyes.
“Babe, give it up. They soaked through my shirt round the time she went back to that school,” he informed her.
Those eyes darted to his.
Tears in them, the green seemed more green, the brown almost amber.
So totally the prettiest eyes he’d ever seen.
“Tell me you liked it,” she urged quietly.
The Queen’s Gambit binge was over.
“I wasn’t sure what your deal was with that show, but the last episode payoff was massive.”
A huge smile split her face.
Rix pulled her up his chest and kissed it.
She tensed at first, then released and relaxed into him.
And his kiss.
He ended it and shared, “Tuesday, I’m grabbing El Gato and going to yours.”
“Okay,” she whispered.
“I’m spending the night.”
Her eyes got big.
“We’re not fucking.”
Her brows dropped and she rubbed her lips together.
“Taking it slow.”
She stopped rubbing her lips together and repeated, “Okay.”
“Now, you need to go home, because you smell good and your hair’s fuckin’ fantastic and that dress has been doing a number on me all night so I want you in my bed tonight. If you don’t go, I’m gonna see what it would take to get you to agree to stay.”
She bit her lip.
He watched and muttered, “Right.”
Then he did an ab curl, and in a couple more moves, they were both up.
His legs made it known it was time to remove his prosthetics.
He ignored that.
He also ignored the fact that in her bed on Tuesday, she’d see.
He never wore anything but pants and jeans.
So she’d not only see the prosthetics.
She’d see the stumps.
Yeah, he ignored that and walked her to the car.
He kissed her, closed mouth, and not for long, because if she started in, with the generosity of her little tongue, she wouldn’t be going home.
Rix held the door while she folded in.
She gave him a cute wave and a little smile before she pulled out.
He watched her go.
He watched even after she was long gone.
And then he muttered, “You’re a dick, Hendrix,” to the dark street.
He knew he was.
Because he knew it.
He knew it was over even before his father mentioned the name Elsa Cohen.
He knew it when it was a physical feeling, watching her expertly lower herself into the cockpit of her kayak.
He knew it when she gave in on the oatmeal cookies.
He knew it when she got pissed at Brian.
He knew it when she texted about him meeting her friends.
He knew it when he saw that binder.
He even knew it when he heard someone coming, and then she rounded the rocks on that trail in Cali, the sun shining on her hair, making the red come out, the startled, bashful look on her pretty face.
He knew.
He definitely knew it now, The Queen’s Gambit payoff.
The girl, quirky and bright and gifted, alone in the world.
Adrift.
No anchor.
But chess.
And then, suddenly, she realizes that she hasn’t been alone for a long time.
That precisely because she was quirky and bright and gifted, she’d earned respect and a whole lot of love along the way.
Yeah, after that, he knew it for certain.
Still, he wasn’t gonna do dick about it.
Because she was Alex.
And he was Rix.
And they might not have a lot of time together.
But he was going to give her everything he had to give.
Until it was over.
Chapter 13
The Pep Talk
Alex
“Don’t even start with me.”
I stared at Gal on my phone, because she answered my FaceTime call like that.
Therefore, for obvious reasons, I asked, “What?”
“This play of calling me instead of Kate, because you know Kate is going to encourage you to go for it with Rix tonight, rather than backing off what the two of you agreed this weekend, and you think I won’t. You think I’ll talk you out of it. And you’re grasping for reasons not to go for it.”
I was rethinking how open I was with my girls and how much I loved them in my life.
At least I was rethinking that about Gal.
“Huh” was all I could say.
“Yeah,” she agreed.
“So, that means you’re not going to talk me out of being a couple with limits with Rix?”
There you go.
I was too open with my girls.
Last night in an epic Zoom session, I told them both all about it.
Including the fact I was having second thoughts about doing it.
Because, away from the mind-muddying presence of Rix, I wasn’t certain it was that good of an idea.
“I’m going to tell you what you won’t believe,” Gal began. “And I know that, because I told you all this last night. But apparently, you refused to listen to me.”