But she knew it wasn’t just a business dinner. She knew it was more. And she knew she wanted to do it again. She wanted to sit with Rafael. And talk with him. Lean her head against his shoulder. Touch her skin to his. The way she felt when she was with Rafael was so different from how she felt with Tim. The spark, the zing. The freedom.
Nina pulled up the web browser on her phone and Googled her name and Rafael’s together. The first thing that popped up was a photograph of the two of them, holding hands and running toward the kitchen at the Dublin Pub. She was looking at him, and he was glancing at her over his shoulder. There were grins on both of their faces.
She clicked on the photograph, and a headline came up: The Princess and the Politician: How Long Have They Been Together? Then underneath that photo was a smaller one of the hug that Samira had tweeted the night of the primary. Rafael’s eyes were closed, his cheek against Nina’s hair. And her arms were so tight around Rafael’s back that her fingers made dimples in his suit jacket. God, was that what they’d looked like? No wonder Tim was so upset. But honestly, why couldn’t the media have just left them alone? Why did anyone care?
Nina went back to the Google search list and clicked on another news outlet. The same original photo was there, the one of them racing into the kitchen, but then next to it was a picture from that ages-ago spread of Nina’s parents in People. This headline said: Rafael O’Connor-Ruiz Looks at Nina Just Like Joseph Gregory Looked at Phoebe. Nina inspected the photo, the expression on Rafael’s face, on her dad’s. And it was true. The awed, amused, adoring look was there for the world to see. Jesus.
Nina’s phone chimed. It was Rafael.
Jane just sent me the links, he wrote. It’s more than Twitter. We’re all over the Internet. I’m really sorry.
Nina stared at her phone. She didn’t know how to respond. This was why her father had created the headline game. This was the worst-case scenario. She opened up the last conversation she had with him. I could use some help here, Dad, she thought. You, too, Mom.
She scrolled through their last weeks of texts, looking for inspiration. How would he have fixed this? What would he have said to create the least amount of damage? She wished she could ask him what to do. And at the same time, she was almost glad he wasn’t here to see his daughter disappoint him so publicly.
Nina pulled a tissue from her purse and tried to blot the tears threatening to overflow her lower lashes. She took a deep breath. Rocks, she thought. Pigeons. Turtles. Grapefruits.
* * *
• • •
Nina had gotten her emotions under control by the time the cab pulled up to Tim’s building. The external could be fixed with a press release from the campaign and an announcement of her and Tim’s engagement. If that was what she wanted. But the internal. The feelings she had when she was with Rafael. That was so much harder to figure out.
Nina took the elevator up to Tim’s floor. She could’ve opened his apartment door with her key but felt like she shouldn’t. He’d seemed so upset. So she knocked.
Tim opened the door. “You don’t let yourself in anymore?” he asked.
Nina sighed. Already she’d done the wrong thing. “I didn’t want to surprise you,” she said.
“You mean like how you surprised me by making bedroom eyes at that politician?”
“I wasn’t—” Nina knew getting defensive wouldn’t help, but it was hard not to when Tim was on the attack. This wasn’t a side of him she saw often, but she knew it existed. She’d seen it directed at other people before, but never at her. She took a deep breath. “May I come in?” she asked.
Tim stepped aside. She walked in and sat down on the couch. Tim sat on the love seat, across from her. His body was rigid.
“I really don’t know what to make of this. I know you said you weren’t cheating on me, but it sure as hell looks like you were. That hug picture from primary night. The way you looked at him. What’s going on, Nina? Do you know what your father would’ve said about this? About these headlines?”
Nina took a deep breath. She knew. Of course she knew. And she also knew that Tim didn’t believe her. She could tell. He’d chosen the press over her. And he knew just what to say to cut her deeply. He’d hurt her on purpose. It took a lot to get Nina to show her anger. An anonymously quoted source, someone who worked for the Gregory Corporation, once described her father as a “slow burn”; he wasn’t easy to anger, but once he did, watch out. Nina thought that wasn’t quite right. He was like her. The anger was there, but it was controlled. It took a lot for her and her father to let their emotions show. The feelings had to seem justified, the repercussions worth the expression. Nina clenched her fists to keep herself in check.
“I’m going to say it again,” she told Tim. “The media’s wrong.”
“But that hug picture—” he protested.
“Was just a hug,” Nina said. “On primary night. We were all happy. He hugged me. The end.”
“But his face—”
“I can’t control his face,” Nina said. “And the fact that you’re blaming me for his expression is inane. Do you hear yourself?”
Tim had the grace to look embarrassed. “What about tonight, then?”
This was the harder part to explain. “Tonight . . . he asked me for help with a speech. I told you that. So I went over. Mostly because I wanted to feel like myself for a little while. And after we worked for a few hours, we were hungry, so we went to get a burger next door at the Dublin Pub. A business dinner. Like people have when they work together. I assume that photographer had told the restaurants near the office that he’d pay for tips, if Rafael ever came in alone with a woman, and he did, and the photographer came. And so we ran into the kitchen.”
Tim looked visibly calmer now. “So it really was innocent? Nothing happened between the two of you?”
Nina wished she had a glass of water. Or wine. Or anything, really. Something to sip, to give her time to think while she swallowed.
“Nothing physical happened,” Nina said, not wanting to lie to Tim, answering what she’d wished he asked.
Tim blanched. “What does that mean?”
“I’m sorry,” Nina said. “After that, we were running, and holding hands, and talking on a bench along the river. And I didn’t kiss him, we didn’t do anything—but, Tim, I wanted to.” She bit her lip to keep it from trembling. In admitting this, she felt like a failure. Like she wasn’t strong enough. Like she was a kid again and her father was telling her not to cry in front of the guests, but she couldn’t stop the flow of tears. And she knew telling the truth like this would hurt Tim, which she never wanted to do. But after finding out so many of her father’s secrets, she didn’t want to keep any of her own. Not any longer.
“But you didn’t,” Tim said. He was cooling down. “You’re just colleagues.”
Was Tim telling himself a story? Purposefully misunderstanding her?
“Did you hear me?” Nina asked, hating to repeat it. “I just told you I wanted to kiss someone else.”
Tim rubbed his hands along the thighs of his jeans. “It’s okay. I want to kiss other women, too, sometimes. But I don’t. I’m not really worried about you wanting to kiss someone else as long as you don’t actually do it.”
Nina looked at him now. His hair slightly out of place, as if he’d been raking his hands through it. His beard neatly trimmed.
“Wait, you want to kiss other women?” Nina asked. “Legitimate people you know, or celebrities? Like, how you’ve had a crush on Anna Paquin since she played Polexia Aphrodisia in Almost Famous?”
Tim sat up a little straighter. “Are we being completely honest?” he asked.
“Of course,” Nina said. Why would he even need to ask if they were being honest? She thought about last night, when he came over and said he needed to remember that he loved her. Did something happen then that he’d kept secret? Was he afraid of his feelings for someone else, too?
“You know Casey from my office? The one with really long hair who heads up the team of web designers?” Tim said, slowly, as if the confession was costing him something, but it was something he was willing to pay to make things right with Nina. “I wouldn’t mind kissing her.”
Nina was quiet.
“I haven’t,” Tim said quickly. “But you said to be honest, and if we’re being honest, I wouldn’t mind. That’s why it’s okay if you want to kiss Rafael. It’s normal. Just . . . you know, there’s a difference between wanting and doing.”
Nina took a deep breath. Was it normal? She swallowed hard. She knew that what she was going to say next had the ability to explode their world. “Maybe we should do it,” she said. “Maybe both of us should, if that’s what we want.”
Tim stood up and sat down next to Nina. “Wait, no,” he said, grabbing her hand. “That’s not what I meant. I don’t want to date Casey. I don’t want a future with Casey. I want a future with you. Everything’s going to be better soon. Once we get married. And you’re on the board of the Gregory Corporation. And we have kids. And I can be CEO after my dad retires. Everything will be perfect.”