“Yeah, I did, didn’t I?” She grabbed a tissue, shaking her head as she walked into her bedroom. “Give me a second to throw some clothes on.”
He nodded. Clothes were definitely a good idea. “I’ll be right here.”
Smiling, she shut the door. When she came out a minute or two later, she wore a skimpy pair of pajamas that barely covered her ass. “I thought you were getting dressed,” he said drily.
“I did.” She glanced down with a wrinkled brow. “I’m going to have a drink. You’re not getting one. You had enough earlier.”
“Yes, mother.” He followed her, dragging a hand through his hair as he watched her walk. She was always so graceful. Even when rocked by something strong enough to make her cry, she managed to keep her beauty and grace with each step she took. “I didn’t want one anyway.”
“Too much already?” she asked, peeking over her shoulder at him.
Lifting a shoulder, he leaned against the entrance to the kitchen. “Maybe. Maybe not. I’ll tell you in the morning.”
Instead of laughing, as he’d expected, she frowned, way too somber for his own liking. She watched him as if she knew all his deepest, darkest secrets…and didn’t judge him one little bit. But she didn’t. Couldn’t. He went to great lengths to hide how messed up he was from everyone.
Especially her.
She turned away and lifted the lid off the glass container in her kitchen, and he let out a sigh of relief. It had cupcakes in it. It always did. As if owning a bakery wasn’t enough for her, she also felt the need to bake at home. It was her way of self-soothing.
He drank and fucked. She baked things.
Not all that different, really.
“Do you ever worry you don’t have your life as together as you might hope?” she asked, her voice distracted and shaky. “That every choice you make is only messing it up even more, until it’s a tangled mess you’ll never recognize?”
“Every damn day,” he admitted, even though he didn’t want to. But he refused to lie to her, even if he couldn’t stand the idea of her discovering he wasn’t the strong, resilient man she thought he was. The type of guy she could call on nights like these.
Even if he could never call her his.
Chapter Four
When someone broke into her house while she was naked in the shower, and scared half a year off of her life, obviously the first person Lauren called had been Steven. And when the door shut behind her intruder, and she poked her head out, and the only stuff missing had been the stuff she laid out for Brian…
Yeah, she’d put two and two together pretty quickly.
But by then Steven was at her door, and about to come in, and she’d had little to no time to recover from the scare. And when he’d hugged her tight, concern etched all across his handsome face…an idea had come to her.
One that, once planted, had been impossible to ignore.
Earlier, she wished there was a way to make sure he was okay. To make him remember the good things in his life. This was the opportune chance to do that, up close and personal. If he thought she was still scared, or was shaken up, he would never leave her side. It would give her the opportunity to remind him how fun life could be…
If you were with the right person.
So she rolled with it. Maybe she over-acted on some points, but it had worked. He was here, and she was here, and now all she needed was a game plan of fun.
But despite her excitement at this opportunity, she couldn’t ignore one cold, hard fact: for the first time in their relationship, she lied to him. And if he found out…
God, he could never find out.
She, more so than anyone, understood his hatred of liars. It stemmed from childhood, when his parents had lied about being happy but had been sleeping with other people behind each other’s backs, and continued throughout his adult years. It continued when his one and only girlfriend as an adult had done the same thing to him.
He couldn’t abide lies of any kind.
She’d seen him walk away from friendships over them.
Up until a few moments ago, Lauren hadn’t had a reason to worry. Now, she did. It was a small lie. More a lie by omission than anything else. Brian had come in, and she had been scared…for a second or two. She took a deep breath, staring down at the red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese frosting and red sprinkles as if they held the secrets of the world. They didn’t. She’d know, since she’d made them. They were just cupcakes, and she was just her, and Steven was just…
Steven was just Steven.