Say Yes

Damn. Macks really has gotten under my skin.

When we’d been together in high school, she had constantly reminded me there were more important things than money. Not because of anything she said, but just because of who she was. Macks had been the most important thing to me back then; I would’ve thrown my entire fortune away for her. At least, until my mother died and everything changed.

To her surprise—and possibly my own if I cared to think about it—I dipped my fingers in the paint and, locking eyes with Mackenzie, flung a large gob against the wall. “Damn, will you look at that? Now I made a real mess, all on my own.”

Before Mackenzie could process that, I stood up, smearing a healthy glob of bright green acrylic on her nose.

Her eyes widened more, as though I had grown two heads, or maybe a fifth limb. Her surprise only lasted a few seconds though. Then a wicked gleam flashed in her emerald eyes as she realized I’d started a war—and she had all the ammunition.

I darted out of the way as, lightning fast, she reached down to dip her fingers into the same mess of paint I had and chased me around the art space.

“Get back here!”

I laughed. “Not a chance, sweetheart!”

We darted around the plethora of paintings that Mackenzie had managed to muster up, laughing as we covered each other with splats of paint and near misses. I was careful to avoid getting paint on any of her projects. I actually would’ve felt worse about those than the floor. If anything in this room besides Macks herself could be called priceless, it was the beautiful shit that came out of her mind, channeled through a paintbrush.

Mackenzie managed to get a couple of good swipes across my chest; I got paint in her hair before we ended up colliding, collapsing to the ground in a heat of sweat, paint, and laughter.

“Your suit is all dirty,” she said, snickering.

“It’ll wash out,” I said. “And if it doesn’t then, fuck it. I have other things t

o wear.”

She gave me a puzzled look.

“What?” I asked, flopping onto my back with my arms around her.

“You,” she said. “You’ve changed so much since I first saw you in your office. It’s like a whirlwind.”

“How do you mean?”

She leveled a look at me. “Well for starters, when I first moved in, you were super uptight.”

“I was not.”

“Was so.”

“Agree to disagree?”

“You have a complete organization system for your ties,” she deadpanned.

“Okay. Fair point.”

A laugh bubbled from her chest, and I wrapped my arms tighter around her, enjoying the feel of her good humor.

“You just… I dunno. You’ve matured so much since high school. Which I like! But it’s nice seeing you have fun again, too. I like you when you’re having fun. It’s like… back then.”

She didn’t have to explain. I understood the feeling. It was like the best parts of our relationship all those years ago. Back when things really were carefree and our lives weren’t complicated by fake marriages and strings-attached inheritances and struggles to prove ourselves in our chosen lines of work.

Fuck. We really had gone down the rabbit hole together. This whole situation was beyond insane.

But right now, I didn’t care about any of that. I didn’t care about the circumstances that had brought us back together, that had put Mackenzie under the same roof as me, that had left us both on this messy marble floor covered in paint.

She was here. In my arms.

That was all that mattered.