“Jesus. What happened?”
“In- in short,” Trey panted. He stopped and gulped in a breath. “In short I ignored the weather warnings and went out anyway. My car got stuck a couple of miles from here. I called for a tow, but apparently, half the city is under snow and they said it would be hours if they could even get to me before morning. I stayed in the car, idling it for as long as I could, but I only had less than a quarter of a tank and it ran out in an hour. I gave up on the tow and decided to walk. It was only a few miles which wouldn’t have been bad, but I didn’t have boots and I got soaked through right away, there were so much snow and wind. I tried to call you after I tried calling a tow, but my phone died, and I didn’t have a charger in the car.”
Ambi stared at the pathetic sight that was Trey. She should be happy to see him washed in looking like a miserable, drowned rat. She wished she could say that she hoped that he’d contracted pneumonia and died prematurely, but she didn’t wish that at all. Trey’s hands looked painful. His feet might have frostbite. She wouldn’t laugh if he lost a couple of toes at her expense. She wouldn’t laugh at all. Despite everything, she didn’t want Trey to be miserable.
She just wanted him to leave her alone.
Except honestly, she wasn’t even sure she wanted that either. She had been, but now… after two days and two kisses, she had no idea where she stood. She wasn’t as resolute as she should have been. She wasn’t resolute at all.
“You’re an idiot,” she mumbled. “A complete dumb ass. Who drives around in winter with less than a quarter tank and without a survival kit with a candle and a set of warm clothes?”
Trey blinked. Water clung to his eyelashes, starring them above his ridiculously gorgeous jade eyes. He looked pathetic, but still unfortunately gorgeous.
“You’re right.” He shrugged. “It was stupid. All of it. I shouldn’t have come.”
“No. You shouldn’t have.” It occurred to her that now that he was there, Trey was likely there for the night. She wasn’t going to send him back out into the cold. Getting a cab would likely be impossible until the streets were plowed, and she wouldn’t fare any better in her car than he had in his. “You shouldn’t have.”
She debated about making him sleep in the office overnight. The floor would be good enough for him. It was better than being out in the blizzard. Really, that’s all he should hope for. He could get his rich daddy to send a freaking driver to come pick his ass up sometime between now and morning, plowed be damned. Maybe they could land a helicopter or their private jet on the top of the building.
Ambi winced internally at herself. She was being petty. She knew it, but she just couldn’t help it. She was ten seconds away from telling Trey to make himself at home before she bolted up the stairs to her own comfy apartment, but then a big glop of snow melted off his hair and ran down his face like a really unfortunate bird shit or a raw egg.
She was horrified to find a smile playing over her lips. God, she’d pay money to see Trey get shit on by a bird. She wondered if she could find one for hire.
“You better come up.” She pointed to the ceiling. “I live up there, but then again, you probably know that given that you stalked me. You must have. You have my private cell number.”
Trey tried to muster up his signature smirk, but instead, his lips wobbled, and his teeth knocked together loudly as a violent shiver swept through him.
“Anyway. I don’t want to be the one responsible for you getting pneumonia or something. Two wrongs don’t make a right and two turds don’t make anything good. We’ve already decided that you’re a turd. I don’t want to be a turd. I want to be the better person. So- if you- can- uh- promise me a truce, I’ll make you a cup of mint tea and you can get out of those wet clothes.”
Trey groaned. “You k-know I h-h-hate mint tea.” He had trouble with the words, given that he was shivering so hard that his whole body was shaking.
Ambi grinned wickedly. “I know no such thing. You know, I don’t remember much of anything at all from when we went out. It was such a long time ago and it wasn’t very long or meaningful. When you ended things, I just kind of forgot about all of it. What I did remember, I viewed as kind of a really low point in my life, so I tried to block out as much as I possibly could.”