Bauer, for me to go anywhere with him that involved sharing the same roof.
Now I was thinking about Finn. Because he would’ve been polite and sweet. Unassuming. He would’ve taken my bag and called me Claire, and it would be comforting because I knew what to expect from him.
As Isabel asked Bauer some questions about snowboarding, and he gave me a tiny wink, my head and my heart were screaming at me not to leave this apartment with him.
Instincts were blaring like a tornado siren. My hand tightened around the handle of my backpack until my fingers started tingling from loss of blood flow.
I couldn’t do this.
If I wasn’t capable of one full evening around him, one full evening of pretending to be my sister, I definitely couldn’t do this for an entire night. With him.
“And you have good snow tires?” Paige asked him. “Because you might encounter bad weather.”
“That’s going north of them,” Isabel said. “Ignore her, Bauer. She’s like this with all of us.”
Bauer set a hand on his chest. “My Jeep can handle anything, I promise. I have excellent tires.”
“Do you mind if I quickly grab a picture of your driver’s license?” Paige continued. “Just … in case.”
He tilted his head. “Umm, yes?”
“Why? Something to hide?”
“Okay,” I interjected. “Paige, I think he gets the picture.”
“Believe me,” Bauer said seriously, “I’m well aware of how precious my cargo is.”
I rolled my eyes.
Paige, however, looked pleased. “You’re damned right.”
Setting a hand on my sister-in-law’s shoulder, I squeezed in warning. “Thank you, Paige.”
I gave her a look.
She gave me one right back.
If we didn’t leave soon, she’d pull a shotgun out of thin air and start cleaning it in front of him.
“Ready?” I asked Bauer.
His wide grin held the slightest secret edge to it that was meant only for me. It made my heart race inexplicably. My head was still screaming in warning.
“Let’s go, princess. I’ve been ready since last night.”
CLAIRE
The drive from my apartment to Richard’s place in Vancouver was roughly two and a half hours. I learned a few things in that relatively short span of time.
1- You could stare at the breathtaking scenery for most of it and live in abject denial about what was waiting for you upon our arrival to Richard’s place. Memorize entire mountain ranges, each craggy, uneven peak, and imagine it to such detail that if you actually knew how to do something like … paint or draw, you’d spend those two and a half hours thinking about how you’d paint or draw them.
2- Bauer was, regrettably, a very good singer. He favored classic rock and alternative as his music of choice, and it took everything in me not to jam my fingers in my ears as he sang along. His voice was low and smooth without frills or fancy embellishments, but it made the hair on the back of my neck rise, and therefore, I didn’t like it.
3- He was also freaking relentless in trying to engage me in conversation even though I was doing my very best at ignoring his existence until I had no other choice. It took until the last thirty minutes of our drive before I finally cracked.
“So, princess, when did we start dating?”
Ignoring the unsteady gallop of my heart when he asked that, I kept my voice even and emotionless every time he asked me something that I felt forced to answer.
“Let’s go with six months.”
“Six months, it is,” he agreed easily.
Two songs later—songs he knew the harmony to—he tried again.
“What changed?”
Tearing my eyes away from the mountains, I begrudgingly let my gaze turn in his direction. Which was a mistake, because Bauer, in the shirt and the jeans and the hat, with that scenery and that dark hair along his jaw, was like something ripped out of
Rugged Man Magazine, and I was not here for that.
Not here for it.
At all.
He gestured back and forth between us when I didn’t say anything. “Between us. What changed? Six months ago, I mean.”
My mouth fell open. “I-I don’t know. Does it matter?”
Bauer’s shrug was careless. “Yeah, it matters. If I’m hanging out with a couple who interests me, and I start asking them questions about their relationship, I’d want to know what changed, considering we’ve known each other for years.”
“Well,” I hedged, “you and I just … I don’t know …”
“Thank you for proving my point about why we need an answer.”
I gave him a look. “I’d bet ten bucks that he won’t ask what changed between me and you.”
“Me and Lia,” he corrected lightly. “Remember?”
Swallowing, I nodded. “Right. You and Lia.”
“I mean, there must have been one moment,” he said. “Maybe you were spending the night.”
I closed my eyes. I didn’t want to play this game with him. Didn’t want to imagine whatever he had in his head because it was probably vivid. “I thought you never went home.”
“Rarely,” Bauer conceded. “They don’t exactly roll out the welcome mat for me.”
Staying quiet felt like a safer choice because my options were either contribute to the little story he was concocting or allow him to spin a tale of his own making.
“So I probably snuck in late since I needed a place to stay.” He tapped his thumb on the wheel, and the sun glinted off the solid silver ring he was wearing. “You couldn’t sleep, so I found you in the kitchen, staring into the fridge.”
Carefully, I tucked my knees up to my chest and hugged my arms around my legs. I didn’t want to imagine this. Because it suddenly, somehow seemed so much worse if he was placing Lia into his mind, instead of me.
My safe choice didn’t feel so safe anymore.
“No one will ask this,” I said quietly.
Bauer ignored me. “Maybe you offered me a drink because you were going to have one. One turned to two. Just enough that you were willing to lower your defenses around me, princess. First time you ever did that, I’m thinking.”
New Book: Back Home to Marry Off Myself
Loredana’s father left the family for his mistress, leaving them to fend for themselves abroad. When life was at its toughest, her father showed up with “good news” after 8 years of absence: To marry off Loredana to a paralyzed son of the wealthy Mendelsohn family.