"You've been lying to me," she says, her voice low with accusation.
"I should've told you I knew Cole."
"Why didn't you?"
"Because it was a long time ago, and by the time I realized he was your ex, it seemed pointless to bring it up. You were trying to forget him and I convinced myself it didn't matter because he was already gone. But the truth is, I'm not proud of what went down between us."
"Start talking. How do you know him? And what the hell happened between you two?"
I bring my hand up to the back of my neck before registering the ache spreading across my fingers. The guy's jaw might as well have been made of fucking steel.
"We went to Milton Prep together," I say, my tone flat. "I was there on grants and scholarships, one of maybe a dozen who didn't come from a rich family. Cole took me under his wing and…we were friends for a while. Until we weren't. We had a falling out."
"Shocking," she says, deadpan. "Let me guess, it was about a girl."
"It was, and it wasn't."
It was about a lot more than a girl, I just hadn't realized it at the time. I allowed my insecurities about being a charity case to grow into a massive chip on my shoulder. Cole bruised my ego and, being the hotheaded kid I was, I let my attempt to get back at him spiral out of control.
Mila watches me in the mirror and I can tell she couldn't care less about a high school feud.
"You two need to grow up," she says. "I can't believe what you did out there. You put me in the middle of a fucking pissing contest on one of the biggest nights of my career."
"I know, I'm sorry—"
"I felt so fucking small." She bites out a laugh. "First Cole showing up with his casual cruelness, like he had no idea what seeing him would do to me. Then Tobias cutting in like I'm some child. Then you, arguing over me like I'm some shiny toy for you to claim."
"I'm sorry," I say again. "You're right. I behaved like a child. I didn't need to use my fists to let your ex know you're with me now."
"I'm not with anyone but myself," she snaps.
I press my lips together, regretting my words, her anger rolling over me like barbed wire. She draws in a steady breath before straightening to take in her appearance. She sighs, her lips turning down, then leans in to inspect her reflection. My gaze lowers to the way her dress clings to her ass as she leans into her reflection.
I get the urge to slide my arms around her middle, to bring her comfort with my touch. The fact I don't is only a testament to her words. She's not mine. Despite the look in her eye on the night we danced like the world belonged to us. She'd leaned into my touch then, but something tells me she'd shrink away from it now.
She's thinking about him and I hate it. It's why I lost my temper when he said what he did. It's the constant question gnawing at the back of my head, whether I'll ever be able to truly drive him out of her mind.
Of course she's not over him. I witnessed first-hand the struggle she's lived to even get to this point. She's never let anyone else in to take his place. She's never given anyone else the chance.
"I've got to go back in," she says.
"Do you really want to go back there?"
"Obviously, I don't. I can barely see straight I'm so goddamn pissed, but it'll look worse if I leave now.""
"Since when do you let yourself feel pressured to do anything you don't want to do, regardless of how it looks?"
She lifts a hand to her forehead. She's tense all over, trying and failing to hide how much seeing her ex has rattled her.
"You're right, it's almost over, anyway. It's not like I need to risk embarrassing myself any further."
I take careful steps over to her, and even when her gaze snaps up to mine again, she doesn't warn me off. I turn her around to face me and run my hands down the sleeves of her dress, the lace prickling my palms.
"Let's go," I say, brushing her hair back behind her ear. "I'll take you home."
"Fine, but just…I need a minute, Andrew."
"I'll be outside."
I step backward toward the door, watching her expression change. Her brows knit together and secrets swim past her eyes.
TWENTY
ANDREW
"MAYBE YOU SHOULD SIT for a minute and cool off some more before you break your house."
Mila ignores me.
A pot of boiling water rattles on the stove. I drum my fingers against the granite of the island countertop, where she banished me after the first time I tried to help.
"I hope you're hungry," Mila says, her expression grave enough to warn me against being anything but.
"I'm starving." I point to the stove. "Are we having a large pot of tea?"
My tone is playful, but she shows no signs of warming up. She slams the refrigerator door shut behind her and walks over to the counter. It's a strange sight. A woman clutching a head of cabbage and a bag of carrots while wearing a gown and five inch heels. She's so lost in thought I don't think she can hear the clacking of her heels on the stone tiles. I doubt she realizes she forgot to take her shoes off. She stormed into the kitchen as soon as we got through the door, mumbling things under her breath. I tried to stay out of her way, but when it became clear she planned on wielding pans around I tried to reason with her and almost lost an eye.
Mila arranges the vegetables on the counter across from me, setting them beside the ingredients she grabbed from the pantry. I have no clue what she's making, but I've never heard of anything good coming from boiled cabbage.
"You know, you don't have to cook, we can order something."
Her eyes snap up at me. "These vegetables will go bad if I don't use them. I've got a new grocery delivery coming next week."
I put my hands up. "Okay, noted. But, could you put the knife down when you talk to me?"
Again, my attempt to make her smile gets no reaction. Her face remains serious as she picks up some potatoes and begins skinning them like they insulted the motherland. She dumps the vegetables inside the boiling water, then pours chicken stock into it as well.
"What is it you're making again?"
She doesn't look when she answers, her eyes trained on the slow chopping of cabbage.
"Red borscht. It's a Ukrainian soup my mom used to make."
"Are you sure you need that much cabbage in it?" I ask before I can stop myself.
She pauses to look at me, eyes narrowed. "Do you have a death wish or something?"
I put my hands up and hold her gaze for a beat before she turns away. She gathers up all the cabbage, heads over to the stove, and glares at me before she dumps it into the soup, daring me to stop her.
The steam from the pot wafts my way as she gives it a stir. Rich herbal scents wash over me with a sweet nostalgia I can't place. It doesn't smell so bad after all.
"I'm not trying to be a smart ass," I say. "I'm just genuinely curious if you always cook with stilettos on? Because that's fucking hot."
Her eyebrows draw in at my question. She stops to glance down at herself then back up at me. I can see she's considering taking her shoes off, but then she looks up at the cabinets and decides not to.
She opens a cabinet, closes it, spins around, and heads back to the pantry. After scanning the shelves for a few seconds, she slams the pantry door shut and heads back to the kitchen cabinets. She blows out a breath to move a strand of hair that fell on her face.
"What are you looking for?" I ask, sensing frustration boiling inside her hotter than the water rattling the pot. Sometimes I wish she would just yell outright, instead of steaming inwardly in an attempt to maintain her composure.
At my question, Mila mutters something that sounds like flour. She begins opening and shutting cabinets with more force than necessary. The last cabinet she shuts, bangs back as though an item shifted out of place. She opens it again and something falls down on the counter and explodes into a cloud of white dust.
"Motherfucker!" Mila screams.
She throws her hands up in the air, shaking with an
ger and sending more flour swirling into the air around her.
I rush over to where she coughs and splutters. Her face, her hair, her dress, everything is covered in flour. Brushing a hand over her face, I wipe away some of the white powder from her eyebrows.
"You found the flour," I whisper.
I pull my lips inward to form a tight line.
"Andrew," she snaps, her eye twitching. "This is not funny."
I nod, mustering a serious expression only because I'm holding my breath. I tuck a white strand of hair behind her ears and stare at her. She has no idea how bad it really is.
"I'm sorry," I say.
Mila sighs and a puff of white lifts from her chest and hovers over our faces. A slow wheeze of laughter escapes me. Just when I think I'm in trouble, a grin splits across her face and laughter erupts from us both at the same time.
We laugh for a long time, me much harder than her. But when our laughter dies out, Mila lifts a strand of her now-gray hair then looks down at the soiled sleeves of her once-beautiful dress.
"What a fucking night," she says, throwing her head back with a groan. "I should go take this dress off."
"I can help with that," I say, but when she squints up at me I pull on an innocent smile.
She lets out another sigh and backs into the counter, her shoulders sagging.
The rejection stings more than it should.
"I'm still mad at you. You know that, right?"
"I know. I meant it when I said I was sorry about tonight," I say. "I'm sorry for not telling you I knew Cole. I'm sorry for the role I played in upsetting you. I just…I don't know where we are, Mila. You and me. It's hard to read you, sometimes. I don't know what you want."
She covers her eyes, mouth opening and then closing again.
I draw in a slow inhale, dreading whatever thoughts are swirling around in her head. I have the strong suspicion I'm not going to like what she's about to say.
"I want everything to go back to the way it was," she blurts out.
My response is a slow blink, my chest rising and falling at steady intervals as silence settles between us.
She goes on before I can speak. "I've been kind of a mess, if you haven't noticed. This time of year…it always screws with my head. If I'd been thinking straight, I wouldn't have kissed you. Because you mean more to me than the mindless urge for physical contact."
I step in front of her, setting my hands on her waist. She shifts and flour dusts the sleeves of my suit. She looks up at me and I wipe more flour from her cheeks. Not that it makes a difference.
"Mila…"
"Drew, we can't do this."
Even before the words leave her lips, my heart begins to race in my chest. I draw my arms around her middle slowly, giving her time to react.
She doesn't pull away.
"Things with you are never easy, Mila. I get that, but I don't care. I don't care if I've got to walk uphill the whole way to make it work. I want you."
The delay in her response weighs heavy in the silence.
"I don't want to lose you," she mutters. "Every relationship I've touched since Cole has turned to dust in my hands. I don't think I know how to give myself to someone again. And I don't want to hurt you."
"You couldn't hurt me, not unless I let you. Look, I know Cole being back is messing with your head. But I'm here, Mila. I've been here this whole time and I'm not walking away now."
"I don't know why I let him get to me like this."
The words are low and fast, like a thought escaping her lips. They weren't meant for me to hear.
"He makes you angry because he's everything you're scared of."
"I'm not scared of him," she argues.
"That's not what I mean," I say. "You're scared of the unknown and the unpredictable. You're scared of who you are around him. You're not yourself."
I lean back to look at her. She nods but remains silent, gaze cast downward. I run my hands over her arms. I ignore the clouds of flour hanging in the air around us. It's strange, but I don't think we could've had this conversation if she weren't covered in white powder.
"I should go clean up," she says.
I take a step back and glance down at my suit, which now matches her dress in patches of white.
"Stay here and keep an eye on the soup. But don't touch it." She blinks up at me all serious-faced for a few seconds, then adds, "Why are you looking at me like that?"
I try not to grin, but the concern on her face is too genuine not to.
"You look like an angry ghost and it's so sexy, it's killing me."
"Are you kidding?" she asks. "This is turning you on? I look like something that's about to be deep fried."
I shrug. "Yeah, I mean, I don't know what else to say. It just works for me."
Her gaze flicks to the ceiling. She points to me, then to the soup. I watch, amused as she turns on her heels and walks away. Wisps of flour follow her movements out of the kitchen. When she disappears down the hall, I roll up my sleeves and get to work cleaning up the mess. It's a task that proves to be tedious and yet, not enough to distract me from the knowledge Mila is currently stripping off her dress just a few rooms away. I ignore the nagging in the pit of my stomach. The one that's been growing since last night when I picked her up from the exhibit.
I can lie to myself as good as the next guy, but there's no escaping a truth that insists on pelting you in the face. It's one thing to not be over your ex, and another to have him actively trying to get you back. It doesn't matter if my ego is bruised that she's not over him—it's not about me anymore. It's about making sure Mila doesn't get sucked into Cole's orbit again. I'd catch a grenade for that woman. I'd let it splinter me if it meant keeping her from getting hurt.
TWENTY-ONE
MILA
THIS IS THE TIME of year I dread the most. Not only is it the anniversary of the wedding I never had, but it's also the anniversary of my mother's death. She passed away three years and a month from the day Cole left.
The events have layered over each other, making it impossible to think of one without thinking of the other. And every year as this week approaches, I'm trapped in a mood I cannot control. It's hard to face the reality of wounds never quite healing.
It's frustrating to accept we only move in circles. I don't want to believe it's true, but every year around this time I begin to see Cole's face in every crowd. I hear my mother's voice in the dead of night. They haunt me together, driving me to obsess over the things I should've said, or the questions I could've asked. And though I've never been able to escape this pattern, or even brace myself for it, I've done this enough to know there's a point where the spell breaks and I'm allowed to repress the memories again and move on. At least for another year.
This year is different. This year Cole's face is no longer a mirage in the crowd. His haunting is no longer a nightmare in the middle of the day. It's real. He's back. He's here.
I wake for the second morning in a row weighed down by bitterness and resentment. There are lots of people I want to blame, but the truth is there's no one to blame but myself. For the last few years, I convinced myself I didn't need answers. It's easy to tell yourself you don't want the things you're sure you'll never have.
And now, as I dress for work, I realize I'm done pretending. I let my pride get in the way for too long. I've never been able to shake off the way I broke down on the phone with Grant all those years ago, begging him between pathetic sobs to tell me what happened. Grant wouldn't tell me, and it felt as though I'd been dropped for a second time in just as many days by yet another man I thought I could trust.
I closed up after that, hating what the pain did to me. I refused to show my weakness to anyone in such a raw way ever again. It was the worst kind of torture, to be surrounded by people who wouldn't tell me what they knew. So I pushed away those I could, and pretended to be okay with those I couldn't.
I ask my driver to take a detour this morning on my ride to work. We get caught up i
n traffic and I sit in silence, plotting the way I will get answers. We ride over the Brooklyn Bridge, leaving the city behind us.
We arrive at our destination, coming to a stop along a street lined with small shops. I find the one with the rose-gold sign and white script lettering.
Bakeology Cafe.
I get out of the car and I'm overcome by the decadent aroma wafting out onto the street. I follow the scent inside, powdered sugar with hints of fruit and vanilla. The smell alone is enough to sag my tense shoulders, but the view inside is a small oasis from the city street.
Slab and cement are replaced by bright and cheerful colors. Sounds of traffic are exchanged with the chatter from customers in a little sitting area across the counter. A long row of tall display cases boasts an impressive array of cakes, pies, donuts, and other pastries.
I move farther inside, catching the attention of a fresh-faced young woman who flashes a huge smile and asks what I would like to order. I start to tell her whom I'm here to see, but a figure at the open doorway to the kitchen catches my attention.
Camille steps behind the counter wearing a white apron. She stops dead when she sees me, both surprise and worry ticking past her face.
"Hi, Camille." I offer a small smile despite losing the warm sensation I got when I first entered the bakery. She looks no better than the last time I saw her. "Can we talk?"
She hesitates before nodding.
"Of course, yeah, come on back."
She glances away and undoes her apron with clumsy hands, setting it somewhere behind the counter. I follow her down a short hall, past where several of her employees mill about, and into a small office with an oversized window overlooking the kitchen.
Camille closes the door behind us and offers me some coffee, which I decline. She then offers me some pastries, which I also decline. She sits on the edge of her desk and crosses her arms as though she's cold.
"Did you go?" she asks, biting at the corner of her mouth.
The question is innocent, but the show of nerves is the only evidence she knows why I came to see her. The whole ride here I'd been assigning blame to Camille for misrepresenting the exhibit to me. After all, hadn't she been the one to tell me it would bring me closure? Hadn't she insisted it would be the best thing I could do?
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