Her nose curled up a little as her head barely tipped to the side, as if she didn’t quite believe me and was searching for something. A question piqued her gentle smile, before she turned her attention back to the fleeting white dotting the sky.
I wondered if she could she see it in me the same way I’d seen it in her, if she knew in that moment she’d unlocked something in me and I’d never be the same.
She stole one last glance at the fluttering sky. “We’d better grab a cab or we’re going to be late.”
I shook myself off. “Yeah. You ready for this?”
Light laughter tipped from Elizabeth’s mouth, the sound echoing in the stiff winter air. “No, not at all.”
I came in close to her side, smiled down at the girl I loved. “Me neither.”
Chapter Nine
Elizabeth
The hushed winter pressed down from above. Flurries danced as they fell. Expanding my lungs with a breath of freezing cold air, I struggled to quell the hammer knocking against my ribs, sought the peace found in the beauty of this night sky.
Christian’s fingers brushed down the inside of my arm before he wound them at the crook of my elbow. His fingertips pulsed twice at the sensitive spot, as if tapping out a message, before they settled and found a secure hold burrowed in my skin.
A flit of uncontained nerves rose as goose bumps along my flesh, and I bit at my lip to cover my reaction. I didn’t know if I could ever feel better than I did right then. A sense of awe sank down deep into my bones, softening the reservations I had about agreeing to attend this dinner with Christian. Never before had I seen snow. The spots where it had fallen and melted against my skin still stung and burned, but the memory covered me like an embrace.
But it was Christian’s touch that had my head spinning.
I guess when I’d agreed to this dinner, I thought we’d fight to get back to the place where we were just friends. I thought we’d shove our feelings down like we’d been doing for so long, that those feelings would fester and grow until we found ourselves in a situation so much like the one we’d been in last Friday night.
I peeked up at him just as he looked down to catch my wondering gaze. One side of his mouth lifted, his eyes soft as they traced my face, and he squeezed my arm a little tighter.
Going back didn’t seem to be a part of Christian’s intentions.
Something had changed from the moment Christian had shown up at my apartment door until he held onto me now, as if the beauty falling around us had the power to chase away all our unanswered questions.
He leaned in close to my face, his head tilted to the side. “I’m so glad you’re coming.”
He’d broken me down so easily. Relief had come like the blaring horn of a freight train when I saw him standing outside my class, his beautiful face marred with the same affliction I’d drowned in for the last week. I’d tried to resist him, to tell him why I had to be true to the decision I’d made, but in the end, I missed him too much. The hole he left behind was too great. There was nothing I could do but concede.
Being around him had become a risk I was willing to take.
“I’m glad I am, too.”
He pulled back a bit and his smile widened before he turned to raise his free hand to hail an approaching cab.
Our breaths rose up and mixed in the crisp night air. The fingers loosened at my arm and glided down to take my hand as the cab pulled to the curb. Christian opened the door and stood aside.
“Scoot in first.” He pressed his palm lightly to the small of my back.
Energy sparked with the light contact. My heart leapt to my throat. Being around Christian had thrown my nerves into overdrive. I scooted all the way across the back seat. Adjusting my skirt, I pulled the seat belt across my chest and snapped it in place.
Christian plopped down beside me with a heavy exhale. “I can’t believe how cold it is out there.”
He puffed hot air from his lungs into the cup of his hands before he rubbed them together, then turned his face my direction. Dim light from the streetlamps bled through the windows, illuminating the confined space. Chunks of black hair had come loose from the style he’d tried to tame it into, pieces sticking up in every direction they shouldn’t be. His chin was held strong in an emotion I didn’t understand, his mouth twisted in a timid smile. But his eyes... Was I wrong, what I saw there? The same thing I thought I’d glimpsed on the sidewalk when we left my apartment five minutes earlier?
I got lost there, in the expression of his face that conveyed everything I wanted him to feel.
Internally, I cautioned myself. Images from last weekend sped in blips across my vision. I thought of how I’d begged him with my body before I begged him with my mouth to feel the same way I did, his expression when he walked out my door, the devastation that had made it hard to get out of bed in the days he’d been gone.
I was so desperate for him that I would delude myself into believing this was something it was not. The cliff was so close, my knees weak and my feet fumbling as I struggled to balance, my heart on the line. I was one slip from complete destruction. Christian would own me with a flick of his fingers.
He leaned forward and grasped the headrest in his hands, giving the driver directions to the restaurant. His long body filled the small space, his knees pressed up against the back of the seat. The driver nodded, and Christian sat back and adjusted himself into a comfortable position, pulling the seatbelt across his chest.
The car merged into traffic, the silence thick as the simmering darkness within the cab surrounded us.
I stole a glance to my left. Well, it wasn’t exactly stolen since Christian was already looking at me.
He rested one side against the door, his elbow on the windowsill and his head propped in his hand as he unabashedly stared. Streetlamps flashed through the windows in quick succession as the cab traveled down the road, illuminating flickers of the stark intensity of his blue eyes.
Heat rose to my cheeks and a gradual tingle diffused across my skin. If I could have, I would have turned away, but I was trapped, locked in whatever was happening deep in the recesses of Christian’s mind. It was smothering, surged out in waves, a tide that seemed to break against us both.
I squirmed in my seat, and Christian wet his lips, the lump in his throat bobbing as he swallowed.
“Are you missing your mom today?”
His question jarred me from the turmoil tumbling through my mind, reminding me that, no matter what, Christian was my best friend. He cared about me.
“Yeah.” Although really, half the day had been spent worrying that I’d made a mistake when I gave in to him yesterday, and the other half watching the clock because I couldn’t wait to see him again. “I talked to my mom earlier. My older sister, Sarah, and her husband are going over to my mom’s, and of course my little sister is there. I didn’t get to tell you...Sarah is having a baby. I get to be an aunt.”
With the thought, a wistful smile threatened at one corner of my mouth. I felt bad that I hadn’t taken enough time to think of my sister, how amazing her news was, that she was bringing a child into this world. I couldn’t wait to see that baby’s precious face.
Christian’s face murmured a smile. “Yeah? That’s awesome, Elizabeth. I bet you wish you were there right now.”
My shoulders rose in an uncertain shrug. Did I? I knew I should. But right then, I felt like this was exactly where I was supposed to be.
One side of his mouth quivered. “Does it make me selfish that what I’m giving thanks for today is you being here with me?” He shifted and fidgeted with a button on his coat. “I don’t know where I’d be right now if it hadn’t been you in that café at the beginning of the year.”
“Christian.” Unrecognizable questions wove into my tone, so much contained in just his name.
My pulse spiked when Christian slid his hand slowly across the seat, the movement calculated. His chin tipped to the side and he flipped his hand so his palm was up. This time, he didn’t just
take my hand or guide me into what he wanted. He waited. It was an invitation, one subject to a decision from me.
My eyes flicked from his hand to his face. I wavered, a gush of air suffusing into the cab as I deliberated. I wanted to ask him, what does this mean? I wanted reassurance, for him to ease the ache that had bound itself to the beat of my heart, for him to say he wanted me in the same way I wanted him, and that I wasn’t making the biggest mistake of my young life.
Instead, I wove my fingers through his.
As if he found as much relief in the contact as I did, a sigh fluttered from Christian’s mouth, and he squeezed my hand.
The cab came to a stop, bringing an end to whatever Christian and I had just shared.
Even if that was it, if we shared nothing more, I’d cherish it, because I would swear, for a few seconds, Christian knew he felt more, even if he didn’t know how to admit it.
Venting a sound of frustration, Christian wrenched a hand through his hair when the valet opened my door. He seemed as opposed to leaving the safety of the cab as I was.
“Looks like we’re here,” he said, stating the obvious as he pulled his hand from mine.
Inclining his head for me to go on, I accepted the help of the doorman and stood from the cab. For a moment, I was alone, fidgeting as a new dread came to settle in the pit of my stomach.
My nerves rocketed as I absorbed my surroundings. Christian was right. The last people I wanted to spend Thanksgiving with were his parents, and the last place I wanted to spend it was somewhere like this. No question the building was beautiful, but pretention poured from its walls, an excessive display of glass and marble and brass.
What the hell was I doing here? I normally wasn’t one of those girls who felt ill at ease in their own skin. I liked who I was. But here, I had no place.
Christian sidled up to me. Like it belonged there, his hand went straight to the small of my back. “Let’s get you out of the cold,” he encouraged, turning us up the runner.
The attendant opened the door and stood aside with a clipped nod of his head.
I lifted my gaze to Christian to find a slight grimace when he turned his chin down to me, an apology, as if he knew how nervous this all made me. I didn’t even know what we were anymore, and now I had to face his parents with all those dizzying questions mucking up my mind.
We checked our coats, and Christian led us to the podium where the maître de stood. “Reservation for Richard Davison.”
The man scanned his book. “The rest of your party has already arrived. Right this way.”
Subdued conversations created a dull hum in the overly elegant space. Waiters in tuxes balanced silver trays, flitting silently around the room. Light clatters of silverware seemed the most distinct sound.
I tensed amidst it all. No. Definitely not a place I wanted to spend Thanksgiving. It wasn’t as if I’d never been to a nice restaurant before, but this place was over the top.
Christian leaned in close to my shoulder and mumbled, “I told you this would be miserable.”
I faked a smile. “It’s fine. It’ll be great.”
He laughed under his breath. “You’re the worst liar I’ve ever met.”
His hand dropped from my back and found my hand, weaving our fingers together. Part of me wanted to jerk away, to stop the flow of confusion I felt from the overt gesture, to hide whatever this was from his parents, to cut off the longing it ignited within me, but I couldn’t let go.
Christian’s hand constricted on mine when the maître de stopped in front of his parents’ table.
The man dipped his head. “Your party.”
Christian said, “Thank you,” but I found I could give no response as I fixated on the couple in front of me.
Oh God. What had Christian dragged me into?
Two of the most beautiful people I’d ever seen sat looking up at us. My gaze waffled between the two of them, shocked by the striking resemblance Christian bore to his mother and stricken by the coldness in his father. Something about his hard stare made it difficult to look away, although the man’s contemplation easily jumped between Christian and me. There was little semblance between father and son other than the thatch of black hair perfectly tailored on Mr. Davison’s head.
His mother was waif thin and wore a silk two-piece skirt suit. Jewels dripped from every exposed surface of her body. I could only guess the long hair she had in a stylish coif had been dyed blonde, and she wore her chin permanently lifted in an elevated air of self-righteousness.
Unease had me shifting my feet as I shrank back from the severity of their presence.
“Mom, Dad, this is my friend, Elizabeth Ayers. Elizabeth, this is my father, Richard Davison, and my mother, Claire Davison.” Christian released the death grip he had on me and gestured in my direction, although thankfully, he chose not to move far from my side.
Richard Davison slowly rose from his seat and extended a brusque hand across the table. “So nice to meet you, Elizabeth.”
Wrapping his hand around mine, Christian’s father shook my hand. It was firm, hard, unwelcoming. There was nothing nice about it.
“Nice to meet you, Mr. Davison,” I forced around the lump in my throat.
When I turned and accepted Christian’s mother’s hand, it was cool to the touch, clammy. “Very nice to meet you, Elizabeth.” It was all form and pomp, insincere.
I struggled to keep my hand from trembling in hers and searched for confidence, reminding myself I was doing this for Christian. “Very nice to meet you, too, Mrs. Davison. Thank you for having me.”
In return, she offered a tight nod of her head and folded herself back under the table.
Christian pulled the chair out for me and helped me settle. Almost inconspicuously, he brushed his fingers under my elbow, a silent buoy to my spirit. I would suffer through this for him.
“Thank you,” I murmured under my breath as I adjusted in my seat. We were handed our menus, and I crossed my feet at my ankles as I sat up straight in the chair. Rigid. Impressing people had never been something I was interested in, but something about these two told me I would fare better pretending to fit into a place where I so obviously did not.
This was going to be a long night.
I glanced above my menu to find Christian’s father watching me with the concentration of a hawk about to swoop in on its prey.
My attention dropped back to the words, but I could still feel his eyes penetrating through the thickness of parchment and leather.
In silence, we studied the menus. When the waiter arrived, I ordered a water and the Thanksgiving special, hoping to make the least impact with my presence as possible.
After our orders were taken, Christian’s father sat back in his seat, still studying me. “So, Elizabeth, how did you and Christian meet?”
I swallowed and swiped my napkin across my mouth. I stole a glance at Christian, and he just smiled at me in encouragement. I turned my attention back to his father. “We both signed up to be paired with a study partner in our American Government class, and Christian turned out to be mine.”
Richard Davison nodded, and I thought maybe it was an acceptable answer.
I sucked in a little breath of relief. Maybe I could handle this.
“And where are you from?”
“San Diego.”
“A long way from home.” It wasn’t a question, just an observation I was sure was tied to another thought.
“Yes,” I said.
“So why New York?”
“I’ve always dreamed of moving here. Columbia University was my first choice.”
“Hmm. It’s a hard school to get into.” Another observation.
“Yes,” I agreed.
God, I wasn’t prepared for this, to be set on display, subject to Richard Davison’s scrutiny. I’d counted on Christian’s promise that his parents would find me so inconsequential that they wouldn’t look twice in my direction.
Mr. Davison sat back while his salad plat
e was removed and a soup bowl was set in its place. “And what do your parents do?”
My nerves flared, and I shifted uncomfortably in my seat. I’d always been proud of my family, but everything about his demeanor put me on the defensive. “Um...just my mom. My dad left when I was young, and my mother has always worked in manufacturing.”
He lifted his brow. “Design?”
I minimally shook my head. “No. She works on the floor.”
Whatever interest Richard Davison had in me was silenced in my response, as if my answer had given him all the information he needed.
Tension fell over the table, and Christian brushed his fingers down my leg, another apology, one I couldn’t even acknowledge.
Instead I stared at his father, contending with the powerful urge I had to defend my mother, to tell him how hard she worked to feed us and keep a decent roof over our heads.
I remained silent because it was clear in Richard Davison’s eyes nothing I said would matter, anyway.
My assumptions made about Christian’s parents were right. They were as hollow as I suspected, bred too high, their heads filled with too much.
Christian had never had a chance.
Is this what he would become? Would he succumb to the mold of his father, to the distance in his mother, be shaped into this machine that cared for nothing?
The thought soured and caused nausea to roll in my stomach. God. I couldn’t stand the thought of this happening to him, for the light in his eyes to dim and the playfulness in his smile to fade.
Finally, the main course was served.
Christian’s mother sipped at her wine, and in between bites filled Christian in on the elite. “Did you hear Stephen Bell and Emily Cann are engaged?” She tittered a laugh. “Who would have thought those two families would come together? That will be quite the fortune for their children. Oh, and the Graham’s have sold their house and bought a historical downtown...”
I had to squash the urge to roll my eyes. Christian’s mother hadn’t seen him in months, and this was all she could offer him? Gossip? She never even asked him how he was, if he was happy or troubled or was struggling in any way.
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