Then There Was You: New York Times Best Selling Author

by Contreras, Claire

  He smiled, dropped a chaste kiss on my lips, and headed for the door. “I’ll pick you up at eleven.”

  “You aren’t going to stay?”

  He shook his head, hand on the door. “If I stay, if . . . if we’re going to do this hooking up thing until you leave and then call it a day, maybe we should discuss it. When you’re sober.”

  “I’m sober.”

  He cocked his head and shot me a look.

  “I’m mostly sober.”

  “Mostly isn’t good enough. I’ll pick you up tomorrow morning.”

  “Fine,” I grumbled. He chuckled as he walked down the driveway.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  “That boy is going to break your heart again.” Grandma Joan crossed her arms as she leaned against the doorframe. She had come over this morning to make sure her friends took everything they purchased, and that everything included my entire childhood bedroom set. I wished she’d leave. I didn’t exactly want her here when Rowan arrived, especially since there was no telling what she would end up saying to him.

  “I haven’t given him my heart to break.” My cell phone charger was the last thing to go into my overnight bag before I zipped it closed.

  “Oh, Tess.” She sighed heavily. “He’s going to keep you here and ruin your chances to become someone.”

  “That isn’t true.” I frowned.

  Rowan wasn’t the type to keep anyone anywhere. As long as I knew that, I’d be fine. Besides, I wanted to leave. I needed to leave. I wanted to argue with grandma, to tell her that I could make a name for myself anywhere, but we’d both know it was bullshit. Unfortunately, location mattered. Grandma Joan shook her head, her thin lips twisted in disappointment. She’d always wanted more for my mom. She wanted her to live her own life, not put it on hold for some man, which Mom did anyway. I could tell she was trying to figure out whether or not she should give me a long speech, but after a beat, she sighed and shook her head.

  “Just be careful,” she said finally. “Don’t get pregnant.”

  I scowled. “I’m not that stupid.”

  “Neither was I, and look at how I ended up.”

  I sighed heavily. I wasn’t going to answer that because I knew I’d say something I’d regret. The doorbell rang and cut our conversation short. Mom had that fancy ring on it that used to drive us crazy as teenagers, but as an adult, it brought me comfort. Funny how perception changed over the years.

  “I’ll be back in a few days. I gave the realtor your number just in case, but he’s putting a lockbox on the house,” I explained, rolling my bag toward the stairs. I heard her small heels behind me as I picked up the suitcase and walked down with it.

  “You’ll call,” she said. “When you get there. I don’t trust that kid’s driving.”

  I laughed. I didn’t necessarily trust it either. He drove like a damn maniac. I kept that to myself, though, and opened the door. My heart skipped a beat when I saw him. He was dressed down—joggers and a loose Punisher T-shirt, which somehow didn’t manage to hide any of his muscles. My mouth watered just thinking about what was underneath that shirt. I blinked, remembering myself, and he grinned, leaning in to press his forehead against mine and breathe out. My heart skipped another beat, but I managed to breathe out with him. A part of me wondered if he’d taught the hongi to another woman. That part of me reared its green head and rooted its heavy feet on my heart. I backed away quickly. That wasn’t the kind of emotion a hongi was supposed to provide.

  Rowan looked at my grandmother, who had a small smile splayed on her lips and a hand on her hip as she waited.

  “What? You aren’t going to greet me?”

  He chuckled, stepping in and doing the same to her. When they stepped away from each other, she tugged his ear hard, making him grunt as she pulled him down to her five-foot-three level.

  “You hurt her, I kill you,” she said. “How’s that for a hongi?”

  “Nana!”

  She shot me a fiery glare that made me cower a bit. Rowan rubbed the tip of his ear with his fingers.

  “I promise to keep her safe.”

  “It isn’t her physical safety I’m concerned about,” Grandma said, glaring at him.

  He simply nodded at this, and I stepped in to pull him away from her before this got any more awkward. He said goodbye and picked up my suitcase, walking outside. I followed and climbed into the passenger seat of his car.

  “I’ll call you when I get there,” I called out with a wave. She waved back, looking non-too-happy with the arrangement.

  “She hates me,” Rowan said once we drove away.

  “Eh.” I shrugged.

  “The fact that you can’t even try to defend that statement means she hates me. That doesn’t bother you? You love her.”

  “Your mom hates me. Does that bother you?”

  “She doesn’t hate you.” He scowled, looking over.

  “She hates the idea of us together.” I raised an eyebrow, daring him to say otherwise. He looked at the road ahead, which made my heart sink a little. A part of me wanted him to contradict me or at least explain why she hated the idea of me dating him, but I let it be. I would leave soon, and it wouldn’t matter.

  “She doesn’t hate you, though. My mom loves you. Her problem is with me, not you,” he responded, but it didn’t make me feel even the slightest bit better. “Joan hates me.”

  “Because she thinks you’re a player who will break my heart.”

  “I’m not.”

  “I know.”

  He was a lot of things, but a cheater wasn’t one, even if he did seem like one by dating multiple women at once. He was just never the type to settle down, but he always let it be known to all parties.

  Except you. He was with her. And he was with you.

  The thoughts snapped at me like a barracuda. Snap, snap, snap. The way I wanted to snap, snap, snap her neck every time I saw her. I pushed it away. He hadn’t been with anyone else while we were together. I knew that without a shadow of a doubt.

  “I would never purposely hurt you,” he said, reaching over and sliding his hand over mine. I closed my eyes for a moment and breathed, enjoying the moment.

  “I know that.”

  “Did you RSVP for the cocktail thing?”

  “Yes. It starts at five thirty, but the hotel I booked is right by it, so it shouldn’t be a problem.”

  “We’ll be there by four,” he said. “Is that enough time for you to get ready?”

  “Uh, yeah, is it enough time for you to style your hair?”

  He winked. “Guess we’ll find out.”

  I smiled, shaking my head and glancing away to hide my blush. “It’s going to be miserably hot this week.”

  “Is that why you’re wearing that flimsy little sun dress?”

  “Yeah.” I smiled, glancing over at him. “I’m glad you took note of the kind of fabric I’m wearing.”

  “No comment.”

  “What does that mean?” I looked down at my sundress and frowned.

  It was a super cute, albeit, flimsy little dress I’d purchased during the Free People super sale a few months back. Like most of their clothing, it was whimsical and, yes, a tad revealing, with spaghetti straps that showed off my entire back. I’d covered myself with a jean vest, so he hadn’t even caught a glimpse of that part. Not that I wasn’t showing enough skin to begin with. The low neckline exposed the tops of my breasts, and I was pretty sure he could see through most of the material past the bodice, which was why I’d worn ivory panties. I looked up at him, still frowning.

  “Why no comment?”

  “Because if you knew how hard I’ve been since the moment I picked you up, you wouldn’t be as amused about my noticing the fabric.” His words shot straight between my legs. I shifted a little in the seat.

  “Oh.”

  “Yes, oh.”

  I bit my lip, eying the tent in his joggers. I could definitely see it, huge and hard and ready. It made me clench my legs together again.
It took every ounce of self-control I had not to reach over and free him.

  “You’re driving. You need to focus on that.”

  He sighed. “You’re right.”

  His response made me wonder how many times women had gone down on him or jerked him off while he was driving this car, and just like that, I went from turned on to bothered. I folded my arms in front of my chest again and looked out the window.

  “What’s going on up there?” He reached over and tucked my hair behind my ear, giving him a clear view of my face.

  “I’m trying not to think about how many women have done dirty things to you in this car.”

  He chuckled, shaking his head as he focused on the road ahead. After a moment, it was clear he wasn’t going to answer me, which further pissed me off.

  “Have there been that many?”

  “I’m not having this conversation with you.”

  “Why not? We’re friends again, aren’t we?”

  “Friends?” He shot me a look. “Is that what we are?”

  “You were the one who fled the scene yesterday and said we were going to discuss things.”

  “I did, didn’t I?”

  “So? Shall we discuss?” I turned to face him. “Why are we discussing this anyway? Don’t regular people just hook up and break it off when it’s over?”

  “We aren’t regular people.”

  “Okay. Do you discuss this with all the women you hook up with?”

  “Not necessarily, but you aren’t like them.”

  “Because what? You think I’ll fall in love with you? Or is this about the stupid change thing that I’m supposedly not good with?”

  “Taking you to Lover’s Lane the other night wasn’t the smartest thing to do.” He sighed. “I just want to be clear on things because you’re leaving, I’m not, and . . . well, we need boundaries.”

  “We never needed them before. We went our separate ways when you ended things.”

  He stayed silent for a beat. “You know what, let’s talk about that, since you’re so keen on arguing these days.”

  “I’m not keen on arguing. I just think you’re full of shit.”

  “Remember when I asked you to go to Columbia with me and you chose Yale?”

  I rolled my eyes. “Big whoop. Your girlfriend chose Columbia. I thought you’d be satisfied with that.”

  “She . . .” He shook his head. “She isn’t my girlfriend. Never was.”

  “Not what I heard.”

  “Enlighten me then.”

  “Did you forget about Facebook? If they had been giving out medals for the most posts made in a day, Camryn would have won. And guess who was in ninety percent of them?” I shot him a look. He breathed out noisily through his nose.

  “Not my doing. I didn’t ask Camryn to follow me to college. She decided to take it upon herself to wedge herself further into my life by posing as my girlfriend in some circles and soon-to-be girlfriend in others, I knocked the rumor down until I was blue in the face. Still, it hadn’t mattered with some of the girls at school.”

  “I bet you didn’t try all that hard.” I shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. We’d already broken up.”

  “Because you chose Yale.”

  “That is not why we broke up and you know it. Besides, I chose to follow my dreams, Rowan. How can you, of all people, fault me for that? Or are you jealous that I had the balls to do something you didn’t?”

  He stayed quiet. I sighed. Why was I upset again? I turned the radio up and started scrolling through stations. Rowan and I had a difference of opinion on most things, including music, so we normally kept the radio off, but bickering about songs was better than bickering about him having sex with other women or why I followed my dreams instead of his.

  Though, him rubbing in the fact that I didn’t follow his lead and that we didn’t stay together because of it pissed me off. What kind of power did he think he held over me? Maybe that was the problem. He was so stuck on his own ego and the way people walked around on eggshells around him that he didn’t even realize some of us had our own thoughts.

  “It’s a touch screen,” he said. “You don’t have to stab it.”

  “I’m not stabbing it.” I jabbed the screen once more and stopped at the Nineties pop station, catching the tail end of an N’SYNC song I knew for a fact Rowan hated. Then Avril Lavigne started to sing, and instead of changing the station like I normally would have, I turned it up, knowing it would irritate the crap out of him. I expected him to try to turn it, or at the very least mock the lyrics, but he started to sing. Loudly. His eyes smiling as he looked over at me and caught the surprised look on my face as he started to sing about making things complicated.

  Oh god. I covered my face. He had an awful, terrible singing voice. Despite myself, I started to laugh, and laugh, and laugh. And finally, I uncovered my face and joined in on the impromptu car karaoke moment, singing the next chorus with him. Never in a million years would I have thought he’d know the lyrics, but then Rowan was always surprising me one way or another. We sang loudly, stealing glances as he drove down the freeway, and by the end of the song, I had tears in my eyes because I was laughing so hard.

  “You’re an awful singer,” I said between laughs. “Like, awful.”

  “You aren’t so great either.”

  I shook my head, smiling so widely my cheeks hurt. “I thought you hated that song.”

  “I do.” He chuckled. “How do you think I know it so well?”

  “Because Roger loved it,” I offered, laughing even harder as I thought about his old rowing teammate who was obsessed with anything nineties and everything Beyoncé. He joined in, shoulders shaking. “How is he anyway? Do you keep in touch?”

  “He’s fine. He invited me to his wedding next summer. I’m supposed to be in the party.”

  “Oh?” My brows rose. “I’m assuming he’s marrying a man.”

  “You would be right.” He grinned. “Nice guy too. Accountant.”

  “Roger with an accountant? Geez. Opposites really do attract. What is he doing with his life?”

  “He went to culinary school and got on full-time at a good restaurant in New York.”

  “Nice. Good for him.” I smiled. Rowan put his hand over mine on my lap again.

  “I don’t want to hurt you,” he said after a moment. “The last thing on Earth I would ever want to do is hurt you.”

  “I know.” I squeezed his hand. “I’m sorry about what I said.”

  “Don’t be.” He grinned. “You’re right. I am a little jealous of you. My entire life I wanted to be a college professor, but I’ve always known my place in the world, and it resides in Hawthorne Industries. I’ve come to terms with that.”

  “You know that you could do both.”

  He shook his head. “You know how I am.”

  “Balls to the wall.”

  He chuckled. “Pretty much.”

  “Well, for what it’s worth, I think it’s commendable.”

  “I don’t regret what we did the other night,” he said. “A part of me wishes I could be strong enough to stop myself, but I just . . . when it comes to you . . .”

  “I know.”

  “You leave soon, and I don’t want to go back to being strangers.”

  “That was your doing,” I said, though I wasn’t sure if I had it in me to stay friends once I left. Would that entail seeing him with other women and vice versa? I wasn’t sure either one of us were built to handle that.

  “I know. I fucked up. I don’t want to fuck up again. I’m just putting it out there.”

  “Is this your way of telling me that if I try to have sex with you, you’ll turn me away?”

  “This is my way of telling you I won’t turn you away, and I’m not sure how I feel about that.”

  I wasn’t sure how I felt about it either. Excited, anxious, terrified. At least I knew I wasn’t alone in this.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Rowan

  I glanced around
the cocktail party, looking for Tessa. She’d told me she’d meet me down here once she finished getting ready. I was talking to a man who owned a factory down in Queens about where he imports his fabrics when I finally spotted her. She was wearing a tight black dress that hit her knees and red lipstick. Her brown hair cascaded down in soft waves that people paid big money to achieve and she had naturally. She laughed at whatever the man she was talking to was saying, and I felt it in my groin. I wanted to take her away from here and have my way with her, the way I’d been dreaming about for over ten years.

  Tessa had no idea the kinds of things she did to people. I watched the way she managed to wrap every man in the room around her little pinky as she spoke to them. It was her smile. It was the way she acted as if she was held captive by your words, regardless of what you were saying. She had a way about her that put people at ease and made them talk. Two qualities I needed in order to take this company to the next level. Two qualities my fake wife should definitely have. I only had a few days left to decide. I’d spent most of my time trying to figure out how to get out of it, but the more time passed, the more unlikely it seemed and I knew thinking about Tessa being the woman signing that contract was stupid. She wouldn’t go for that. Hell, she wouldn’t even follow me to college. I wasn’t stupid enough to believe she’d marry me out of convenience. A man could dream, though.

  “These are the newest fabrics we got from Peru. They’re even more vivid in person,” Mr. Ferrero said. I made myself look at his phone screen and then took it from his hand. Damn. The fabric was nice.

  “You have this in Queens?”

  “I have samples of most of it. I just brought back a shipment of the red one and this ivory.”

  I let him scroll and show me the ivory.

  “Can I show this to my assistant?”

  “Sure.” He smiled, allowing me to lead him over to where Tessa was standing.

  She looked up, her gaze finding mine before we reached her. I felt a sense of . . . something tickling my chest when she looked at me like that. If I were being completely, no-bullshit honest, Tessa was the only woman who could look at me and send my heart into a frenzy. I pushed the thought away. It was nostalgia. That was why I felt this way. She introduced me to the man she’d been speaking to—Cody, a buyer for Barneys, and I introduced her to Mr. Ferrero. After a moment, Cody excused himself to speak to someone else and I asked Mr. Ferrero to show her the fabrics.