Page 42 of The Muse
“Callie got pretty tight-lipped when I asked about her degree. Was she a stripper or something?”
June snorts. “I don’t think that requiresseveraldegrees. Everyone has secrets for different reasons.”
“I know. It just seems like a weird secret.” As we drive down the hill, I glance at June. “What’s your secret?”
“What’s yours?” Her eyebrows jump up her forehead.
“I asked you first.”
“Well”—she looks ahead—“if I tell you, then it won’t be a secret.”
“I don’t think we should have secrets,” I say, and I mean it, but I don’t know if I can walk the walk. Not yet.
“That’s a big step. No secrets, huh?”
I pull over along the side of the road. “We have a problem.”
“Your car is broken?”
“I don’t know where we’re going. Am I taking you home? If so, you have to tell me where you live. Are you coming back to my place? If so, then I have to behonestwith you about my living situation.”
Her lips part with a slow breath. “Are you living in your car?” she whispers.
I chuckle, but she doesn’t.
Shit.
She’s serious.
“Not anymore,” I say. “I told you I have a roommate. Do you think he’s waiting at some bar for me to finish my date so he can get back in this”—I circle my finger around—“our house?”
Her eye twitches. I know she’s trying not to be shocked by me, my past, and my whole messed-up present situation. Monroe was right. I give too much too soon. But I don’t want to be with someone who can’t handle it. Maybe that’s why I’m alone, residing on a sofa. I should slow down before I lose her.
“Do you want to order a ride? I’ll wait here with you, and when they pick you up, I promise not to follow you.”
This time, she can’t hide her flinch. “Flynn,” she whispers.
“It’s fine.” I run my hands through my hair. “I wouldn’t trust me either.”
Her hand rests on my leg, and I stare at it, wanting nothing more than to hold it. Kiss it. Pull her into my arms. When I picked her up at the park and carried her to my car, it was the first time in … forever, that I remember feeling someone else’s body so close to mine without it being a forgettable hookup.
“The gallery,” June says, pulling her hand away from my leg.
“The gallery?”
She nods. “I live in an apartment across from the gallery, above the salon.”
“So why did you use the bathroom at the gallery instead of running up to your apartment?”
“Because I was …” she swallows hard. “I was taken.”
“Taken? What does that mean?”
June stares at her folded hands for a few seconds before lifting her head and offering a shaky smile. “On my twenty-firstbirthday, I went out with friends. Got my first legal martini. Danced. Laughed. Gossiped. Then I snuck off to the restroom because I was feeling sick. And I …” She pulls in a shaky breath. “I don’t remember what happened next. Everything was dark. There was a humming noise. And I felt this vibration. That’s when I realized I was in the trunk of a car.”
Fuck me …
She swallows hard, wringing her hands. “It was only three days. And then it was over. I wasn’t injured or abused. And despite years of therapy, there are just some things that make me nervous.”
