Page 15 of Shades of Grey & Gold

I pull my eyebrows together but can’t stop the smile forming on my lips.

“We haven’t seen each other in over seven years, but it’s not like I live on another planet. It’s definitely a coincidence, sure. I’m more likely to end up here than you are!” I drop my arms to my sides and sidestep to lean against the old brick wall.

Callan tips his head forward, staring at the sidewalk, then raises it to look at me.

“The place where you were supposed to be two years ago…you weren’t.” He takes a slow step towards me, and his eyes look darker. “I never would’ve expected to find you hiding behind a desk on Main Street in this little town.”

He’s within arm’s reach. I look up into his eyes, then down at the zipper of his jacket, hanging at the bottom, and my hand moves in front of me, tugging lightly on it. Once again, I’m confused. Whether or not it’s the tequila is unclear.

“What do you mean, ‘two years ago’?” My eyes move back to his and my body shivers against the cold of the brick wall.

His eyes overtly trace a path from my eyes, down my arms, my chest, and down my legs, finally lifting his head back to my eyes. He shrugs out of his jacket and holds it out on one finger in front of me.

I take it and slip my arms inside. It’s warm from his body heat, it smells like leather, cedar, and burnt salt. I close my eyes, pulling the jacket around my chest as I lean back against the cold bricks.

He takes a step closer, so close I can feel the warmth of his chest and see the faint little puffs of breath as it rises and falls.

“You wouldn’t know what I mean.” His eyes are piercing mine. “Because you weren’t there two years ago when I went into Ellison and Parker to find you.” His smile has dropped, and his eyes are serious, watching mine for a reaction. “I finished…”

He pauses and his eyes definitely fall down to my lips before they land back on my eyes.

“…the things I had to take care of and went back. For you.”

The band is still playing the song on the other side of the wall and the music pounds into my body through the bricks. My mouth is hanging open slightly, and I don’t think I have breath left in my lungs. I’m confused, but my brain already feels hazy and I’m considering whether I’m making this scene up in my head.

I breathe in the smell of his jacket again: leather, cedar, and metallic burnt salt.

Callan reaches up and puts both his hands on either side of my head against the bricks. He leans in and the metallic, smoke-over-salt smell is stronger, enveloping me.

“You know, the last time we were in this position seven years ago, I let you walk away.” One of his hands falls to my shoulder and down the arm of his jacket, lightly lacing my fingers in his.

I follow his hand until I’m staring at our joined fingers. The world feels like it’s spinning, but I’m sure that’s not because of the alcohol alone. He rubs his thumb across my fingers before running them back up the path they came to hold my face.

I let myself do what I didn’t seven years ago, relaxing into the touch. My body slackens and my lungs find air, breathing in sharply at the same time my eyes close. When I open my eyes, they meet with his darkened gaze, and the playful smile I haven’t seen in seven years.

His thumb runs across my cheek, leaving heat in its wake, as he tucks a strand of my curly hair behind my ear on a sigh of his own.

“I let you walk away with someone else. I watched your light fade, slowly, for that whole time—all because of him—I just let you walk away from me.” My eyes look down at his lips again where the smile has dissipated into a serious expression. “I went back two years ago to show you what I meant. Show you how it felt to be with someone who admired the light inside of you… protected it and never let anyone overshadow it or extinguish it.”

“You went to Ellison and Parker?”

My brain feels like it’s still catching up, and his smile perks up again, the pads of his fingers warm, resting below my ear, rubbing slow circles into the cold skin there.

“Yes, against what turned out to be my better judgment since you weren’t even there. And then I stayed there this entire time because…” His hand leaves the bricks and my neck, as he takes a step back and runs his hand across his face. “A story for another time, maybe.”

“I’m so confused.”

A laugh bubbles out of my mouth and all of the information swirls in my head. The tequila is somewhere in between it all and I’m unsure where it ends and reality begins.

“I don’t even know how you’re in front of me right now or here at all. You know I just found your pen yesterday? Literally yesterday.”

“My pen?” He looks amused and closes the distance between us once more, his hand finding my face again and rubbing right next to the dimples my smile is creating from the laughs that won’t stop spilling into the cold, quiet air around us.

“The present you gave me at graduation. I never opened it, Patrick took it, and… I don’t know, but now you’re here.” His smile falls again at the mention of Patrick’s name and my brain scrambles to find a way to get the smile back. “I like it. The pen. It’s fancy and pretty to look at.”

He rolls his lips together. “You’re pretty to look at.” His lips pull back into a smile on a sigh. “I’d make up for all the lost time and kiss you right now if I didn’t know for a fact you are probably three to five shots in and might not remember it tomorrow.”

“This will all feel like a dream regardless, so you should kiss me anyway.” I put my hands against his white shirt and press lightly into his chest, running my hand up, feeling his muscles twitch as I reach behind his neck.