Page 38 of Playing the Field

But right now?

Right now, I’m on edge, and I fucking hate it.

I sit on the edge of the couch, one foot planted on the floor, my hands clasped in front of me as I watch the city lights flicker through the floor-to-ceiling windows. Toronto stretches out before me, a sea of movement and energy, but I don’t see any of it.

Because I’m waiting for her.

The whiskey tumbler on the coffee table is barely touched, the ice melting into a pool at the bottom. I should drink it. Should let the burn settle in my chest, smooth the edges of whatever the hell is clawing at me from the inside out.

But I don’t.

Because the second I do?

She’ll walk through the door, and I don’t want my judgment blurred when that happens.

I want to remember every second of tonight.

I drag a hand through my hair, rolling my shoulders, trying to shake the restless energy coiling in my muscles.

It doesn’t help.

She’ll be here soon.

And when she gets here, we’re supposed to talk.

That’s what she said. That’s what she thinks is going to happen.

But I know better.

We don’t talk. We argue. We fight. We collide.

And the last time we tried to talk, I ended up kissing the breath out of her.

Now?

Now I’m waiting for the woman I haven’t been able to stop thinking about since the second I left Cape Town.

And I know, without a doubt, that once she walks through that door?

Nothing between us will ever be the same again.