Page 13 of Fire

“So why are you here, then? Aside from the obvious?” She makes a sweeping gesture with her hand.

“A little payback, I guess. Are you going to tell on me?” It comes off as playful, just as I intended.

She smiles, and damn. Seeing her like this after all this time is somewhat jarring. After graduation, I always thought she’d be at some prestigious hospital, married to a super-smart neurosurgeon. I never expected to run into her at Edwin’s outlandish place in Brentwood.

“Depends,” she answers.

“On?”

She leans against the bedroom door, and I take the opportunity to let my gaze wander. Again. Zara has always beena stunner. Even in college, when she tried to hide behind bulky sweaters and quick comebacks, she was irresistible to me. It was irritating, to be honest, mostly because she seemed completely immune to my good looks and witty banter.

“Will you let me hide in here with you for a bit?”

Well, this just got a little more interesting. “Sure, but who are we hiding from?”

Her head drops back against the door with a soft thud as she lets out a deep exhale. “My husband.”

My eyes dart to her left ring finger. The one I scoped out moments ago. Right before I checked out her tits. And her ass. Yep, still no ring. “Husband?” And then I realized where we were and who we were with. “Wait, who are you married to?”

She hesitates. Her lips press together before she finally replies, “Not important, actually.”

“Not important?”

She shakes her head, her dark-brown hair brushing her bare shoulders. “Nope, because as of last week, he’s actually my ex-husband. Still getting used to saying that.”

I cock my head to the side and stare. “Is that how you ended up at this party with him then? ’Cause you forgot you divorced this mystery ex-husband?” Or is she still in love with him? An unexpected surge of jealousy hits me square in the chest.

Where the fuck did that come from?

“No, but he’s not ready to admit it to his douchey friends. So he brought me to save face.”

The relief I feel is…unexpected. I rub my chest, feeling a dull ache between my ribs. I used to have a thing for my hot tutor back in college, but that was ages ago. “I’m sorry. No wonder you were fleeing down the hall.”

“I wasn’t—” She starts to say, but then relents. “Okay, yeah. I definitely was.”

My mouth curves into a smile. “They’re literally the worst, aren’t they? Edwin by himself was decent back then, but as a group?” I fake a shudder, causing her to laugh.

“They compared cufflinks. I stood there for twenty minutes while they inspected each other’s heirloom cufflinks. Did you know Drew’s family jeweler has crafted pieces for the royal family?”

“Wow, what a bunch of pretentious twats. No wonder you need me to rescue you.”

“Hey, I didn’t say anything about rescuing,” she argues. “I just need a place to?—”

“Disappear?”

“Yes.”

“What if, instead of staying here and running the risk of getting caught, we just left?”

“Together?” The way she says the word makes me think of her and me and all the things we could do…together.

And now I’m half hard. Because once there was a time when all I thought of was the things that woman and I could do together.

Is tonight my second chance?

“Sure, unless you want to stay…”

“Nope.”