Page 71 of The Deals We Make

“Yeah, but not here. Let’s go back to my place.”

“But you just arrived. Was there something you needed to do for your mom?”

He grabs his coat off the hook. “Was just checking in on her before I came looking for you.”

Something deep in my belly warms. “You were going to come looking for me?”

He huffs. “That’s what I said.”

The truck beeps as he unlocks the door, but I’ve barely had time to open it before Ti picks me up and sits me on the seat. The move shouldn’t be so panty dropping.

“I’m more than capable of getting into a truck by myself. I can?—”

“Shut up, babe,” Ti says as he closes the door.

The way he says it brings a smile to my lips. It’s a playfulshut up.

It’s a quick ride to his house, and we park in front of it. “Déjà vu,” I say quietly.

“Or Groundhog Day,” Ti says.

I turn to face him. For some reason, I feel compelled to tell him in the safety of the truck. Before we step into his home. “I was scared, Ti.”

He shifts in his seat. “Why?”

I sigh. “I was so in love with you. Back then. I don’t know if what happened last night was a throwback to those feelings or a response to the now. And anything with you feels like, because of our history, more than a casual one-night stand. But you live here, and I live in California. And the world I’ve built out there is really important to me. I needed last night to be casual in my mind to be able to handle it. But…”

Ti reaches for my hand and squeezes gently. “But?”

“It can’t be casual between us, can it?”

He cups my cheek. “I don’t think it can be casual, but I also don’t know how we would ever make it permanent. But is that a good enough reason to not even try?”

“Not sure my heart could take the breakup again.”

Ti grunts. “If we’re talking facts, we weren’t ever together before.”

I slap his chest. “You know what I mean.”

He leans over the armrest and kisses me softly. “I do know what you mean. I don’t know how long you’re going to be here.But maybe something that matters is better than something casual, even if neither lasts.”

I think about his words. “There’s so much in the air. I don’t know how to manage it. All this stuff going on with Mom, the things I have going on with work that I just can’t drop.” I look at him. “You.”

“If I’m a burden you have to figure out, then we’re doing this wrong. Let me be the one who lightens the load. Let me be the one who helps you escape for as many precious seconds as you can spare.”

The sincerity in his words is overwhelming, but… “You make it sound like I’d be using you.”

“Would you?”

I think about his words. About the way it made me feel. The relief that, for once, I wasn’t in this all on my own. I shake my head. “No. I would never do that. You were too important to me to do that.”

He touches my cheek, his thumb easing across my cheekbone. “You feeling overwhelmed?”

“I’m used to carrying a lot. Can’t be a CEO without big shoulders.”

Vex tuts. “I didn’t ask if you had big shoulders or if you are used to carrying a lot. I asked if you were overwhelmed. Like, is there a gnawing ball of stress eating away at your stomach? When you take a deep breath, does your heart drop, or your chest struggle to open up and allow air into your lungs? If I checked your heart rate, would it be elevated like you just ran a hundred-meter sprint in ten seconds?”

I glance away and look out the window to where Ti’s trees are wrapped in burlap. The man even knows how to care for shrubbery. Maybe it’s time I let him care for me a little. Even if it’s only for now.