gave her a look that was both warm and curious. “Are you okay with going back to work tomorrow?”
“I don’t know. Are you?”
“It’s going to be a little odd. I mean, since we decided at the outset that we’d keep this out of the office—”
“Right, and we should.”
Why couldn’t she just tell Kyle she was falling for him? Why couldn’t she get past her fears? But she of all people should have known that taking things too far could lead to disaster. This weekend fling was a lot like her short-lived reentry into the world of hacking when she’d helped take down terrorist Web sites. It had given her a thrill, and then she’d kept her control. She’d walked away.
Her gut told her walking away from Kyle was the right thing to do, too. The safe thing to do.
Her inner wild child longed to invite him to stay the night again, but instead she put away her snow globe collection and suggested she had laundry to do to get ready for work.
Kyle glanced at his watch. “Oh, yeah,” he said. “Guess I should be heading home and doing the same.”
Yasmine stood up from the bed and he followed her. She tried to think of something to say but couldn’t.
Kyle took her hand and pulled her close. “I’ll see you tomorrow at work, okay?”
“Okay, but—”
“We won’t mention this weekend.” His expression turned serious.
Yasmine sighed. “Right. I’ll give you a ride home.”
She placed a kiss on his cheek, which seemed ridiculous given their recent intimacy, but suddenly she felt stiff and standoffish. He quickly gathered his things, and they headed out the door, which should have been a relief for Yasmine.
But they rode back to his place in an uncomfortable silence, all the things they should have said but didn’t hanging between them. In front of Kyle’s apartment, they said an awkward goodbye, and Yasmine drove home feeling utterly confused, torn by the conflicting ideas that this weekend had either been the most exciting thing she’d done in a long time or a huge mistake.
Or both.
The moment she was alone in her apartment, her feelings of paranoia and loneliness returned with a vengeance. She’d made a mistake sending Kyle away so brusquely. And she couldn’t stop thinking about him. Couldn’t stop thinking about the whole idea of fantasy fulfillment, and how much she wanted to do for him what he’d done for her. So after she’d started the laundry and cleaned up her apartment, she picked up the phone and called Cass.
“How’s Mr. Wonderful?” Cass asked when she heard Yasmine’s voice.
“He’s gone home now, but we had a rather steamy Christmas together.”
“I could tell. There were major sex vibes in the air the other night between you two.”
“There were not!”
“Please. You looked at each other like you were starving.”
“That could have been because of your cooking, you know.”
“Oh, you did not just go there.”
“Sorry. Really, thank you so much for having us over, and in the future, please don’t feel like it would be rude to order pizza delivery.” Yasmine laughed, only because she knew Cass could make fun of herself.
“Please come get this damn bûche de Noël. Even the homeless guy on my block won’t eat it.”
“You should be ashamed of yourself, trying to foist that thing off on the less fortunate.”
“I know. I bought him a new pair of shoes to make up for the offense.”
“I hope you can extend that sense of generosity to a less-needy person in your life. Namely me. I need a favor,” Yasmine said.
“Oh? After you insulted my cooking?”
“I’m truly sorry. Now do you think you could hook me up with a private peep show room at the Pink Pussycat?”
“Whoa, mama. Back up there for a sec.”
She could almost see Cass’s perplexed look over the phone.
“I owe Kyle a little fantasy experience, okay? I need a peep show room to do it, and I was hoping you could talk to the manager at the club, pull a few strings…I’m willing to pay, of course.”
“So you need a room, but not a girl.”
“Of course no girl—I’m the girl in the fantasy!”
“Hey. You never know how many girls might appear in a guy’s fantasy.”
“True, but I’m not down with that.”
“I’ll see what I can do. When do you need the room?”
“Um…I was kind of hoping for today.”
“I’ll call you back,” Cass said.
“Thank you, thank you, thank you.”
“Don’t thank me yet. Wait until I get you what you want to grovel at my feet.”
Yasmine hung up the phone