Keeping Secrets in Seattle - By Brooke Moss Page 0,68
parking lot soon. I had to get everything out that I’d come here to say before he came any closer. When I put my palms on his chest, I noticed his pulse thudding through his shirt. I took hold of his wrists and stepped back. “Why do you keep doing that?”
“Doing what?” he asked.
“Touching me like that.” I still felt tingles where his palms had been.
“Like that?” He shoved his hands in his pockets.
“Like we’re more than friends.”
Gabe glared at me. “I’m engaged, Violet.”
“That’s what makes this so wrong.” I gestured between the two of us. “I’m trying to have a serious conversation with you, and we can’t stay off each other!”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
I jutted my chin out at him. “Your fiancée is a liar and a phony. And her parents aren’t rich. They’re normal middle class people. With a normal middle class house, and a normal middle class grandma living with them.”
A long line appeared across Gabe’s forehead. “What? How did you find this out?”
“I…looked into her background a little bit.” I glanced away, embarrassed.
“You did what?” His brows knit together.
“I did it for you.”
“You snooped into Alicia’s background for my sake?” Gabe’s eyes had glazed over, and his jaw locked into place.
“Yes. You have no idea what kind of a person you’re engaged to. Do you know what she was like in high school?”
“I’m supposed to care what she was like in high school?” He ran his hand over his head.
“You should care about some of the things I heard.” I took a step closer to him. “She’s a gold digger. A girl she went to school with said that she—”
“You know, I never took you for the jealous type. All these years, and you never acted at all envious.”
I was taken aback. “Well, you haven’t been engaged to any of them.”
“So it’s the engagement that has you acting so crazy?”
I wanted to scream. “This isn’t crazy. Why do I have to keep explaining that to everyone?”
“This is ridiculous.” Gabe’s jaw twitched, and a muscle in his neck bulged. I was in the weeds now. “You followed me here so that you could tell me what Alicia was like in high school?”
“You aren’t listening. I know that this all seems weird, but I have a point.” I was shouting now.
He looked at his watch. “Alicia is going to wonder where I’m at.”
I sighed. “You’re being too stubborn for your own damn good. It doesn’t even matter that Alicia is completely wrong for you, because on paper, it all works.”
“Listen.” Gabe took hold of my shoulders. “I know this is hard for you. All this change is hard for me, too.”
“You can’t marry her.” My quavering voice was almost drowned out by a passing car.
Gabe’s eyes softened. “Vi, don’t say that.”
“Please don’t marry her.” My eyes moistened, and I stared at him with every ounce of intensity burning inside me. “She will hurt you worse than I ever did. I can promise you that. She doesn’t want kids. Did you know that?”
His mouth opened and closed without a sound.
I couldn’t stop there. “Ask her the name of the nursing home where her grandma lives.”
“Please stop,” he said tiredly.
“Just ask her about her policy on men.” My voice shook, and it was clear by the defeated expression in his eyes that he’d stopped listening to me minutes ago, but I pressed forth. If nothing came from this conversation at all, I knew that I had at least tried. “Ask her what her policy is on upgrades, Gabe. Just ask.”
Gabe pushed a strand of my hair away from my forehead, making a shiver tiptoe town my back. My breath caught in my throat. “Vi…”
He stepped closer to me, and my heart thudded in my chest so hard that I swear he could see it through my dress. Alicia, Cameron, and all of my anger and frustration slid to the back of my mind, and all I could focus on were those eyes I’d loved since I was six years old. He touched my cheek, and I shuddered.
Fingers trembling against my face, Gabe took a shaky breath before whispering, “You need to go home now.”
His words hit me like a punch in the gut, just as the doors to the concert hall swung open with a bang. We pulled apart, almost in slow motion, as Gabe’s eyes deadlocked on mine. “Intermission…”
“Please.” I tried to catch my breath. “Just listen.”
His voice was strained when he spoke again. “You’ve got to