Lethal Wedding (Wedlocked Trilogy Book 2) - Charlotte Byrd Page 0,42
says, "given that she is your ex-girlfriend and all.”
“Yeah, you would think so but it wasn’t really. I’m getting used to the fact that we’re not together anymore.”
“Would you mind doing me a favor?" Chelsea asks.
“Sure, anything.”
“Would you take me home?"
“Oh, yes of course.”
“It’s not because I had too much to drink,” she adds. "It’s just that it has been a really long time since a guy took me home and I sort of miss it.”
“Really? But I heard from Franklin that you were actually dating a lot.”
“That’s what I want Franklin to think, but that’s actually not true.”
“Do tell," I say, calling an Uber on my phone.
“Well, Franklin and I have kind of a complicated relationship so I don’t exactly want to tell him the truth about how little I’m dating nowadays. Especially now that he’s so in love and engaged to Aurora.”
On the drive over, we talk a lot about our old relationships and find out we actually have a number of things in common.
She seems to be just as heartbroken over Franklin as I am over Aurora and she even makes a joke that we should band together and try to break them up.
We talk about how we could possibly do that but neither of us come up with a feasible plan.
When I show her up to her apartment, I walk her to her door. We’ve both had a little bit too much to drink and one of the neighbors pokes her head out and even shushes us as if we are children.
Laughing, I follow her into her apartment.
“I have the worst neighbors,” Chelsea says. “That’s one of the problems of being as rich as I am and being able to afford to live where I live. I’m completely surrounded by old widows or creepy old men that feel like they can treat me like shit just because that’s what they’ve always done to women since the fifties.”
I laugh. When she misses a step and trips, I put my hand around her waist and prop her up.
Our eyes meet and neither of us look away.
She’s beautiful and funny and before I know what I’m doing I feel myself pulling closer to her. With our lips almost touching, she steps up on her tiptoes and kisses me.
Her lips are soft but her mouth is strong. She buries her hands in my hair and I wrap my arms around her waist. I keep my eyes shut. When I open them for a moment, it only occurs to me that she is not Aurora.
I let out a sigh. Before I can step away, she grabs up my shirt and pulls me closer. A few moments later, we are on the kitchen floor.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Chelsea says.
“What?” I mumble through the kiss.
“You want me to be her.”
“No, of course not.”
“Yes, you do. And I want you to be Franklin."
She must be really drunk or maybe I am, but I don’t know how to respond to this.
“Listen, let’s just do this," she says. “I want to feel anything but pain. I want to feel something real.”
I shake my head. I might have been able to do it before but now it just feels too… Awkward.
I push away from Chelsea and get up. I walk over to the living room. I take a seat on her plush couch and stare at the unusual statue of a dragon in the corner of the room. It’s nearly six-feet tall and would be overwhelming the space if there were anything else around it.
“You don’t like it, do you?” Chelsea asks, plopping down on the seat next to me.
“No, not really.”
"You know, you’re the first person who has said that to me in a very long time.” She laughs. “No, actually! I think you’re the first person who has ever said anything like that to me.”
“Okay, thank you, I guess," I say.
“No, thank you. In my life, I have a lot of yes-men and not too many people telling me the truth about, well, anything.”
Chelsea gets up and walks over to the bar at the far end of the room. She pours herself a glass of wine and then asks me if I want anything.
I shake my head no. This evening has been long and drunk enough already.
"I thought that Franklin would tell you the truth,” I say. "He seems like the type.”
She shrugs her shoulders and sits down next to me on the couch, this time much closer.
“You would think so, but he had