Though, if you’re a good friend, you’d answer all three.”
“Fine. No, we did not kiss. We sort of talked about feelings. I don’t know if I’m in love with him, but that’s entirely irrelevant.”
“Love is never irrelevant, but we’re going to park that for now because I choose door number two. Feelings. What did you talk about?”
“Rachel would never make me do this.”
“True. Because Rachel is as bad at talking about her feelings as you are.”
Might as well get this over and done with. “He said he’d planned to quit his job. So we could have a chance. But that he can’t anymore because he needs his job to support his daughter.”
Anna was silent. After a few seconds, Lacey opened her eyes and checked her screen to make sure they were still connected. “Anna?”
“Sorry. I was wondering how on earth you don’t kiss someone after they’ve said something like that.”
This time it was Lacey who was silent.
“Oh, wow.”
“What?” Lacey tugged the covers up to her neck.
“You would have kissed him, but he didn’t kiss you. Why didn’t he kiss you?”
It was like Anna had somehow hacked into CCTV footage of them from the evening before. “He said my job was too important. And that he didn’t want to do anything that he couldn’t follow through on.” She rubbed her eyes. “I can’t believe he said that when he doesn’t even know.” Oh, she hadn’t meant to say that aloud.
“Doesn’t know what?”
“You can’t tell anyone. Like no one. Not even Rachel.”
“Just tell me.”
“Meredith offered me a big promotion. Like CEO big.” It was the first time she’d said the words aloud. Lacey O’Connor. CEO.
Lacey held the phone away from her ear as a squeal reverberated from Colorado.
“So you pretty much threw yourself at him, and he turned you down. Because your job was too important, and he didn’t even know about this.”
She’d just told Anna she was going to be in charge of a large multinational company, and Anna had turned it straight back onto Victor. Fancy that. Lacey should be annoyed, but she was too busy trying not to remember the feeling of Victor’s lips in her hair.
“So, not that I want to scare you off or anything, but you get that he loves you, right?”
Lacey managed a half-laugh around her increased heart rate. “Did you miss the part where we haven’t even been on a date?”
“Lace, I know you haven’t seen a whole lot of it, but this is what love looks like. Choosing the other person. Wanting the best thing for them. What he did last night? That’s love.”
The words hit Lacey so hard that she dropped her phone and had to scramble to find it among the blankets.
Anna couldn’t be right. He couldn’t love her. He barely knew her. She lifted the phone back to her ear.
“He can’t love me.” There was a tinge of desperation to her words. Attraction, she knew what to do with. Like, she knew what to do with. Flirting, she knew what to do with. But love? The kind of love Anna was talking about? She had no idea what to do with that.
“Oh, honey, you don’t get to have a choice. The choice is his, and he’s chosen you.”
There was a knock at the door, saving her from the conversation. Saving her from the feelings causing her heart to try and escape her ribs.
“Yes.” It was an instinct answer. She should have said no. Or go away. Because there was only one person who could be on the other side, and she wasn’t ready to see him with Anna’s insistent words in her ears.
The door opened, and Victor stuck his head in. “Morning.”
“Do you love me?”
Do you love me?
The words had flown out of Lacey’s mouth from where she sat—in what Victor assumed was one of his mother’s nightgowns—among a pile of sheets and blankets.
Her hair was disheveled, her eyes wide, and her phone was in her hand. Someone squawked from the other end.
“Nope, go back outside. Right now. We’re going to pretend I never said that. Goodbye.” Lacey untangled herself out from her bedding and strode across the bedroom like she intended to physically manhandle him out of the door. Good luck with that.
Do you love me? Heart thudding, Victor stepped into the room and closed the door behind him.
“Nope. Not acceptable. Uh uh. You’re on the wrong side of the door.” She was still holding her phone, which Victor plucked from her hand while she was busy jabbing him