hand over her lips, the other slamming the curtain back in place, she backed up and stumbled onto the bed. The prompt cards scattered to the floor, but thankfully the Angelica was all right.
“Will you open the window!” Abby’s voice hissed though the glass and fabric.
Lexi did, and the sight made her want to cry all over again. It wasn’t Marc. He hadn’t crawled up her trellis, hadn’t come to say he was in love with her, and even worse, she didn’t know if he regretted hurting her. If he had even felt what she had. And if his chest ached to the point of suffocation.
“It’s you,” Lexi sighed, unable to hide the disappointment in her voice. “What are you doing?”
Abby stared. “What does it look like I’m doing? I’m breaking you out of this self-imposed hellhole.”
“Oh.” For some reason that made sense. “Why didn’t you come through the door?”
“Because it’s locked.”
“I would have let you in. Plus, there’s a spare key. I hid it under the gnome.” Marc knew it was there. He had used it a few times to wake her up in the morning after his run.
God, she missed him.
“Great to know. Next time I have to knock for over an hour, I’ll remember that.”
“How are you all the way up here?” Lexi leaned out the window, around Abby, and squinted at the bright-yellow ladder wedged up against the side of the building. Then she looked at the window across the alley and wondered if he was in there. She had pulled her blinds so he wouldn’t see her crying, but every few hours she checked for a sign of him. She never found one.
Maybe he had fallen asleep on his desk, waiting for her to open her blinds. She nudged her tank top lower, happy that she had forgone a bra, leaned out the window farther, and asked, really loudly, “Where did you get the ladder?”
Lexi looked at his window. No lights. No movement. Just depressing darkness.
“I borrowed it from Jack,” Abby said, giving her a really weird look.
“So it’s Jack now, huh? What did that cost you?”
“Three extra piano lessons, and—” Abby paused. “Why are you yelling? Are you drunk?”
“No.” Lexi smiled. Then laughed. Then slapped a hand over her mouth.
Abby leaned in and immediately jerked back, her nose wrinkling. Abby had a perfect nose, pert with a few freckles, and it even looked cute when crinkled up in disgust. “Did you fall in a vat?”
“Nope.” Lexi sat back on the bed and snagged the bottle of Angelica off the nightstand, shoving it in Abby’s face and nearly knocking her friend off the ladder.
“Give me that.” Abby snatched at the bottle, but Lexi held on.
“He broke my heart, Abs,” Lexi whispered.
Abby’s eyes went soft with understanding. “I know. He’s an idiot, and the only thing that saved him from having to place his own ‘Where’s My Dick’ ad is that he’s my brother, and I love him.”
“Me too,” Lexi said, and the tears pooled up again.
“I know you do. At the farmers’ market, I knew.” She took Lexi’s hand in her own tiny one and squeezed. “Would it help if I said that Marc knows he messed up and that he didn’t know Jeffery was after your recipes until it was too late and then he was stuck between disappointing you and my other brothers?”
Lexi thought about it and shook her head. He had still kept secrets from her, and good intentions or not, secrets hurt. Sometimes they hurt worse than lies. And Lexi was tired of being hurt.
“Would it help if I said I think he loves you back, but being that he’s a DeLuca with the Y chromosome, he couldn’t help but screw this up?”
“That makes it worse.” Lexi took in a shuddery breath and tried not to cry. Imagining a life without him had been devastating. But what if Abby was telling the truth? What if he did love her? She would be walking away from her only chance of spaghetti-splattered-apron kind of love. “I don’t know what to do. This is different than Jeffery. I’m not embarrassed or angry. God, Abs, it hurts so bad.” She patted the spot above her heart that felt like it was missing, like it would never be whole again. “I can’t even breathe.”
“Which is why you’re going to go grab a towel before we both wind up drunk and crying.”
“I don’t want to go—”
“Grab a towel.” Abby gave Lexi one last look and then started