Baiting Him (How to Catch an Alpha #2)(15)
“I want you to be happy too,” she tells me softly.
“I am happy, Mom,” I assure her.
She shakes her head. “I know you think you are, honey, but I promise you, when you actually feel happiness, the kind of happiness that roots itself in you and takes over your soul, you’ll know what I mean when I say I want you to be happy.”
I understand what she’s saying. I also know I’ll never be able to convince her that I am actually happy. Kind of . . . pretty much. Luckily for me, our drinks and then dinner arrive, giving us something else to focus on. We both dig into our meals with abandon and chat only about things that are easy to talk about.
After we finish with dinner, we walk out to the parking lot and hug goodbye before we get into our cars. As I drive to my place, the anticipation of seeing Gaston causes a jolt of adrenaline to sweep through my system. I should have opened up to my mom about him tonight. She was her old self throughout dinner, and I know the woman she was before my dad did what he did would have been happy to hear about the guy I was seeing.
Maybe next time, I think as I park in my designated parking spot. I send Gaston a text when I get out of my car to let him know I’ll be there soon, and he immediately texts back with a smiley emoji. When I got up this morning, I found two texts from him: one from last night wishing me a good night and the other from this morning wishing me a good morning. Having been with guys who didn’t put themselves out there, I wasn’t sure what to think about Gaston’s texts. Really, I’m not sure what to think about him in general. He doesn’t seem to be playing any sort of game. If anything, he just seems sure about wanting to get to know me.
Once I reach the lobby, I check my mailbox. I shove the stack of what I’m sure is mostly junk mail into my purse, then walk toward the bank of elevators. Inside, I scan the numbers, looking for the one that will take me up to Gaston. I never paid much attention to the numbers before now, but when I see that his is actually the last on the keypad, my heart lodges in my throat.
The top-floor condos are all huge, at a little over three thousand square feet. All have balconies triple the size of mine, along with three bedrooms, four baths, and designer kitchens. When I bought my place, I was shown one of the units, even though it was way more than anything I could afford. I remember walking through the door, wondering why someone would pay so much to live in a building when they could buy a house on the beach for not much more. I should say, I wondered until I saw exactly how luxurious they were.
I press the button, and as soon as the doors close, my nerves kick into overdrive. It doesn’t take long to reach the top floor, and when the doors open, I find him waiting for me, leaning back against the wall with his hands shoved in the front pockets of his jeans. We stare at each other, and then after a long moment, he holds out his hand and grins.
I place my hand in his and then laugh as he tugs me toward him and wraps me in a hug. Apparently, my mom isn’t the only one with magical hugs. As soon as I’m pressed against him, I let out a quiet sigh.
“You smell like cake,” he tells me, burying his face in my hair.
“Is that a bad thing?”
“Hell no, I fucking love cake.”
Giggling, I look up at him. He studies my face for a moment, and my entire being starts to fill with anticipation. When he leans in and only softly touches his lips to the tip of my nose, I’m disappointed, but just slightly, because that kiss was sweet.
“Come on. I want to show you my place,” he says, and I let him take my hand and lead me down the hall.
The space, even from my vantage point near the entrance, is beautiful. In the sunken living room, there is an overstuffed light-gray couch, two darker-gray chairs, and a long, shiny, black coffee table, all centered around a fireplace that takes up part of the wall, with the biggest TV I have ever seen mounted above it. I can see the kitchen, at least part of it, and it’s all dark cabinets and marble countertops. The entire space looks like it’s staged to go on the market tomorrow, not like someone is actually living in it.
I start to tell him his home is beautiful but stop when a tiny white blur flies across the room. I freeze for a moment, thinking I’m imagining things, and then blink in surprise when Gaston bends down to pick up the fluffy ball of white fur.
“You have a dog,” I say, and he grins, running his fingers over the top of the dog’s head as it attempts to lick the underside of his jaw.
“This is LeFou,” he tells me, coming closer to where I’m standing.
“You’re kidding? You named your dog LeFou—LeFou, as in Gaston’s sidekick from Beauty and the Beast?”
“I didn’t name him. My mom did before she delivered him to me as a birthday present. At that point, I couldn’t change his name, since he wouldn’t respond to anything else.” I start to laugh, the image of him with the tiny dog and its name too much for me to handle. “You’re going to give him a complex,” he tells me, and I laugh harder, then wipe away the tears that are running down my cheeks.
“Sorry, LeFou, you’re adorable.” I hold out my hand, and he sniffs my fingers before he licks them. I carefully take the tiny dog from his grasp, and the moment I have him in my hold, he goes crazy, licking any part of me he can reach while his tiny body wiggles uncontrollably. “He’s cute. And your place is beautiful,” I tell Gaston, and his expression fills with pride.