The Friend Zone(57)

This is as good as it will ever be.

If Tyler couldn’t eclipse Josh, nobody could. And it made me start to cry because the whole fucking thing was completely and utterly hopeless.

His thumb moved along my jaw, and his eyes blinked back tears. He probably thought I was moved by the kiss. I guess I was. But not in his direction.

“I love you, Kris. I’m always going to love you,” he whispered. “Please forgive me.”

I looked away from him, wiping a tear from my cheek. “I can forgive you if you can forgive me back.”

He wrapped an arm around my shoulders and pressed his cheek to the side of my head.

Our embrace was full of loss and regrets and what-ifs.

Tyler was a version of my life. A path I could have taken. But now I was so far off course I didn’t even know where I was going anymore. All I knew was I was headed for a dead end.

And when I got there, I’d be alone.

“Kristen, have you ever heard of the red thread of fate?” Tyler said over me.

“No.” I sniffled.

He turned me until I sat facing him.

“I’ve been studying Mandarin,” he said, speaking to my eyes. “Learning a lot about the Chinese culture. And there was a story I read that really resonated with me.”

He reached out and tenderly wiped a tear off my cheek with his thumb. “In Chinese legend, two lovers are connected by an invisible red thread around their pinky fingers. The two people connected by the red thread are destined lovers from birth, regardless of place, time, or circumstances. The cord might stretch or tangle, but it can never break.”

His eyes moved back and forth between mine.

“You are on the other end of my thread, Kris. No matter how far apart we are, you’re tied to me. I stretched us and I tangled us and I’m sorry. But I didn’t break us, Kris. We’re still connected.”

He paused. That pause that he always did on the phone, the one that told me he was about to tell me the good part.

Then he pulled a tiny, black velvet box from his pocket and opened the lid.

My heart stopped dead. Oh my God.

“Marry me.”





TWENTY-THREE





Josh




I finished the last order Kristen had for me, but I stayed. I wanted to be there when she got home.

I wanted to see that she did come home.

The waiting was physically painful. My chest hurt like a bear trap was clamped over my heart. My mind ran wild. Where were they? At a restaurant talking? Or at a hotel, in his bed, making up?

No. She wouldn’t. We’d just been together last night. She wouldn’t, right?

Fuck, even the thought of her letting him hold her hand sent me into a meltdown.

He was here to get back with her—I had no doubt in my mind. The only thing I didn’t know was what she was going to do about it.

Watching her leave fucking killed me.

But I had no right to her at all. I didn’t even have the right to be upset. This was the guy—the one she’d been heartbroken over for the last month.

He was the guy, and I was no one.

I paced the garage. I paced the house. She was always home when I was there and the vacancy inside made my anxiety worse, reinforced the wrongness of it all. So I went back outside where at least I wasn’t looking at her empty couch.

My stomach grumbled, but I couldn’t eat. Even Stuntman Mike was worked up. He kept crying and looking at the driveway, following me around my workstation like he’d witnessed her kidnapping and was pissed I hadn’t done anything to stop it. Finally I just put him in his satchel and carried him around with me.

6:00.

7:00.

8:00.

There was only so late I could stay before it became obvious I’d been waiting for her. I’d never worked past 9:00 p.m. before. But if I left and just went home, I’d never know when she came back, or how she came back. Happy? Sad? Tomorrow, wearing the same clothes?

And what if he didn’t just drop her off? What if he came back to stay the night? I bet the fucker would love to rub that shit in my face. He’d probably do a goddamn victory lap.

Every car that drove by made my heart pound and head jerk up.

Maybe I should leave. I didn’t know if I could handle seeing them as a couple. I told myself if she wasn’t back by 9:00, I would go. Because the later it got, the more likely it was they were staying the night together—here or elsewhere. And either way it was better if I didn’t know about it.

Finally, at 8:17, a maroon Nissan pulled into the driveway.

She came back in an Uber.

Alone.

My relief was a thousand-pound weight off my chest. I could finally breathe again.

Three hours. They could have just been in a restaurant. The drive there, the drive back—that easily could have been one hour of the three. She didn’t stay the night with him. And after everything, she only gave him a few hours and didn’t let him come back with her? Maybe this was a good sign.

I took off the satchel—I’d rather die than let her see me use her dog purse—and made it look like I was busy laying carpet on the already finished steps and not sitting in the garage waiting for her to come home like a lovesick puppy dog.

She got out of the car and came in through the garage, holding her sweater in her hand, dragging the sleeve along the driveway. Stuntman Mike ran to meet her, bouncing and crying at her feet, but she didn’t reach down to pick him up.