Beg for It(45)

Tyler gave Caitlyn another look. “Auntie says he’s loaded. Do you think he’ll buy me a new—”

“He’s not going to buy you anything,” Corinne interrupted sternly. “That’s rude.”

“Yeah, he’s her boyfriend, not an ATM!” Caitlyn waggled her brows, making Tyler laugh.

Corinne gave them both a look that did nothing to stop the giggling. “I’m glad you’re both amused.”

“Sorry.” Caitlyn sobered up, but barely.

It took another ten minutes or so, but finally the project was finished and Tyler packed off to bed with a reprimand not to let his work wait until the last minute again. Corinne came back to the kitchen to find her sister had cleared the dining room table and was wiping down the counters as the dishwasher hummed. She looked up when Corinne came in.

“He called again while you were with the kid.”

Corinne took her phone off the charger. “Should I even bother to yell at you for telling them?”

“I didn’t, actually.” Her sister turned to lean against the edge of the sink. “They asked me, though, if you were seeing someone after you left me with them that Friday night and didn’t get home until the wee hours of the morning. Peyton’s the one who guessed it was Reese, by the way. I tried to play it off, but they’re not so dumb.”

Corinne pursed her lips. “No. I guess they’re not. I should have told them, I guess.”

“Are you going to bring him around? Is he really your boyfriend now? You haven’t told me a damn thing, but you’ve been walking around all week like a cat that got into the artisanal yogurt.”

“Very funny.” Corinne rolled her eyes and swiped her phone’s screen to see if Reese had left a voicemail. Two missed calls, one voice message. She held her phone to her chest for a moment, helpless against the giddy grin that crept over her face.

“Look at you.” Caitlyn sounded surprised. “Wow. You’re really into him. Even after all this time?”

“It’s always like that in the beginning with someone.”

Caitlyn gave her sister a look. “This isn’t the beginning. You guys have had a thing forever.”

“You can’t count a thing that ended more than a decade ago as a thing, Caitlyn.”

“Tell me you feel the same about him as you would any brand-new beau, and I’ll believe you.”

“I do, it’s just the way you feel when you first start going out with someone. That’s all.”

“Liar,” her sister said. “You’re such a liar!”

It had only been three days since she and Reese had eaten Chinese food on the floor of his office. She’d promised him a list in place of a contract but hadn’t yet finished it. They’d both been coasting on the giddy thrill of what had happened between them, she thought. The list, a discussion, putting words to what they’d agreed to be to each other…that was going to make it all too real.

“We’re seeing each other,” Corinne said.

“Exclusively?”

“Yes.”

Caitlyn lowered her voice, looking conspiratorial. “And you’re doing it with him.”

“Oh my God.”

“I knew it!” Caitlyn cried.

Corinne went to the fridge to pull out the bottle of seltzer water and poured herself a bubbly glass. She took her time sipping from it before she answered her sister. “It’s all so weird, Caitlyn.”

“Uh-oh.” Caitlyn also went to the fridge, but pulled out a can of cola and popped the top. “Weird like how? Like whips and chains weird, or…”

“No chains. No whips.” Corinne hesitated, then admitted, “Well, maybe chains? But probably not a whip. Maybe a flogger. Shit, I don’t know. It’s been so long since I did anything like this. I don’t know what I want to do, or what we’ll do. Shit. I can’t believe this is happening. Reese Fucking Ebersole. After all this time. It’s not real. Is it real?”

Caitlyn pulled a bag of pretzels from the cupboard and set it on the table, then waved her sister to sit. “You tell me.”

“I don’t know.” Corinne fished a handful of pretzels from the bag and nibbled one.

“Nobody ever does, to be honest.”

Corinne laughed. “Very profound.”

“Keeping it real,” her sister answered with a grin that faded after a second or so. “Look. It’s time you get back out there. Some people never get a second chance with their one great love.”

Corinne did not try to deny that description, though she wanted to. “He came back to me, Caitlyn. After all these years, he came back to me. That has to count for something, right?”

To her annoyance, she felt the rise of tears in her throat and had to clear it to hold them back. Her sister looked sympathetic. She didn’t want sympathy. Shit, she didn’t want this to be such a big deal.

But it was.

“Ride the wave, girl. Ride the wave.” Caitlyn shook her head slowly. “What else can you do?”

“I could break it off with him now, before it gets out of control.”

“You just got back together with him! What, are you crazy? Don’t you dare.” Caitlyn caught her sister’s look and scowled. “Look, you bitch, some of us haven’t had any sex in so long our vaginas have become a dry and dusty wasteland.”