Mile High (Up in the Air #2)(47)

“Is it serious, Bianca? It seems really serious.” This came from Judith, who had no qualms about prying.

I had a hard time with girl talk, with opening up in general, but I wanted to try. “I don’t know. It feels that way, but it’s still so new.” I took a deep breath, continuing. “He wants me to move in with him.” I was surprised at myself for revealing that, but I wanted their opinions.

Every single one of them gasped, hands flying to their chests. It was comical.

“What did you say?” Jessa asked. She was the first one to recover, from the looks of the other ones.

I shrugged. “I told him we needed to spend more time together before I could consider something like that. He’s not easily deterred, though. He had a stylist, or dresser or whatever you call them, buy me a wardrobe for each of his houses, so he already has me kind of moved in, even though I never agreed to it.”

More comical gasping and some stuttering at that one.

“That’s crazy, right?” I asked, hoping to hear a sensible opinion.

I didn’t get one. Even sensible Brenda thought he was romantic, and hopelessly in love with me.

I didn’t tell them that he’d never said he loved me. It will hurt to say it out loud, I thought.

“You guys would have supermodel babies,” Judith said on a sigh, in fantasyland.

Jessa was watching me closely, and seemed to see something on my face at Judith’s words. “Oh, my, god, have you guys talked about having kids?”

I grimaced. “He mentioned it briefly. He dropped the issue when he saw that it made me want to run screaming. It’s all way too fast, right? It’s crazy to move so fast in a relationship, right?” I asked, again looking for a voice of sanity.

“Martin said he knew he was going to marry me on our very first date. He said he just knew, like something in his mind clicked. He said I was the missing piece in his life’s puzzle. He pursued me until I saw it, too. And that was twenty years and two kids ago, so it worked out for us.” Brenda smiled as her story got ‘ahs’ around the room.

Okay, even I could admit that story was pretty sweet.

“James strikes me as a man who knows what he wants,” Brenda continued. “I don’t see him changing his mind, either, not with the way he looks at you.”

Okay, I am not going to get any sobering advice from this crowd, I decided.

Next we moved on to manicures and pedicures, the guys joining us again. They weren’t a cute couple, I decided, watching them. They were beautiful, Stephan so muscular and golden, Javier so, well, pretty, and elegantly built.

“Me and Marnie are official losing it, guys,” Judith told us all.

“Did we ever even have it?” Marnie asked her, mock despair in her voice.

“What happened?” Jessa asked, laughing at the outrageous women. They were like a comedy duo, playing off of each other for an entertaining routine.

“We tried to get a guy to do a three-way with us, and he turned us down! ” Judith’s voice was bewildered.

I giggled a little. The unexpected turn of conversation had surprised it out of me.

“Captain Damien?” Stephan asked them sympathetically, but he couldn’t quite hold back his smile.

Marnie and Judith were in pedicure chairs next to each other, and they nodded at the same time, as though in sync.

“Don’t take it personal, girls, he’s hopelessly in love with Bianca,” Javier said, his first words in a while.

Stephan gave him a look, and Javier winced at me sympathetically.

My face flushed. I hoped he was joking, or at least mistaken.

“That’s not fair!” Judith told me. “You have Mr. Beautiful. Give us Damien!”

I wrinkled my nose. “Damien is just a friend. He’s not in love with me.” My voice was almost apologetic. I looked to Stephan for support. “You talk to him all the time, Stephan. Tell them he’s not into me.”

Stephan grimaced. “I’ve told him, over and over again, that you’re not interested in him like that, but he at least has a very enduring crush.”

“What do you mean by enduring?” I asked him, my eyes narrowed on him.

“Two years or so. And he stopped dating, and hooking up, at least six months ago, so that you would take him serious when he asked you out again. He thought that the fact that he’s a slut is what was keeping you from seeing him as more than a friend.”

I was shocked. All of this had been going on without my knowledge, and Stephan decided to tell me about it when we were getting our feet worked on by strangers, and in front of five of our friends. I gave him my best ‘WTF’ look.

It grew real quiet after that, the others sensing the sudden tension between Stephan and I. It was a good ten minutes before they all started chatting again, but I stayed silent, brooding.

I didn’t understand why Stephan had kept it from me, but I supposed it was an awkward thing to bring up, when he’d known how I clearly felt.

Stephan sat next to me when we got the manicures. He looked pretty cute, a big muscular guy in a soft robe, getting his nails done. I was smarter than to point it out, though.

He gave me a searching look. “I’m sorry. That came out at a bad time, but when you asked so directly, I couldn’t deny it. That was just the first time it came up, yanno?”