Room-maid(14)

It wasn’t just that he was handsome and sexy, which he obviously was, but there was something magnetic about him. He was effortlessly charming. People were drawn to him and wanted to be close to him. Or at least that was true for my anecdotal evidence of having seen him in action with three different women. I had the feeling it would be true of almost every woman in his presence.

Hence the restraining order.

He spoke, interrupting my thoughts: “I forgot to say anything earlier, but I want you to be comfortable here. Please feel free to decorate however you want or put up pictures of your family or whatever.”

“Oh no, they don’t show up on film.” Not to mention the last thing I needed was my mother’s disapproving stare gazing out at me on a daily basis.

That made him chuckle and he said, “I am serious, though. The offer stands. This is your home now, too.”

“Thanks.” I couldn’t see myself actually doing it, though. He’d obviously paid a decorator a lot of money to get a specific look and I wasn’t going to mess with that. It was actually a little sad that he’d settled into this decor. As I looked around, I felt like the apartment lacked Tyler’s personality. It was technically beautiful, but it didn’t feel like a home. This was how he wanted to live his life and how he wanted to organize his space. Surrounded by showpieces meant to impress.

It was how my childhood home had been decorated, as well.

So regardless of how nice he was, and how gorgeous, I needed to remember that Tyler was like the people from my old life. I’d recently decided, mostly thanks to Brad and my parents, that I wasn’t interested in dating a man with money. I’d seen that life. I’d grown up in it. It wasn’t what I wanted. I didn’t want appearances to matter more than anything else. Where it was fine if your marriage was falling apart as long as you put on a brave face and pretended like everything was normal. Where you ignored your children and let them be raised by nannies because you had to go to the spa and take multiple vacations a year because of how very stressful your life was. A life where you pitted your children against one another and made them compete for your time and affection.

To be fair, there were probably wealthy families that were normal and functioned well. I just hadn’t met any of them yet.

Which meant that despite my daydreaming, I would never share a life or a home with Tyler. I wasn’t going to stay here long term. I was going to save up enough to get a decent apartment and then I would move on.

“So how long have you and Shay been friends?” he asked.

That flare of jealousy was back, but I put it out. “Since my freshman year of college.”

“What’s her story?”

The jealousy flamed up again. Was he interested? Or just making conversation? It didn’t matter, I reminded myself, and answered his question: “She’s a teacher, like me. She teaches math to the secondary students. Really smart. She’s a great person. She’s also, um, single. If you were interested.”

His food was halfway to his mouth and he froze for a second, as if I’d caught him off guard. It took him a moment to recover. “She seems nice, but she’s not really my type.”

What is your type? The words were on the very tip of my tongue and it was only with the greatest self-control imaginable that I managed to keep them inside me. As if I’d ask the question and then he’d turn slowly toward me and say, Why, you, of course. And then we’d kiss as the screen faded to black.

Nope. This was real life. Something I needed to remember.

I also needed to remember to keep my nose out of his private life. We were going to be roommates, not best friends.

“Message received.”

Again, he seemed anxious about having possibly offended me. “I don’t mean any disrespect to your friend. My life’s not really set up for a relationship. I have a lot of obligations.”

“Like what?” The words were out before I could stop them. Maybe I was the one being offensive, getting too personal. Even though I’d just told myself to stay out of it.

“That’s a very long story. Maybe I’ll share it with you another day.”

Yep, too far. Because that was a way to close down a line of questioning you didn’t want to answer.

It made me wonder about Shay’s instinct that he was seeing someone. It sounded as if he wasn’t, but I was not going to ask him anything further about it.

This conversation felt over and I was back to feeling stupid again.

“Well, I need to get some more unpacking done and then get ready to head over to my parents’. Thanks for dinner.” I carried my plate over to the sink and made sure to rinse it off. I had learned how important that was living at Shay’s. But she refused to let me help clean the kitchen because, as she said, I did everything wrong. That didn’t bode well for my situation with Tyler, but I would figure it out.

“Before you go, would it be okay if I talked to you about Pigeon’s schedule?”

“Sure.”

He came over and rinsed his plate off as well. He leaned in close, his warmth beckoning me, and I closed my eyes, inhaling his scent before I forced myself to take a step back. He left his plate in the sink, which made me feel marginally better that I had done the same. Shay was one of those as-soon-as-it’s-used-put-it-in-the-dishwasher kind of people. I’d done my best to remember but still routinely aggravated her.