Time (Laws of Physics #3)(67)

His eyes widened and he blinked at me.

I lifted an eyebrow. “This one woman?”

He made a resigned sound. “Drunk, she offered to go down on me in front of a room of other VIPs, which inspired more people to make the same offer. Nothing happened, though. I just left, no big deal.”

“God,” I croaked, and I did my best to ignore the sour taste in my mouth. “I’m sorry.”

He shrugged. I didn’t like how much he was shrugging, and I’d almost convinced myself the tight feeling behind my eyes wasn’t jealousy. Well, not really jealousy in the classical sense, because I trusted Abram. It was more like second-hand distress on his behalf.

A thought occurred to me, a worry, unsettling my stomach a little. And maybe next time don’t have so many jalape?os.

“What’s wrong?” Abram covered my hand with his. “Honestly, don’t worry. It’s nothing. It’s like, what can I do other than avoid the PAs and ignore the VIP sessions, right?”

“Abram, I am going to worry. People shouldn’t put their hands on you without your consent. That’s not okay.” In truth, it also made me uneasy because he sounded like me.

It’s nothing.

Nothing happened.

No big deal.

He squeezed my hand. “The tour won’t last forever. It wraps up this fall, and then I’ll be done.”

“Done? Aren’t you already working on another album?”

“Yes, but we’re not signed for two albums, just the one. I’ll stipulate in my contract that I don’t want to do a tour next time.”

My mouth dropped open. “You—you don’t want to do another tour?”

Abram shook his head, looking both determined and tired. “No. No more tours.”

“I—I can’t believe it.”

“Believe it,” he ground out, releasing my hand and reaching for his beer.

“This fall.” I said the words like I could conjure the time jump just by reciting them. “Where will you go? Do you need to live in New York? To record the next album?”

“No. I’ll go wherever you are.” He said this easily, like it was already decided, like it was obvious.

And it made me giddy, so I grinned and spoke without thinking, “We should get a house!” Ah!

Immediately, I wished the words back.

But he was also grinning. “Yeah. Sure. Where? In LA?”

Now I was out of breath, because I hadn’t expected his answer. “Are you serious?”

“Yeah. Why not?” He shrugged, like it was no big deal, and my heart deflated.

Bah. Of course. He wasn’t thinking of a house like I was thinking of a house, as a place to raise a family, as a home, a future, stability.

“Yeah. Maybe. No big deal.” I forced a smile and nodded, my attention focusing on my rice. “We’ll see.”





18





The Interiors of Stars





Abram





Feeling a little cooped up after a day spent inside, and craving Stan’s donuts, Mona convinced me to walk with her down to the donut shop. I didn’t require much convincing.

When we made it to Stan’s, after we’d ordered, after we’d sat down across from each other, I swiped some of her donut.

“For old time’s sake,” I said.

Scowling at my laughing eyes, she held the remainder to the side, supposedly out of my reach. “You are never invited again.”

That just made me laugh harder. Excusing myself, I returned a few minutes later with six chocolate cake donuts, handing her one and explaining the rest were for tomorrow morning.

“By the way, what time is it?” she asked, patting herself down. “Shoot. I left my phone in our room. I keep forgetting to check the clock.”

I shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s not time for you to leave yet, and that’s all I need to know.”

“Yes. We still have two days. Can you believe it?” She grinned at me, dancing happily in her seat.

I grinned back, pleased to see her mood had improved, but thinking three days wasn’t nearly enough. I also wondered when she was going to tell me why she’d grown so quiet after dinner. She’d seemed preoccupied, but not distant. A little sad, a little resigned.

“I have plans for tomorrow,” she said, pulling me from my thoughts.

“You do? Tell me.” I picked up my own donut, toasted coconut, and took a bite.

“First, we’ll go to Andersons and we’ll do some leisurely book browsing. And then, dinner at that Italian restaurant where we had our first date.”

My eyebrows ticked up an inch. “Our first date?”

“Yeah. You know, right after Andersons you took me to that place, and I had the lasagna.”

“You’re counting that as our first date?”

She looked at me as though I were odd. “Of course. Activity plus dinner makes it a date.”

I laughed. “Mona, I think your hindsight is not twenty-twenty. That was the night you told me I was behaving inappropriately.”

“So?”

“So, if it had been a date, then me making the moves wouldn’t have been inappropriate.”