Page 61 of Not Another Love Song

How silly of her. Music was never a safe topic between them.

“How ‘what’ feels like?” she whispered, watching his eyes come back to her, darkening.

Something cruel passed through his gaze, and his lips twitched. “Does Jacob know about us?”

Her blood warmed, hearing him say “us.” The way he addressed it head-on. But something stuck out to her. This fascination with Jacob.

She blinked, eyes widening. “Jacob is my roommate,” she said. “He’s gay.”

The smirk dripped off his lips, his eyes roving her face, drinking in her skin.

She frowned down at her Uber driver on the map. Francisco was four minutes away. “So you think I’d hook up with someone while I’m in a relationship?”

“I’m sorry,” he whispered to her. “Gwen, I’m sorry. I— Fuck.” She saw his hand move to touch her and pull back sharply.

“That’s not why I came over in the first place. So—”

“No, of course not. I’m the one…” She heard him huff, and the ruffle of his hand through his hair. “I instigated.” She kept her eyes down on the map of Francisco’s progress. “Why did you come over?”

She paused, hearing her blood rushing in her ears. “I wanted to play electric violin.” She chuckled, knowing that was only half of it.

She felt him move toward her, crowding her, taking up her air.

“You never got to.” He breathed against her ear. “We could go. Now. Back to the apartment, and you—”

“No. Thank you, though.” The thought made her light-headed. She felt the heat spreading through her as she realized something for the first time.

He wanted her. It wasn’t just about sex. It wasn’t just about luring her into something. It wasn’t about embarrassing her. And it wasn’t about trying to teach her how to play cello.

She pressed her lips together to keep from saying, “Yes, let’s go to your place,” and stared down at her phone, her heartbeat pounding as she watched the image of the car come closer to them.

“Gwen.”

She looked up at him, and his eyes stirred in her that feeling, that emotion that had danced through her when he played tonight. The feeling of being incomplete, just inches from the tonic. The peace.

His lips twitched upward, a small chuckle. “Or we could get tacos,” he said, smiling, and staring down at her, drifting over her like water.

She inhaled deeply. And the scent of alcohol on his breath solidified it for her.

“You’re drunk.”

“I can sober up—”

“And what about Chelsea?”

His eyes slid back and forth between hers, confused and searching. “Chelsea? What?”

She blinked, thinking of Chelsea’s absence from his Instagram, the lack of feminine touches in his apartment.

But that wasn’t the issue. The issue was Francisco in his black Toyota. The issue was how badly she wanted him to join her inside and come uptown with her. The issue was that playing electric violin at his apartment at one in the morning would be explosive—whether or not he had neighbors. That she didn’t trust either of them to keep their distance. They couldn’t just “get tacos” or “jam” or whatever the cool people said. If she spent more than another second in his presence, she’d beg him to touch her again. And she didn’t want that while he was drunk.

“I can’t,” she said. And she felt the string wobble, tugging them both into a frequency that was just unbearable. She saw it on his face. A rejection harsher than before. And that’s why she said, “Not tonight.”

His face relaxed, eyes wandering over her, lips parting.

Peace.

The tonic.

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