Page 7 of Like First Love, Again

“I’m going to help an old acquaintance in need and move on with my life. It’s not a big deal.” Tori manifested her reality.

“Oh, she’s an acquaintance now?” Larissa chuckled. “You’re doing a lot of distancing, babe.” Her expression lost its perennial amusement.

“It’s not that serious.” Tori finished her beer. “I’m just?—”

“No?” Larissa cocked her head to the side. “You’re not gonna get all entangled with this woman to feel the illusion of intimacy without putting anything on the line?”

Tori nearly choked on her drink. She set down the glass too hard. “What?”

“I hate to do this, but I can’t ignore the possibility of spectacular heartbreak and I have to say it.” Larissa’s tone was more serious than she’d ever heard it.

“Say what?” Tori’s irritation was the harsh edge on her consonants.

Larissa had always been direct, and the fact that she was hesitating was making Tori’s pulse jackhammer in her neck.

“Do you think that maybe…just maybe…you only give people a chance when you know it can’t go anywhere? Can’t get hurt if they can’t really get to you?”

“Absolutely not,” Tori shot back without dignifying the question with any consideration.

“No?” Larissa crossed her arms over her chest. She was in agent mode, focused and unyielding. “Explain Shannon then.”

“Shannon?” Tori had dated the real estate lawyer for six months last year. Not only had she been so very gay that she went on family vacations with her kids and ex-wife, Shannon had been the one to dumpher.

“Yes, Shannon. The very lovely lady who gave youthe ick.” Larissa pretended to wrack her brain, tapping her chin for the extra flair of drama. “Why was that again?”

Tori blinked at Larissa. She wasn’t going to indulge her game. The conversation was pointless. Tori was just as open to finding her forever as any other single lesbian barreling toward middle age.

“Oh, right!” Larissa punctuated the moment with a single thunderclap that rivaled all the noise in the brewery. “She giggled.”

Tori bit the inside of her cheek to stop the reflexive laugh at Larissa’s ridiculous performance. She couldn’t help but finish the incomplete portrait. “In her sleep,” she said under her breath. “And it was disturbing as hell.”

Larissa’s dark eyes ignited with self-satisfaction. “A stable, emotionally intelligent, mature, and attractive woman who was super into you, and you fumbled her.” She picked up her half-empty glass. “You could’ve just invested in earplugs.”

“She broke up withme,” Tori reminded her again.

“And you definitely didn’t drift away until she got sick of chasing you.” Larissa sharpened the fact to a point and flung it right at Tori’s chest.

An eye roll was all Tori had at her disposal. “It wasn’t about the giggling. There just wasn’t a spark. Do you want me to settle?”

“Never.” Larissa reached out and squeezed her shoulder. “I love you, you tightly-wound little control freak. I want you to be happy, and I’m afraid that getting mixed up with the girl you think hung the moon is going to make it even harder for you to fall for a mere mortal.”

Tori replied to the unusual show of tenderness with a lopsided smile. “I love you, too. And I’m not gettingmixed upin anything. I’m going to help someone in need and then she’s going to go back to not existing, okay?” She signaled to the bartender to close out their tab. “I barely have to interact with her to sell her mom’s house. It’s going to be fine.”

Larissa’s face said she didn’t believe a word Tori said, but she was too good of a friend to say so.

A few minutes later, Tori stumbled into her two-story loft. Being on the eighteenth floor meant she rarely covered the floor-to-ceiling windows that made her place feel endless. She’d gotten her pick of units. It had been a no-brainer to choose one facing the bay. In the distance, Miami Beach was always glittering with life despite the stillness of her silence. It made the world feel vast and within reach all at once.

The moon gave her enough light to see while she kicked off her shoes and carried them upstairs to her bedroom perched above the open concept living space. There wasn’t a place in her house that didn’t bask in the wall of windows. Without the possibility of peeping neighbors, even her shower and standalone tub had an unobstructed view.

Peeling off her clothes, she dropped her trousers into the darks side of her hamper. The top went into dry-clean-only, and her underwear went into the whites before she padded acrossthe marble bathroom and into her walk-in shower. With the moon at her back, she stepped under the waterfall of hot water.

As she shampooed her hair, she imagined herself as a member of Artemis’ band preparing for a hunt. Washing out the doubt and confusion, she replaced it with the feminine power of the silvery light.

Tori chuckled to herself.Fuck, I’m drunk.

After towel-drying her hair, she slipped into soft shorts and a tank. Her king-sized bed faced the windows where the sunrise woke her every morning. She dropped into bed and closed her eyes.

She refused to let out the feelings thrashing in the locked basement of her chest. Refused to think about what Larissa said. Everything in her life was under control. She’d made sure of that.

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