Sleeping With Her Enemy(68)

Mostly, she was just staring at him with big, sad blue eyes.

He had been an insider for a brief, beautiful moment. Amy and Dax versus Jason and Julie. Amy and Dax versus Lin Harris. Amy and Dax versus the goddamned world.

He wanted back in.

Dax wasn’t an idiot. He could recognize when his self-imposed rules had grown too rigid.

Time to start sleeping with Amy Morrison again.

…

Everything started happening all at once. It had seemed to Amy like the song would never be over, that she would be forced to endlessly live out a waking nightmare in which the object of her imaginings literally manifested in front of her eyes.

She’d been thinking about the baseball game as she sang. The fake proposal. Pulling one over on that whole stadium, almost like they were professional criminals. That was probably the most fun she’d ever had. Except for the time they’d gone paddleboarding. Or…to the movies.

And then there he was. So gorgeous and so unexpectedly dear to her.

To know that she couldn’t have him—in any capacity—was as gutting, all of a sudden, as her non-wedding day had been. Worse. Because this time, she had come to realize, she’d really, truly lost something worth having.

His face was utterly blank as he stared at her. It was almost like he didn’t see her, like he was looking through her. And yet she felt the weight of his attention. She couldn’t wait for it to be over. To flee. But she dreaded it all at the same time.

Then he was coming at her. But so was her brother. For some reason, the prospect of Dax meeting her brother scared her. Dax’s family was so sweet. So normal. She feared, totally irrationally, that if he met hers—even Michael, the only normal member—they might somehow taint his.

Somewhere in the midst of all this, her phone started ringing. She glanced down. It was the moving company. She looked back up. Dax was still making a beeline for her, looking like he was going to explode in anger or…something.

She took the coward’s way out. “Hello?”

“Hello there. I’m calling from Canadian Movers to confirm your move tomorrow. The truck will arrive at your house on Ava Road between one and two p.m.”

“What? No. The move is scheduled for Sunday, not tomorrow.”

“Amy Morrison, 222 Ava Road?”

She furrowed her brow, stuck her finger in the ear that wasn’t resting against the phone to block out the noise of the bar, and turned her back on the two men who had arrived, one on either side of her.

“Yes, but the truck is supposed to come Sunday at one.”

“I’m sorry, that’s not what my records say.”

“Well, amend your records then.”

“I’m sorry, miss, I can’t do that. We don’t have any trucks free Sunday.”

Anxiety began to settle in her gut as she imagined her house, which was nowhere near ready to be moved. She was only halfway through packing.

“You’re going to have to tell me one way or the other, miss.”

“I’m sorry. What did you say?” She took a deep breath. She’d been letting panic get the best of her. She needed to concentrate.

“I said I will refund the deposit on the truck if you want to cancel it, or we can be at your house tomorrow at one.”

She swallowed a curse and shook her head. “I guess I’ll see you tomorrow at one then.”

“What’s the matter?” Dax and her brother said, pretty much in stereo, as she hung up.

Okay, no time now to wallow in heartbreak. Or whatever it was. “Mix-up with the moving company. The van is coming tomorrow.” She picked up her drink and downed the rest of it in one gulp. “Gotta go pack my house. And/or have a heart attack.”

“Shit.” Her brother ran his fingers through his hair. “Well, we’ll get it done—we’ll have to.”

She was already making a mental list. “We need to see if Jack and Cassie can help tomorrow instead of Sunday. And find out if the storage place can take my stuff a day early. I’m not booked to arrive there until Sunday, either.”

“Where are you moving?” Dax asked. “And where’s the storage space?”

“Dax, this is my brother, Michael. Michael, this is my…this is Dax.” She took a step back. No need for Dax to be all up in her space like that—pointless torture was not what she needed right now. “I bought a condo in a church conversion in the Junction,” she said. “But it’s not going to be done for another couple months, so I’m renting a place at Yonge and Bloor in the meantime. Storage is in Mississauga—I’m going to store some stuff I won’t need until the condo’s ready.”