“About Gill. About … Solène.” I glance at the staircase through the archway behind us, but nobody's there, no creaking of floorboards or snicking of doors.
“Ah,” Aveline says, running her long fingers through that ruby red hair of hers. It's half up in a messy bun and half hanging down around her ears. “That.”
“Yeah, that,” I say, picking at the design on my leggings, the black and gray triangles that make up the pattern. “I knew working with Gill would be hard, but I didn't know it'd be this bad.”
“You still love him?” she asks me, and I feel something shatter deep inside, shards of glass cutting at the edges of my soul. My breath hitches and it's the only answer she needs. Aveline's a smart woman. “Have you talked about that with him?” she asks tentatively, her voice holding onto something that I feel like I should be able to decipher.
“I can't,” I tell her. “No, no, that's not right. I can do anything I set my mind to.” Self-talk, always helps. “But I won't.”
“Why not?” she asks me as I look up and meet the spring green of her gaze. “Listen, I don't know what happened between the two of you, but Gill's never shacked up with anyone as long as I've known him and I've known him for years.”
I hate how much that thought heats my blood.
“Have you ever slept with him?” I blurt, needing to know for sure. It's not that I'd hold it against her—or even Gill for that matter—but I want to know before I tell her anything else. Aveline recoils a little, like the thought's an anathema to her.
“Like I said, he's hot, but—and no offense to you or anything—he's a little prickly for my tastes. What I mean is, he's kind of a dick.” Laughter bursts from my throat and I clamp a hand over my mouth. Aveline smiles softly at me.
“But you said you'd seen him naked?” I ask and understanding dawns on her pale features.
“Gill and me, we've been through some shit together. I've happened to catch a glimpse of him nude, but it was nothing like that.” I breathe a sigh of relief, grateful that the only friend I have to talk to isn't one of my stepbrother's lovers. “So I'm a safe bet. Tell me whatever you want to tell me, and it won't leave this living room.” So perceptive. It's a little unnerving to talk to someone like that, but I'm used to it.
“Gill and me … we … were in love once.”
I wet my lips and pause outside Gilleon's bedroom door, listening to the silence of the apartment and the gentle ticking of the clock in the living room. Outside, the rest of Paris goes about their business, not knowing or caring that this moment, for me, is a historic one.
I reach down for the knob and turn it slowly, finding my stepbrother sitting on the edge of his bed with a book in one hand. He looks up at me as I walk in, smiling softly. I wonder if he can tell from my facial expression what I've got planned.
“Hey there,” he says, closing the book and tossing it onto his nightstand. “I was wondering when you were going to come out of that room of yours. Don't you know that Dad and Elena are gone for the night?” Gill grins big and brushes some dark hair from his forehead. “I was thinking we could make out.”
“I was hoping to do more than make out,” I tell him, reaching down and hooking my fingers under my T-shirt. My heart hammers in my chest and I take that brief moment when the fabric is covering my face to snatch a deep breath. I toss the shirt onto the floor, feeling so exposed, so naked in my lacy blue bra. It's the fanciest one I own, purchased at one of the boutiques in Le Marais with my savings.
Purchased just for this.
“Regi,” Gill says, standing up suddenly, the warm glow of his bedside lamp illuminating the straight sturdy perfection of his nose, the slope of his jaw, the dark brows framing his brilliant eyes. I bite my lower lip hard enough to hurt, but I don't wake up from this dream, this spell that I find myself under every day that I wake up and see Gill for the first time. “Are you sure about this?” he asks, taking a long, slow, deep breath.
I've never been more sure of anything in my life. But I don't tell him this. The words sound too sappy, too cliché, even if they're true.
Instead, I answer him by reaching down and popping the top button on my jeans.
Gill's hands curl into fists by his sides and then relax as I move towards him, pausing at the end of the bed, my eyes hooded and my pulse pounding.
“Regi,” Gill says again, more softly this time, his bare feet quiet on the wood floor as he steps over to me, his hands hovering above my hips like he's not sure this is even really happening. Gill and I have gotten close to taking things all the way, but we never dropped over the edge, never let our hearts take us where our bodies so desperately wanted to go.