Chapter 8: WHY DOES HE HVE A SECOND PHONE?

MIA

I caught him in the hallway the next morning.

He was locking his door when I stepped out of my apartment, photo pulled up on my phone. I'd rehearsed what to say but seeing him made the words fade away.

"Hey," he said, turning. "Morning."

"You took a photo of me." I blurted before I could chicken out.

His expression didn't change. "I did."

"When I wasn't looking."

"Yes."

"With my camera."

"Yes." He stepped closer. "Are you asking me to explain or are you telling me you're upset?"

"Both."

He nodded slowly. "You were laughing and you looked happy so I wanted to capture it." He paused. "I should have asked first."

"Yeah. You should have."

"I'm sorry. I overstepped."

I searched his face for something. Defensiveness, maybe. Or the kind of entitled explanation Ren would have given about why he had a right to take what he wanted. But Dante just stood there waiting for my response with the same unreadable expression he always wore.

"Just ask next time," I said finally.

"There won't be a next time. Not without your permission."

"Okay."

We stood there for a moment and I realized I didn't know what else to say. I'd come out here ready to be angry but his immediate admission and apology had deflated it. Maybe Yuna was wrong. Maybe he really was just someone who didn't understand normal boundaries.

"I meant what I said," he added. "You looked happy. It was a good shot."

"I haven't decided if that makes it better or worse."

"Fair." He almost smiled. "Are we okay?"

Was that what we were doing? Deciding if we were okay? Butterflies erupted in my stomach at the way he said “we” almost as if we were a—

"Yeah. We're okay."

"Good. I'd hate to lose my photographer over a misunderstanding."

"Is that the only thing you'd be losing?"

Something flickered in his eyes but his expression stayed neutral. "What else would I be losing?"

Ouch.

I didn't have an answer for that so I changed the subject. "I should get going. I have a client meeting at ten."

"I'll see you later then."

It should have ended there but it didn't. That night he knocked on my door with takeout from a Thai place I'd mentioned liking. Three nights later I ran into him coming back from a late shoot and we ended up talking in the hallway for an hour about nothing important. The night after that he texted asking if I wanted to split a bottle of wine and watch a movie and I said yes before I could think better of it.

We fell into a routine soon enough. We spent a lot of time together, sometimes in silence, sometimes we talked about work, each conversation getting more personal. We shared meals in the hallway, little cafes or in my apartment.

It felt so natural like we'd known each other longer than three weeks.

That should have been the warning sign.

"I'm making dinner tonight," Dante said when I ran into him in the lobby Friday evening. "You should come over."

"You don't have to keep feeding me."

"I know. I want to." He held the elevator door for me. "I cook too much for one person anyway. It's wasteful."

"What are you making?"

"Just pasta. Nothing fancy."

I almost said yes immediately but something made me hesitate. Dinner at his place felt different than the hallway conversations or splitting takeout. It felt more intimate.

"Come on," he said, cutting through my thoughts."You've fed me twice this week. Let me return the favor."

"I gave you leftovers."

"Which were excellent." The elevator stopped at our floor. "Seven thirty?"

I should have said no and kept some distance. My brain told me to listen to the voice in my head that sounded suspiciously like Yuna saying this was too much too fast.

"Okay. Seven thirty."

His apartment was bigger than mine. Same layout but he'd actually furnished it properly with a real couch, dining table, art on the walls that looked expensive. But everything was clean and organized in a way that felt like he was either a neat freak or just didn't live here much.

"Make yourself comfortable," he said, gesturing toward the living room. "Wine?"

"Sure."

He poured two glasses and handed me one. I sat on the couch and watched him move around the kitchen with ease. He'd changed out of the button-down from earlier into a plain black t-shirt that somehow made him look more sexy.

"How was your week?" he asked.

"Ugh, don't remind me. It was very busy. I had three client shoots and I'm still editing the photos from our last session."

"How are they turning out?"

"Good. Really good actually." I took a sip of wine. "You're very photogenic."

"Is that a professional assessment?"

"It's a fact."

He smiled and went back to cooking. I found myself watching the way he moved. There was something so sexy about a man who knew how to cook.

Twenty minutes later we were sitting at his dining table with plates of pasta that looked like a five star restaurant quality. I took a bite and stopped.

"This is really good."

"Thank you."

"No. I mean this is really really good." I took another bite. "This is my favorite. How did you—"

I stopped myself but he'd already noticed.

"How did I know?" He set down his fork. "You mentioned it actually, a few days ago. Don't you remember?"

Had I? I tried to remember but came up empty. "When?"

"When we were talking about restaurants in the neighborhood. You said you'd been craving a good carbonara."

I frowned, then said slowly, "I don't remember saying that."

"You were tired. We'd been talking for a while." He picked up his fork again. "I have a good memory for details."

That was the second time today he'd dismissed away something that felt off. First the photo. Now this. Both times with reasonable explanations that didn't quite settle right.

"You have a very good memory," I said.

"Is that a problem?"

"No. It's just... most people don't remember everything."

"I'm not most people."

There was something in his tone that made me look up but his expression was the same as always. Calm and unreadable. The hairs at the back of my arm stood but I shook my hea.d I was allowing Yuna infect me with her paranoia.

We finished dinner with a little conversation that seemed stiff. It was almost as if we both knew that there was something unspoken between us but neither wanted to address it. When we were done I offered to help clean up and he didn't argue.

"Dishes in the sink," he said. "I'll get the containers."

I started rinsing plates while he moved around behind me putting away leftovers. The kitchen was small enough that we kept almost colliding. His hand brushed my back when he reached past me for something. My elbow bumped his hip when I turned to set a glass on the counter.

Each accidental touch felt more intimate than it should have.

"Where do you keep the dishcloths?" I asked, opening the drawer closest to me.

Inside was a phone but not the iPhone I'd seen him use before. This was old and not quite something a regular person would use as a second phone, even if they needed one.

I stared at it.

"Wrong drawer."

I jumped. Dante was right beside me, his chest pressed against my back as he reached forward and closed the drawer fast.

"Dishcloths are over there," he said, nodding toward the other side of the kitchen.

Although his voice was even and expression unchanged, the air around us had shifted and I couldn't tell if it was my imagination or if the space between us had become charged with tension that hadn't been there a second ago.

I looked at him and he looked back and neither of us said anything about the second phone I'd just seen in his drawer.

"Right," I said finally. "Thanks."

I walked to the other drawer and found the dishcloths exactly where he said they'd be. Behind me I heard him go back to putting things away like nothing had happened.

But there was something about that phone that I just couldn't take my mind off of.