Page 69 of The Catch

She's not slurring her words, and that wasn't quite a hiccup either, but I inspect her with curiosity. I have never really seen Ames under the influence.

"Is there such a thing?" I ask.

She frowns. "I shouldn't."

"Go right ahead, Amy. Pay close attention. I'll love every second of it."

She chuckles, thinking I'm making fun of things.

"Let's take it easy, then." I make a long pass of my fingers on her arm. "We said we would celebrate."

"You have work tomorrow."

"We're celebrating." I clink our glasses and we drink some more. "I'll sleep another time."

"We'll go to bed soon. Each to our own room!" She giggles. "They were teasing me earlier about us living together."

"Evie and them?"

"Yep." She takes a big gulp of her drink. "I was teasing Pen about Bear. She keep— keeps making comments about him so we teased her. Then she teased me about my comments about you and she gave back as hard as she got."

"Wait. Were you making comments about me to them?"

I'm vain enough to love the thought. Greedy enough to be thankful she's been drinking and some filters have come off.

"You can't blame me." She points an accusing finger at me. "I have eyes. I live with you. I danced with you. I am a warm blooded human who likes sex and who hasn't had a mind-blowing night in years and years..."

The air in the room turns to fog, dense as it comes into my lungs and stays there. It's harder to breathe, to know this about her. I want to tell her it's a terrible injustice, that she deserves better. That if she only lets me, I could give her what she needs. That I could set the standard for what she should expect.

She only needs to give up on the happily ever after bit.

Fuck.

She laughs. "Oh my god. I shouldn't have said that. Will you forget I said that?"

"I can't forget it."

"Oh, well, then— fuck it. It's true, and you can do the math."

"What math?"

Because all my brain is doing is trying to argue that maybe, just maybe, Ames is thinking of flings and mind-blowing sex more than she is about long-term relationships that lead to forever.

This plus that, minus him, multiplied by me…

"Did you figure it out, yet, Sherlock?" She drinks the rest of her drink and goes to the kitchen, where she starts making herself another one. "Actually, don'tbother. I'll tell you. One, you're unfairly sexy. Two, Aidan was boring in bed. Element—aril—ly."

She laughs like it's the funniest thing she has ever said.

I finish my drink and meet her in the kitchen. I lean on the island and watch her carefully. She takes my glass and makes me another drink, too.

She's frowning now, shaking her head.

"You okay, Ames? Let's switch to water for a bit."

"I hate him, Saint." She keeps working on the drink. "I mean, not really. But I hate him!"

"Me too."