“You don’t know that.”
“Oh, sure I do, and you know it, too. I probably would have banged another sous chef.”
“Not Raymonde, I hope,” Frost said.
“No. I think I’m safe with him.” Duane paused and then added, “She admitted it to me, you know.”
“Admitted what?”
“Come on, bro. Don’t be dense. Tabby’s in love with you.”
Frost opened his mouth to say something, but what was there to say? He shrugged and drank his beer.
“She told me she came to see you,” Duane continued. “She said she told you how she felt and that you all but admitted that you were in love with her, too. Except you made it clear that you were never going to do anything about it, no matter how you felt. Because of me.”
Frost stared back at his brother. “She’s right about that.”
Duane shook his head. “Well, that is pretty damn stupid.”
“Maybe, but that doesn’t change anything.”
“Come on, Frost. Given that you’re in love with her and she’s in love with you, that makes absolutely no sense. I want you to be happy, too. Do I need to spell it out for you? I hereby free you from screwing up your life in the name of fraternal loyalty. I state now, for the record, with Shack as a witness, that I will hold no grudge if my brother chooses to date my ex-fiancée.”
“That sounds like the carrot juice talking,” Frost said.
“I’m serious,” Duane replied.
“You? You’re never serious.”
“Well, at this one moment of my life, I am,” his brother said. He leaned across the table next to Shack, and he and the cat both studied Frost with the same intense stare. “So are you going to go talk to her, or what?”
The windows in Tabby’s apartment were open, and so was the door, but there was still no air moving on the stifling night. She lived in a fourth-floor studio on Fillmore not far from the painted ladies of Alamo Square. A seafood restaurant occupied the street level, making the building smell like bouillabaisse.
Frost stood in the apartment doorway, watching her and not saying a word. Her back was to him. She had music on as she chopped vegetables for a cool salad on a hot evening. She wore white nylon shorts and a pink tank top that clung to her skin in the humid apartment.
“You really shouldn’t leave your door open,” Frost said after a while. “Anyone could walk in.”
Tabby turned around in shock at the sound of his voice. She almost dropped the knife in her hand. He could see emotions passing across her face like fast-moving clouds. Anger. Hope. Desire. Frustration. Fear.
“Frost.” Her voice was cool. “What are you doing here?”
“I needed to see you.”
Tabby pushed away the preparations of her salad. She wiped her hands on a towel and walked out of the kitchen. “Why? I thought you’d said everything you needed to say already. You didn’t want me in your life.”
“That’s not what I said at all.”
“Well, that’s what I heard.”
Frost felt tongue-tied. He didn’t know how to make it right between them. He put down Shack’s carrier on the floor and opened the door. The cat wandered out into the strange place to explore. When he spotted Tabby, he padded to her immediately.
“Shack wanted to see you, too,” Frost said.
Tabby picked up Shack and softly kissed his head, and then she put him down and let him rummage through her apartment. Frost hadn’t moved. Her white sofa sat between them like a barrier they couldn’t cross.
“So what do you want, Frost?” she asked.
“I want to stop hiding what I feel for you.”
“You told me we couldn’t be together. Now or ever.”
“I know I did. But I can’t live with that.”
Tabby stared down at the floor. Her hair fell across her face. “What about Duane?”
“He said if I’m in love with you, then I’m an idiot to let you go.”
“Really? He said that?”
“He did.”
She walked up to the back of the sofa. “And do you? Love me?”
He came to the other side of the sofa, until only the soft cushions separated them. “Tabby, you know I do.”
“Are you sure? Maybe I’m not who you think I am.”
“I don’t care.”
“I hurt Duane. I don’t want to hurt you, too. That’s the last thing I would ever want to do.”
“I’ll take my chances.”
She leaned forward over the edge of the sofa. He reached out and grabbed her by the waist and lifted her up and over until there was no barrier between them, and he set her on the floor directly in front of him. She wrapped her arms around his chest and held on and wouldn’t let go. Her skin was hot; so was his. Her face was wet. She pressed herself so tightly against him that their two bodies were like one. Her lips were next to his cheek, and she leaned up and kissed the lobe of his ear and whispered no louder than a breath, “I was hoping you’d come back.”
He ran his fingers through her hair, separating the strands, feeling her do the same to him. With the back of his hand, he lifted her chin. Her lips were full and ready. Her eyes were a maze of emotions, but he only focused on the want he saw there. What came next, what was coming down the road didn’t matter. For that one moment of his life, there was nothing but joy in the sticky, still air of the apartment and in the dampness of their skin.
Frost finally did what he’d dreamed about doing for months.
He pulled her face to him.
He kissed her without any guilt at all and felt her kiss him back.
48
Tabby’s eyes blinked open. The apartment around her was dark. It wasn’t dawn yet, but she was already awake.
The night had finally cooled through the open window. She lay atop Frost as he slept. Their arms were wrapped around each other on her sofa. She felt the warmth of his face buried in her hair. They’d never undressed, never touched each other. They’d kissed, they’d talked, they’d kissed again, and they’d fallen asleep.
She disentangled herself without waking him. Shack snored at the foot of the sofa, and the cat didn’t move, either. She slipped away to the bathroom, where she showered and stood for the longest time simply letting the hot water pour over her body. When she was done, she went back to the other room and stared down at Frost. She was naked and aroused, and she thought about waking him up so that he could make love to her for the first time. He’d asked her to wake him before she left.
But she didn’t. It was easier this way.
She found clothes in her closet, and she got dressed silently. She opened the refrigerator and took out a bottle of water. She sipped it and then found a pad of paper so that she could leave Frost a note.
She wrote,
Breakfast meeting with a client.
After a pause, she added beneath it,
I love you.
Tabby collected her wallet and keys and let herself out of the apartment and closed the door softly behind her. She took the steps slowly, as if dreading that she had to go into the world again. Outside, there was a faint pinkness in the sky, like the promise of another warm day. She was alone on Fillmore. She breathed in the air and studied the other buildings around her. There were only a few lights. Everyone else was sleeping. She watched the dark cars around her, the dark windows, the dark roofs. Her eyes went from one place to the next, all around her, with a strange unease. She listened to the rare silence, as if San Francisco were holding its breath.