Panicked, I scoot away a little, but my rounded belly makes me have to reach back and squeeze his knee for stability. Please, let that be his knee.
Instantly, I remove my hand just as quickly as I put it there. “Uh…thank you so much, Remy, but I’m feeling better now.” I think.
“Are you sure?” he asks with concern, and I spin around to put my back to the wall on the opposite side of the elevator and face him.
An emergency light flickers at the top of the car—a little delayed, but I’ll take it—and I can just make out the crease between Remy’s eyebrows. Confident he’ll see it now, I nod. “I’m okay. Really.”
“Good,” he says with a small smile and pulls his phone out of his pocket. He taps the screen, and it comes to life, illuminating his handsome face. “Looks like I still have service. I’m going to call Ty.”
Phone to his ear, he waits while the faint sounds of ringing come from the receiver.
“Fucking answer, you bastard,” he mutters three rings deep, and I want to grin over the memories of the familiar banter that always occurred between him and his brothers.
And when he rolls his eyes heavenward, I can assume that Ty finally answered.
“What’s up?” Remy asks into the receiver on a harsh laugh. “Well, I’m stuck in your building’s fucking elevator.”
He pauses and furrows his brow at whatever his brother says.
“And Lloyd would be…？”
Ten seconds later, he pulls the phone away from his ear and looks at the screen. “Did he really just hang up on me?” he grumbles on a sigh and meets my eyes.
“Everything okay?”
His responding laugh is softer this time. “Well, if you were wondering if Ty is still a pain in my ass, I can tell you with certainty that he is. Though, he is calling the maintenance guy.”
“Okay. Okay. That’s good, right? It’s at least something?”
“Yeah.” He grins at me as he shoves his phone back into the pocket of his jeans. “And…I guess that means we can use this time to catch up, huh?”
Time to catch up—time to explain—time to look at Remington Winslow and remember just how in love I was with him twenty years ago.
Oh boy. I’m not sure I’m prepared for that…
“But first, I guess I should see if this elevator’s phone works,” he says, standing to his feet. “Maybe I can get in touch with the fire department or something.”
“That sounds like a really good plan,” I answer, silently hopeful that it will take enough time to let me dodge the kind of conversation that would make it hard to avoid my truth.
The last thing I want to do is pull Remy into the complicated mess I call my life.
What the hell, New York? Couldn’t you have chosen a better time to throw a summer blackout my way?
Remy
After speaking with Ty briefly to explain the situation, I’m not confident he’s doing anything more than talking to the building maintenance man, and I’m even less assured that he’s doing it in a hurry. In fact, he sounded incredibly preoccupied… In the way that tends to make all the blood leave a man’s brain altogether. Ahem.
Luckily, the elevator emergency equipment is in good working order—not often the case in New York—and I’ve managed to get in touch with the fire department myself.
“It’s another summer blackout,” the dispatcher’s voice bounces from the red emergency phone receiver held close to my ear. “Pretty sure the ninety-degree heat and everyone using their air conditioners like goddamn fiends is to blame. How many are in the elevator, sir?”
“There are two of us,” I answer. “From what I can tell, I think we’ve stopped between the fourth and fifth floors.”
I glance to Maria to see her shifting uncomfortably. I can’t even imagine how hot she must be right now with as pregnant as she is.
“Are you both okay?”
“Yes. But the other passenger is pregnant, and it’s starting to get pretty warm in here. We’re going to need to get some water soon, at the very least.”
Now, I’m regretting finishing off that bottle of water and granola bar I had stashed in my backpack on the plane. Maria certainly could’ve used it right now.
“Understood,” the dispatcher responds, and the faint sounds of fingers over a keyboard fill my ears. “Just hold tight, and we’ll get you out of there as quick as we can. Half of Manhattan is blacked out right now, though, so prepare yourself to settle in for a bit.”