The Road To Her Part 20

"Yuh-huh?"

"Sorry."

"Sorry for what?"

What was she sorry for? For kissing me?

"Everything."

My heart sank. "Okay."

"For almost everything. But not for kissing you just then," she murmured. "I've been wanting to do that for a long time."

"Okay." I tried to sound convinced.

"Holly?"

"Mm-hmm?"

"Don't go."

"I'll just be next door, Elise," I said gently. "You'll be okay."

"Don't go," she said again, struggling to prop herself up on her elbow and look up at me, her eyes heavy lidded, her face crumpling. "I don't want to sleep alone."

I hesitated, still standing at the end of the bed, then eventually crept into bed beside her, pulling the duvet up over us both. Elise turned onto her side, facing away from me, and reached round and took my arm, bringing it across her body and hugging it to herself. I nestled in behind her, spooning her, and wrapped my arms tight around her.

"Thank you, Hol," she said sleepily before turning her head away from me and drifting off to sleep.

Chapter Twenty.

When I woke up the next morning, the memories of what had happened the night before slowly began to seep, like morning mist, through my tired, hungover brain. Elise was still lying next to me, but now she faced me, fast asleep, breathing slowly and deeply.

I lay on my back, staring up at the ceiling, wondering if last night had actually happened, that Elise really had done what she'd done, or whether it had all been that d.a.m.ned cliched just a dream.

She sure wasn't a dream. Her hair, always so perfect and never out of place, was now sticking up every which way; I looked at her lovely, full lips, those same lips that had kissed me the night before with such longing, and I wanted to kiss them again now and keep kissing them, over and over. She truly was beautiful, and I honestly don't think I'd ever wanted someone quite as much as I wanted Elise right at that moment.

I exhaled slowly, studying her one more time as if to check she really was there, then slowly pulled back the duvet and started to get out of bed.

"Holly?" Elise murmured, beginning to stir.

I paused, legs half out of the bed, and turned back to look at her. "Hey."

Elise's eyes blinked open slowly, and I watched as she tried to focus and figure out where she was. "Hey," she said, blinking harder now. She stretched her arms out in front of her and smiled sleepily up at me.

"You okay?" I asked, sitting on the edge of the bed now.

"Mm," she replied. "I think I was quite drunk last night, wasn't I?"

Too drunk to remember that we'd kissed?

"A little bit," I said wistfully. I didn't know if I should say something else, about what had happened, but because Elise hadn't said anything, I didn't feel like I could. Instead I sat in silence, tracing a pattern on the duvet with my index finger while she lay on her back, gazing up at the ceiling, apparently deep in thought.

"En-suite's just there," I said, when it was clear Elise wasn't going to speak. I got up and headed towards the kitchen. "Make yourself at home and all that."

I made coffee in something of a daze, thinking about everything that Elise had said to me the night before while I listened to her pad about in my bedroom, humming to herself as she did so.

A wave of panic washed over me. What if she'd been so drunk she'd forgotten what had happened? What if she thought she just got drunk and crashed at my place-as friends do? Or maybe she did remember it, but she regretted it. She'd gone to the bathroom, and now she was in there thinking about how to tell me she'd made the biggest mistake of her life, wondering just how on earth she was going to get herself out of this situation.

I turned and looked with uncertainty as Elise came into the kitchen and leant against the unit, arms folded across her chest. I hesitated, then turned back to the coffee cups, still empty.

"You okay?" she asked from behind me.

"Sure." I didn't turn to look at her, scared that I wouldn't like the look on her face because it might tell me everything I was afraid of. Instead, I focused on the cups on the unit in front of me, a thousand voices all shouting together in my head to be heard.

What should I say to her?

Should I say anything at all, or wait for her to speak?

I cleared my throat. "Do you remember any of what happened last night?" I peered over my shoulder at her.

She watched me for a moment before a slow, happy expression crept across her face. "I do," she said sleepily.

I remained rooted to the spot, still watching her over my shoulder, the coffee cups still empty. "And do you regret it?" I asked hesitantly.

"Do you?" Elise asked slowly.

I shook my head. "But do you?" I asked again.

Elise walked slowly up behind me and circled her arms around my waist, resting her chin on my shoulder.

"What do you think?" she asked, kissing the crook of my neck.

I leant back into her, practically weak with relief, and put my hands over hers. "Well, I'm glad," I said softly, resting my head against hers. "Last night was awesome."

"We didn't, er, did we?" she suddenly said, pulling her head back and peering at me. "Because if we did, then I don't remember it, and that really wouldn't be good!"

I laughed and turned round to face her, leaning against the unit and tucking a stray bit of her hair back behind her ear. Despite having just got up, and despite being hungover and still being in last night's clothes, she still looked-to me anyway-as hot as h.e.l.l.

"We didn't, no," I said. "We just kissed." I thought for a moment. "Elise..." I began.

"Holly?" Her voice rose with amus.e.m.e.nt.

"Does this mean..." I bit at my lip, looking down towards the floor then back to her. "Does this mean you want to be with me?"

"I guess it does," she said. "If you want me, that is?"

Did I want her?!

"You know I want you, Elise," I said, "but-"

"But what?"

"What about everything we spoke about before?" I said. "About you being scared?"

"I've thought about nothing else for days," Elise said. "I've thought about what you said about nothing had to change between us, and maybe you were right all along." She took my hands. "I thought I'd be okay just being your friend, but I'm not," she said. "Something keeps pulling me to you, time and time again. I guess there's only so many times I can ignore my feelings."

"I meant what I said," I said. "We can just carry on as we were before. Just friends to the outside world, but-"

"But more in private?" Elise offered.

"If that's what you want?" I asked hesitantly.

"Being with you is better than not being with you," Elise said simply. She thought for a moment. "Are you really going to go and see Grace tonight?"

"Tonight?"

"You said you were going out with her tonight," Elise said quietly. "Last night, you told me you were meeting up with her."

"I'll cancel," I said.

"I didn't want to lose you to Grace," Elise said again, lifting her eyes to mine. "I would have kicked myself if I'd have let that happen."

"Well, I'm glad you did do something about it to not let that happen," I said.

"I've been such a s.h.i.+t to you lately." Elise squeezed my hand. "I'm sorry." She frowned. "I've just got one thing I need you to know, though," she said.

"Which is?"

"That I need to take this slowly," she said. "I've never felt like this about another girl before." She looked down at our entwined hands. "And it's a bit freaky, to be honest," she continued, "but there's just something about you, Holly Croft, that I can't resist."

"So now what?" I asked.

"I should go, that's what." She groaned.

"I didn't mean that," I said, disappointment burning in my chest. "I meant, does this mean we're, you know?"

"I know what you were getting at." Elise lifted my hand to her lips and kissed it. "And I guess it does." She hesitated. "But I really do mean it, Holly," she said. "Just one step at a time, yeah?"

"Of course," I said. "We can take this as slowly as you want, Elise."

She held my gaze awhile before finally letting go of my hand and walking to the kitchen door. "And now I really should go home and change." She laughed, looking down at herself. "Get out of these clothes. Anyone would think I just slept in them."

Chapter Twenty-one.

Once Elise left my apartment, I felt wretched. It was as though the minute she walked out the door, all the fun and colour and excitement that always came in with her just followed her straight back out again, leaving my apartment grey and lifeless once more. The rest of my morning just became an irrelevance, counting down the minutes until I could see her back at the studios again.

When I did see Elise at work a few hours later, it was all I could do to stop a stupid soppy grin from spreading right across my face. She looked happy, too, the first time I think I'd ever seen her look truly and deeply contented in the whole time that I'd known her.

I wanted to spend every single second of that day with her, to keep her close to me, to keep remembering that we really were together at last. However, as it turned out, and to my disappointment, we hardly saw anything of each other all morning. Most of my time that day was filled with filming mundane scenes with Bella and Rory in the Hunters' front room, which on any other day would be all pretty unremarkable stuff, but today wasn't just any other day. Today was different, special.

And that was all down to Elise.

We finally had time to ourselves over lunch, when filming stopped at around one p.m. for our break and Elise came over to my set, having finished filming elsewhere in the studio. I'd usually go to my dressing room alone or grab a sandwich and head to the green room and see who was around for a gossip. But today I wanted to be alone with Elise, having that selfish desire to have her all to myself, to just be alone with this gorgeous girl I was crazy about, without having anyone disturbing us.

"Hey you." Elise linked her hand with mine when the set had finally cleared and we knew we were alone. "How was your morning?"

"Agony." I rolled my eyes. "I thought about you constantly."

"I thought about you all morning, too." Elise threaded her fingers through mine. "Kevin's been going on to me about the TV Today awards ceremony tomorrow night, and all I wanted to do was think about you."

"The ceremony." I groaned. "I'd forgotten about that."

"Well, you've had a lot on your mind, haven't you?" Elise widened her eyes, making me laugh.

"You'll be okay, will you?" I asked, "Going with me?"

"To the awards?" Elise replied. "Of course! It's work, isn't it?"

"I mean, now things have changed," I said.

"Nothing's changed, remember?" Elise said, casting a look over her shoulder as she heard a noise. She hesitated before she spoke, checking we were still alone. "It's all as we were."

"With added bonuses," I said quietly.

"With secret added bonuses," Elise corrected. "Our secrets."

"I wish we could go home right now." I sighed. "It's been h.e.l.l trying not to tell everyone about us-especially Bella."

"You haven't, have you?" Elise looked horrified.

"Of course not!" I squeezed her hand. "I'm not gonna tell a soul, of course I'm not."

"Sorry." Elise shrugged apologetically.

"I get you when you say no one needs to know anything," I said softly. "This is just between you and me."