Something Borrowed Read Free Page A

am, I have a lucid instant where I consider clearly
    what was missing in my twenties and what I wish to find in my
    thirties. It strikes me that, in a sense, I can have both on this
    momentous birthday night. Dex can be my secret, my last chance
    for a dark twenty-something chapter, and he can also be a prelude
    of sorts a promise of someone like him to come. Darcy is in my
    mind, but she is being pushed to the back, overwhelmed by a force
    stronger than our friendship and my own conscience.
    Dex moves
    over me. My eyes are closed, then open, then closed again.
    And then, somehow, I am having sex with my best friend's fiance.

Chapter 2
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    I wake up to my ringing phone, and for a second I am disoriented
    in my own apartment. Then I hear Darcy's high-pitched voice on
    my machine, urging me to pick up, pick up, please pick up. My
    crime snaps into focus. I sit up too quickly, and my apartment
    spins. Dexter's back is to me, sculpted and sparsely freckled. I jab
    hard at it with one finger.
    He rolls over and looks at me. "Oh, Christ! What time is it?"
    My clock radio tells us it is seven-fifteen. I have been thirty for
    two hours. Correction one hour; I was born in the central time
    zone.
    Dex gets out of bed quickly, gathering his clothes, which are
    strewn along either side of my bed. The answering machine beeps
    twice, cutting Darcy off. She calls back, rambling about how Dex
    never came home. Again, my machine silences her in midsentence. She calls back a third time, wailing,
    "Wake up and
    call me! I need you!"
    I start to get out of bed, then realize that I am naked. I sit back
    down and cover myself with a pillow.
    "Omigod. What do we do?" My voice is hoarse and shaking.
    "Should I answer? Tell her you crashed here?"
    "Hell, no! Don't pick up lemme think for a sec." He sits down,
    wearing only boxers, and rubs his jaw, now covered by a shadow
    of whiskers.
    Sick, sobering dread washes over me. I start to cry.
    Which never
    helps anything.
    "Look, Rachel, don't cry," Dex says. "Everything's going to be
    okay."
    He puts on his jeans and then his shirt, efficiently zipping and
    tucking and buttoning as though it is an ordinary morning. Then
    he checks the messages on his cell phone. "Shhhit.
    Twelve missed
    calls," he says matter-of-factly. Only his eyes show distress.
    When he is dressed, he sits back on the edge of the bed and rests
    his forehead in his hands. I can hear him breathing hard through
    his nose. Air in and out. In and out. Then he looks over at me,
    composed. "Okay. Here's what's going to happen.
    Rachel, look at
    me."
    I obey his instructions, still clutching my pillow.
    "This will be fine. Just listen," he says, as though talking to a client
    in a conference room.
    "I'm listening," I say.
    "I'm going to tell her I stayed out until five or so and then got
    breakfast with Marcus. We got it covered."
    "What do I tell her?" I ask. Lying has never been my strong suit.
    "Just tell her you left the party and went home Say you can't
    remember for sure whether I was still there when you left, but you
    think I was still there with Marcus. And be sure to say you
    'think' don't be too definite. And that's all you know, okay?" He
    points at my phone. "Call her back now I'll call Marcus as soon
    as I leave here. Got it?"
    I nod, my eyes filling with tears again as he stands.
    "And calm down," he says, not meanly, but firmly.
    Then he is at
    the door, one hand on the knob, the other running through his
    dark hair that is just long enough to be really sexy.
    "What if she already talked to Marcus?" I ask, as Dex is halfway
    out the door. Then, more to myself, "We are so screwed."
    He turns around, looks at me through the doorway. For a second,
    I think he is angry, that he is going to yell at me to pull myself
    together. That this isn't life-or-death. But his tone is gentle.
    "Rach, we are not screwed. I got it covered. Just say what I told
    you to say And Rachel?"
    "Yeah?"
    "I'm really sorry."
    "Yeah," I