Chapter 24

The thought of loving Ace drifted from my mind as another thought clouded it instead. "So, Kimmy gave me some advice."

"Oh did she?" He asked me in a tone that made me believe that he would expect something like that. 

I nodded. "She says we need to work on our communication."

"What's wrong with our communication?" Ace asked in a defensive voice that mirrored my own when Kimmy had talked to me the day before. 

"Let's be real here Ace. Neither of us are good at telling the other how we're feeling; me especially," I smiled over at him. 

He sat up from his current position and began pacing his bedroom. I flipped over onto my stomach and watched and he chewed on his thumbnail in concentration. "Okay, so how do we fix our little problem?" 

"No clue. I didn't get that far," I admitted. 

He walked over to me and squatted in front of me. He placed his hands on my cheeks and pinched lightly. "Well get your cute little ass up and help me come up with something."

I swatted his hands away from my face, feeling like a toddler when he pinched my cheeks. "I don't know, why can't we just promise to tell each other stuff?"

"You are the most dysfunctional problem solver I've ever met," Ace sighed. 

I sat up and rested my elbows on my knees. "Yeah, but like, a cute dysfunctional problem solver."

He nodded in agreement and I felt myself smile widely. He thinks I'm cute. 

Or does he?

I squinted my eyebrows, deep in thought. Maybe he wasn't agreeing with me. What if he just happened to be nodding his head after I said-

"You okay over there?" Ace's suspicious voice asked, pulling me from my self conscious thoughts. 

I shook my head, mentally of course, and met my eyes with his. "Yep, completely fine. One hundred percent good." An amused look filled his face and he sat on his desk chair. "Whatcha doin?" I asked. 

"Brainstorm time baby," he rubbed his hands together maniacally. Still looks hot though. "So, I actually think you had a good point."

"What? When?" I asked him, confused and also not paying much attention. He looked really adorable when he was concentrating. 

He rolled his eyes at me, as if he could tell exactly what I was thinking. 

Not good. 

"When you said we should just promise to tell each other how we're feeling."

I scrunched my nose up. "But there's no guarantee that will work."

"There's never a guarantee sweetheart. If we want to have better communication we need to trust that whenever there's a problem or we're feeling a certain way, we'll tell each other," 

I bit my lip a little. "You're smarter than you lead on, you know that right?"

For once, the smile Ace wore was a shy one. "Thanks beautiful."

Ouch, my heart; another nickname. 

"So what now?" I asked Ace. 

His smile turned into a smirk and his eyes turned mischievous. "Now, I get to kiss you whenever I want." I raised an eyebrow. "Let me rephrase. Now, I get to kiss you whenever I want and you want it too." 

I smiled. "I guess I can work with that." Ace stood from his chair, came toward me and grabbed my hands. He pulled me up until I stood and covered my lips with his. 

I let him kiss me for awhile, his hands pushing through my hair, savoring the way he felt against me before I pulled back slightly. "Am I your girlfriend now? For real?"

Ace's lip's froze against mine and I pulled back to look at him. "We don't have to put any labels on us, do we?"

I blinked a few times before pulling back completely so I was out of his arms. I plopped back onto the bed. "I guess," I lied. 

Ace stared at me for a few seconds before sitting beside me and held one hand on my cheek. "Mad, what did we just promise each other?"

"To tell each other exactly how we feel," I answered him quietly. 

His thumb stroked my cheekbone. "So, stop lying and tell me how you feel about what I just asked."

"I don't like it," I conceded in answering. 

Ace's jaw clenched and he looked passed me. He took a deep breath. "I just don't want to call you my girlfriend yet."

"Why not? We've done it before."

His eyes found mine again. "And look how that turned out. I just don't want to lose you again and I feel like if I'm getting exactly what I want, it will be pulled away from me."

"So what you're saying is, if I become your girlfriend, something will go wrong and I won't be?" I asked him, confused. 

He nodded. 

"Ace, that's crazy. How will you ever get anything you want if you're too scared to go for it?" I sighed, leaning into the hand that held my cheek. 

He shrugged. "I just don't want to hop into us right away. All good things come to those who wait."

"That was cheesy," I told him, my voice sounding sad. 

We just looked at each other for minute before we heard Anna calling us down for dinner. I stood from the bed and started to make my way out the door when Ace gently grabbed my wrist. 

"Baby, it's not because I don't want to be your boyfriend, you know that, right?"

Boy, he was sure full of nicknames tonight, wasn't he?

I gave Ace a small and sad smile. "Yeah." But I don't think I knew if that was true or not. 

Anna insisted that I stayed for dinner. She had apparently "missed me" in the week or so I had been gone. So I sat in between Ace and Noah as Austin talked about his day at work. 

They were so normal, I realized. I had never really had this; not with Harry and Samantha. While there was a period of time in which my family was happy, we never sat at our dinner table and talked about our day. 

We would sit in separate rooms and make separate dinners and have separated conversations. And those conversations were usually between Samantha and me. I wasn't ever close with Harry so we never talked about how my day went. 

Samantha on the other hand, I was close to. She was my mother after all. And when she left, it devastated me. I couldn't wrap my mind around the fact that my own mother had left me. 

With him. 

And she was gone and out of our lives for over a year before she finally contacted me again. It was right before my sixteenth birthday when she called me from an unknown number. 

I was so angry with her for leaving. But not only that, leaving me and not telling me or talking to me since. 

She was honest; she didn't regret leaving Harry and his emotional abuse. But she did regret leaving me. But she explained how she couldn't come back, wouldn't. She thought I would be fine on my own for the next few years because in her eyes, I was stronger than she ever was. 

At this point in my life, Harry didn't hit me or yell at me. He would ignore me. So I believed her; I could get through that for two years without her. 

But she didn't know how he had changed since then. If she did know, I had a feeling her feelings on me being able to stay strong would change. 

But now, every year on my birthday, I received a phone call and a present; more than what I got from Harry. 

But sitting there at the Ace/Ross family table, it felt more than home than mine ever did. 

"I'll see you at school tomorrow. Do you want me to pick you up?" Ace smiled down at me as he walked me to my car after dinner. 

I panicked for a second, remembering he still didn't know I was back at home. "No, it's okay. I don't mind driving."

"Will you eat lunch with me tomorrow?" 

We had reached my car and I leaned myself against it. "I don't know Ace."

His eyebrows scrunched. "Why?"

"You sat with Farah and her friends for a week. You didn't sit with Raze and you barely talked to Loki. You guys need to talk through whatever you're fighting about," I told him. 

Ace ran a hand through his hair and then placed it on the back of his neck. "Do you know why I haven't talked to Raze?" I shook my head. "He's mad at me because of what I did to you, to us."

Wow, I knew I loved Raze. 

"Really? He stopped talking to his best friend because you screwed up with your fake girlfriend?" I raised an eyebrow. 

He sighed. "Well, he's mad about that, and the fact that I didn't tell him about our pseudo relationship."

"Yeah, sorry for telling him about that by the way," I looked down at my feet, ashamed that I had told Raze our secret. 

Ace shook his head. "Don't be. I should have told them in the first place."

We both stood there without talking for awhile until I unlocked the car and started to get in. "I'll see you tomorrow Ace."

"Wait," he said. I waited. "So, is that a yes, you'll eat lunch with me or?"

I rolled my eyes and got in the car. "I told you I'll think about it."

Ace sighed dramatically but let me get in the car. "Alright, see you tomorrow Grey."

I chuckled and started up the car but remembered something. "Wait, Ace, just so we're clear, you and Farah broke up right?"

"Oh yeah. She dumped me so hard and so fast after I kissed you yesterday," he laughed. 

I smiled. "Good. I'm glad that you got broken up with." And then he closed my car door for me and I drove home.