Those Who Wait Read online

  Those Who Wait

  Haley Cass

  Copyright © 2020 Haley Cass

  All rights reserved

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  ISBN-13: 9781234567890

  ISBN-10: 1477123456

  Cover design by: Art Painter

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2018675309

  Printed in the United States of America

  This may not exist (definitely not in the same form) without Kate, Elizabeth, Isadora, and Sam. Thank you for letting me scream about this for what seems like decades.

  Thank you to Monica for editing this monster (even if you hate my commas).

  And forever thank you to Regina for making me feel brave.

  A huge thank you to anyone who has read any bit of this through the years and thought it had potential to be... this.

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  About The Author

  Chapter 1

  “If you’re waiting for a beautiful woman to come out of nowhere and sweep you off your feet, you’re going to be waiting forever,” Regan stated as factually as if she was reading it from a manual.

  Sutton Spencer rolled her eyes. “I’m not waiting for anyone to sweep me off of my feet.”

  Maybe she had been, once upon a time. But that was a while – and several big romantic mistakes – ago.

  With that, she slid off the stool at the breakfast bar in their shared apartment and went to sit on the couch, balancing the bowl of cereal she was having for dinner on her lap. She could still feel her best friend’s incredulous stare from the other side of the room.

  “Sutton, you haven’t even been on a date in almost a year.”

  “I’ve been busy,” she mumbled, even as she ducked her head.

  Her friend flopped down onto the couch next to her with a sigh. “I’ll give you time off after being with Joshua. He was nuts.” The reference to Sutton’s controlling, emotionally manipulative ex-boyfriend was an understatement to say the least. “But you haven’t even gone out with me just to have fun in months – you refused to come out to the bar tonight! And you’ve been like this ever since you had your whole revelation.”

  Sutton could feel her cheeks burning annoyingly hotter and she knew she was as red as her hair as she shot Regan a glare. “I hate when you call it that. I just don’t want to go out; it has nothing to do with my . . . self-discovery.”

  She also hated that she didn’t have a better word to use.

  “Yeah, well, you’re becoming a hermit. You’re sitting here on a Friday night, already in some pajama shorts, ready to – what, watch TV?” She fell back against the cushion with a groan. “You used to be slightly more fun.”

  “I’m not going to watch TV, I’ll watch a movie.”

  Regan nailed her with a look. “You haven’t gone out with a romantic intention since you came to terms with being into women. And if you think I don’t know it’s just because you’re scared, then I’m honestly insulted that you think I don’t know you at all.”

  Sutton supposed twenty years of friendship gave Regan an insight to her that was almost too good.

  “What’s the point of stepping out of the closet if you’re too much of a chicken shit to go on a date with a woman?” Regan looked genuinely quizzical, which made the sarcastic remark die on Sutton’s lips.

  It was hard to describe, really.

  Sutton wasn’t in the closet. After a woman had danced – grinded, really – against her in a way that had surprisingly made arousal curl low in her stomach, and had then initiated a kiss in the club that Regan had dragged her to after her finals last spring, Sutton had spent the summer agonizing over her sexuality. She’d never thought of herself as anything other than straight, before. Because she’d always liked boys, and she liked to kiss boys, and she liked the way they felt. Then there had been the dancing and that kiss, and she’d liked that, too.

  She’d really liked it.

  As the summer had gone on, Sutton finally admitted to herself that she liked girls, too. After months of poring over websites and dipping her toe into some lesbian fiction, Sutton’s sexuality clicked together like a puzzle she’d never even known wasn’t solved.

  As someone who had never had debilitating shyness when it came to talking to a woman, it turned out that approaching a woman when she knowingly attracted to her was very difficult.

  She placed her bowl down on the table before she settled back and admitted, “Fine. I might be scared.”

  Might be, as in the idea of going out with a woman made her stomach flip-flop so intensely she thought she might vomit. It was both fear and excitement, but still.

  Regan gave her a sympathetic look before she turned her attention to the phone in her lap and Sutton was grateful that the subject seemed to be dropped. Not that she thought it would be dropped for long, considering when Regan got her teeth into something, she held on tight.

  Tonight, though, she was happy to relax and watch a movie before she had to start her outline for the first paper of the semester that she had to write for her Victorian Poetry class. All the while willfully ignoring the undeniably pitiful state of her love life.

  “Done!” Regan announced a few minutes later.

  “Done with what?” It was only as her question was ending that she realized Regan didn’t have her own phone in her hand, but Sutton’s. “What did you do?”

  Her friend had a familiar bright-eyed devious look as she held Sutton’s phone up and wiggled it – but not close enough for Sutton to swipe it out of her hand. “I’m helping you out.”

  “What in the world is that?”

  Dread was already settling in her before Regan answered. “It’s a dating app. You’re welcome; you’ll be getting messages from hot girls in no time.”

  For a moment, Sutton sat there, stunned into stillness. Only for a second, though, before she lunged forward, hands out and grasping. Regan eluded her, hopping off of the couch and running around the table as she started tapping at the screen.

  Sutton jumped up. “Give it back.”

  Regan shook her head, not moving her eyes from the screen. “If I give it back, you’ll never even browse.”

  She calculated the size of the coffee table. She had long legs; she could jump it.

  Once more, Regan knew her too well, because she held her hands out in a peace offering gesture. “Look. I’ll give you the phone. If you promise me you won’t delete your profile, and you browse through some profiles. Maybe send a message or two.”

  She only hesitated for a moment, but it was enough for Regan to latch on to.

  Regan crossed her arms, her hand still securely holding onto Sutton’s cell phone, but her tone was considerab
ly gentler than before. “Okay, since you didn’t jump me, I know that there is at least a part of you that wants to try this out.”

  There was no argument against it even in her head because she did. There was that part of her that wanted to get over her nerves and at least see what was out there.

  She found herself nodding through the anxiety and reaching for her phone. As she wrapped her fingers around it, she shot Regan a look and cautioned, “Just to look.”

  “Spoil sport,” Regan muttered, letting out a long suffering sigh but releasing her phone anyway.

  Sutton scoffed as she settled back onto the couch, cautiously looking at the app. She narrowed her eyes when she read the name: SapphicSpark. “You’re kidding me.”

  “It’s apparently a very reputable place!”

  “How would you know?”

  “You hear a lot of talk about people’s dating lives when you work in a café!”

  Turning away from her, Sutton shook her head, red hair falling over her shoulder and curtaining her from her friend’s overly excited gaze from the other side of the couch. After a deep, calming breath, she looked over the profile her friend had created for her. She’d – thankfully – chosen photos that Sutton might have even chosen for herself. The rest was fairly simple – her age, likes, and a message option.

  Sutton, 25, New York City

  Likes: literature, dogs, snow, knitting, running, and lemon cakes

  She couldn’t argue with any of that.

  With trepidation, she pressed the button in the top right corner that was beckoning her to Browse profiles!

  Not only had she never done this with women before, but she’d never done something like this with men, either. Men had always just . . . been there.

  Finding a woman, who not only was she attracted to and liked but who also liked and was attracted to her was harder. And scarier.

  It was somewhat comforting knowing that all of these women were out there and just as not straight as she was. And maybe some of them could be interested in her.

  The thought of it made her heart beat a little faster.

  Before it actually seemed to stop in her chest for a few beats upon her next swipe. Because the woman in the picture who was coyly smiling up at her from her phone made her stomach erupt in butterflies. Her light brown hair was perfectly tousled and even through a picture her piercing eyes were somehow flirty.

  She was well aware that there were some people who simply took pictures really well or photoshopped them in ways to look better, but this woman was stunning any way she looked at it.

  Charlotte, 28, New York City

  Likes: puzzles, Indian food, rainy days, designer shoes, dancing, and gardening

  “Oh, wow.”

  Regan’s voice right next to her ear startled her, causing her to fumble her phone in her hands. She threw her friend a glare. “I thought you were going to give me time to look. On my own.”

  “Well, I was. Then I noticed you were staring at someone and I wanted to see. And now that I checked, I have to say – you need to message her.”

  The Message button seemed to taunt her and her mind ran amuck with the idea of seeing that face in person. Or even going on a date with her. Just the thought was enough for her heart to race.

  “Absolutely not.”

  “Why not? She’s hot, you’re hot. You need an introduction to the lady loving world and she looks like she’d be a really good one.”

  She glanced at Charlotte’s picture again for a peek – yeah, she was that hot. “It’s not that easy. She’s – I’m not – I mean, just look at her. What am I going to say? Hi, I’m a grad student who hasn’t even dated a woman yet, do you want to go out even though you can clearly date anyone you want?”

  Regan was giving her the Sutton-is-being-unintentionally-amusing look that she was very familiar with but couldn’t stand. “Well, I wouldn’t exactly phrase it like that. Have some faith; it’s not like you’re chopped liver.”

  “I know that.” She groaned fell back against the couch, phone in her lap. “But I’m not that.”

  That . . . confident, sexy-smile, flirty-eyed, my-picture-alone-can-seduce-you, was definitely not her.

  When Regan hmm’d, Sutton should have known she was getting off the hook too easily. It was practically her own fault when her phone was snatched from her lap.

  She jumped to grab for it, but Regan was already moving her thumbs quickly over the screen.

  “Regan Marie Gallagher, give my phone back now.” She knew in the momentary pause of Regan’s typing that she did a pretty great job of channeling her mother’s reproachful tone.

  In a determined, calculated leap, she closed the distance between them, grappling for her phone.

  It was fruitless. Because only a moment later, Regan cried out victoriously, “Sent!”

  The sound that left the back of Sutton’s mouth was nearly feral. “You didn’t!”

  “Of course I did.” Regan’s smile spoke of no regrets. “Now, have you changed your mind about coming out with me tonight?”

  The glare Sutton sent her was answer enough.

  “Suit yourself. Stay home and obsess about Stunning Charlotte.” Regan slid the phone back to her.

  Pointedly ignoring her, Sutton frantically navigated her own profile to see her sent messages. And then just about died.

  Sutton, 7:43PM

  Hey there. I saw your profile and you look

  really interesting – and hot. Do you want to

  hook up meet up sometime?

  Horrified, she didn’t acknowledge Regan at all as her friend all but ran out of the apartment. Sutton didn’t think she could possibly blush more than she already was and, as panic started to build, she went back to Charlotte’s profile to try to send another message.

  Something where she would try to beg her to ignore Regan’s message that made Sutton out to be pleading for a freaking hook up. Only to be informed: For our users’ well-being, SapphicSpark does not allow multiple messages to be sent to a user unless they allow it upon receiving your first message.

  What?!

  Any other time, Sutton would have appreciated the step the app took to prevent forms of harassment. But not right now. Why couldn’t there be this one little exception?

  With a groan, she brought her hand up to rub at her temples.

  Peering again at the picture of the woman, she bit her lip as a small sigh escaped. Charlotte was almost too hot.

  Which was a good thing, she reasoned with herself. She probably wasn’t even going to have to try to explain Regan and embarrass herself, because this woman – Charlotte – well, look at her. That woman was bound to have a ton of messages on here. She wouldn’t look twice at Sutton.

  With that in mind, she put her phone down on the table and tried to shake off the whole ordeal.

  ***

  Two hours later, Sutton was very purposefully finishing Regan’s favorite ice cream, rooted to the same spot on the couch. She wasn’t a big fan of the coffee flavor, but it was a small strike back against her friend. She wasn’t going to go far enough to exact Alex-level revenge – Sutton still shuddered to think about some of the pranks her sister had played on her as they’d grown up – but Regan should know there would be several small acts of justice coming her way.

  When her phone vibrated on the table, she assumed it was either Regan, trying to get her to come meet her and some of their friends, or Emma, her fellow TA and closest friend from college. Maybe her mother or one of her siblings.

  She wasn’t expecting a notification from SapphicSpark.

  The spoon she’d been holding clattered into the bowl as she hurriedly unlocked her phone and tapped on the notification. New message from Charlotte! Was displayed on the screen.

  “What the fuck,” she whispered.

  She took a deep breath in an attempt to calm herself.

  It didn’t work and she clicked on the message anyway.

  Charlotte, 10:02PM

  My, that is
one of the less subtle approaches

  I’ve received on here, I must say.

  Why would Regan do this to her?

  Sutton, 10:04PM

  God, I’m so sorry! I’ve been wanting to send

  this for hours, but couldn’t message you again

  until you answered. That’s not – I’m not the

  person who sent that first message! My friend

  created this account and sent that to you. I’m

  sorry, again. And incredibly embarrassed.

  Clasping her phone in her hand, she stared blankly at the movie on the television for a few moments. That was good, right? And now that Charlotte knew the truth, Sutton really shouldn’t expect to hear from her again.

  Which . . . was kind of disappointing.

  She’d barely put her phone down when it vibrated again, sending a jolt of surprise – and excitement – through her.

  Charlotte, 10:06PM

  I never said lack of subtlety was a bad thing.

  Perhaps in other matters, but not when it comes

  to this. So, your friend arranged this? Are you

  not looking for a sapphic spark, then?

  Sutton, 10:06PM

  Oh, I am. Yes. Well, kind of.

  What in the hell was that? She berated herself, letting her head fall back against the couch. For a literature grad student, she could be the least coherent person ever.

  Charlotte, 10:08PM

  Kind of?

  Sutton, 10:09PM

  I meant to say, that I like both men and women.

  Charlotte, 10:12PM

  You haven’t done this very much, have you?

  Sutton, 10:13PM

  No. Never, actually. Is it really obvious?

  Sutton rolled her eyes at herself; of course it was obvious. She only had a second to wonder why this woman was even still talking to her before she got an answer.

  Charlotte, 10:14PM

  Only a little ;)

  Charlotte, 10:16PM

  Tell me, why did your friend deem it necessary

  to create this account and send messages from

  you that seem to be more suggestive than you