Chapter Thirteen
chapter thirteen
MAY
It’s been over a week since I moved into Rafael’s enormous house, and I’ve barely seen him since.
He really took the whole keep out of each other's way thing literally, but I can’t exactly complain. It’s precisely what I asked for.
It’s just that being in this house is lonely; I don’t know how he does it every day without going crazy.
The high ceilings, and white walls, and the huge silver fridge, it all just makes me wish I was back in my tiny cottage with a blanket and a mug of hot chocolate. Not that I’ve had any hot drinks since I’ve been here. I’m too scared to turn the kettle on.
I open the fridge and close it again. There’s no food in this house. There are just ingredients, nothing I can just take out of the fridge and eat. I guess that’s what you get living with a chef, but I feel like a snack every once in a while, and instead I’m left drinking water to fill my cravings. Surprise surprise, it’s not really working.
I place an order for a pizza from Antonio’s for delivery. It’s arriving in half an hour, so I take the time to wander around the huge house I’m currently calling home. It doesn’t sound right, even in my own head .
I’m so glad that the fire didn’t spread to my bedroom, because I’ve needed my fuzzy socks being here. The concrete floors are freezing on my bare feet, so I’m constantly sliding around in my socks. If I wasn’t afraid of Rafael catching me, I’d be sliding down the hallways dancing like Hugh Grant in Love Actually.
Speaking of the grump, Rafael is out at the restaurant this morning, so I thought I’d take the opportunity to do some snooping.
But there’s nothing to snoop through.
As I walk around the big living room, there are no family photos. No mementos from his childhood, nothing. Not even any knick-knacks on the mantelpiece of the gigantic fireplace.
God how I’d like to get my hands on this place. I’m dying to put some books on some shelves, or place a pot plant by the window, but Rafael might literally draw and quarter me if I so much as leave a glass on the table. The place is pristine. Clinically pristine, there’s no life here.
You’d barely even know someone was living in this house if not for Rafael’s truck that he parks out the front, and occasionally cleans half naked. That’s the one thing I can appreciate about being here. Despite his horrible attitude, he’s got a deadly gorgeous body.
I slump back down on the couch, not knowing what to do with myself. Marina has given me the last two weeks off work to get my head right before I come back in, but I’ve been bored shitless without my shifts at the bar with nothing to distract my mind. I’ve tried to pick up a book to take my mind somewhere other than here, but the one I chose was a forced proximity, roommates trope, and that hit a little too close to home for my current circumstances.
I reach for the back of the couch for a blanket that’s not there. Why doesn’t he have any blankets? That's psychotic.
I huff a sigh as I get up off the couch and make the trip to my room. This place is like something from a horror movie. All the doors shut down the long straight hallway, it creeps me out .
I push the door open to my room and immediately feel better. All the stuff from the cottage is scattered around the room and it feels so much warmer than the rest of the house. Like I’ve stepped through the wardrobe into Narnia.
I rifle through the box closest to the door, knowing my crochet blanket sits in there. I see a hint of orange at the bottom of the box, and I grab onto it, yanking the blanket out.
The faint smell of smoke drifts through the air as I pull it out and I nearly gag at the scent as the memories flash through my mind like some sick highlight reel of one of the scariest nights of my life.
I shake the blanket out willing the smell to float away, but it doesn’t, it only intensifies.
I shuffle through another box, which contains stuff from my bedroom at the cottage, and pull out another blanket. I give it a wary sniff and not a hint of smoke lingers on the fabric, so I put it under my arm and carry the crochet blanket in my other hand as I go back out to the living room.
I throw my blanket from my room on the couch and take the crochet one with me as I open the big sliding door to Rafael’s backyard.
It’s a big yard. But again, there’s nothing out here except a washing line. I walk over to it and grab a few pegs from the basket, hanging the blanket up. Hopefully it airs out in the breeze out here.
A ring at the doorbell sounds. That was quick.
I walk back through the house to the front door, swinging it open to see the delivery guy walking back to his car and a pizza box at my feet.
“Thank you!” I yell, he just gives me a wave over his shoulder.
A big shoulder.
A hot shoulder.
I crouch down picking up the pizza and bring it inside, shutting the door behind me.
I finally flop back down on the couch, pulling my blanket up over my legs, and flip open the pizza box. The greasy smell fills the room, and it’s exactly what I was craving.
I pick up a piece and shove it in my mouth, finally feeding myself. I reach for the remote on the coffee table and flick through Netflix, but I can’t find anything I want to watch.
“Ughhhh,” I groan. I struggle endlessly to feel at home here. It just doesn’t work. I just sit here eating my pizza staring at the empty fire in front of me, until Pizza guy's shoulders flicker through my mind again, and I get an idea.
I pull my phone out and open Tinder. It’s like a game to me. For some reason, simply choosing whether to swipe left or right entertains me to no end.
Oooh, Jacob?
Nope. J names are a red flag by themselves.
He’s only got photos of him in a group. I don’t know why people do that? It’s like a lucky dip. You don’t know which one you’re gonna get.
How about Rocco?
Twenty-seven, a job in finance. I raise my eyebrows. He could be cute…
“Not him.”
I jump at Rafael’s voice behind me. “Jesus!“ I curse. “Don’t you knock?”
“At my own house? No, I don’t knock.”
Oh , yeah.
His eyes flick to the pizza left ignored on the table and he looks at it like it personally offended him.
“Why not him?” I ask. I don’t know why, but the words just flew out of my mouth. Why does Rafael think he can judge?
“His name is Rocco, for a start. It sounds like a dog's name.”
I scoff, but now that he’s said it all I can see is a little staffie called Rocco.
I swipe left.
“That app is bullshit anyway,” he says, setting his keys down on the kitchen counter. “It’s not like anyone finds what they’re looking for.”
“What sources are you getting your information from? Because I can assure you that I get exactly what I’m looking for on there.”
He leans against the counter folding his arms across his chest. “Yeah, you and everyone else that’s only looking for a quick fuck are why dating apps don’t work.”
“Oh yeah, cause your method of giving every person in range a death glare is really working out for you.”
He scoffs. “Not that it’s any of your business but I don’t have any trouble in that department.”
I cross my arms. “Really? Because I don’t recall seeing you even glimpse at a woman in the last six months. Unless you count Beatrix. But then again, you were more like glaring at her, so it doesn’t really count.”
“It doesn’t count because she was eighteen and you sent her over.”
I hold back the laugh threatening to bubble out of me at the memory of the night that three teenagers fawned over Caio and Rafael.
“That was all Isla actually, but I don’t know why you’re making this worse for yourself, I tried to give you one and you’re narrowing it down to zero.”
He sighs, glaring at me and I just smile back. This is the most we’ve interacted since I’ve been here and it’s the most comfortable I’ve felt. Bickering with him is far more comfortable than pretending like he doesn’t exist. Although I think it’s been more the other way around. I’ve been going about my normal day to day, except my shifts at the bar, but it’s like living with a ghost. Rafael has been avoiding me.
“That app is bullshit,” he says again, changing the topic.
“It’s only bullshit if you don’t use it to your advantage. Maybe you should set up an account, that way they don’t have to witness your charming personality in real life before they decide if they want a night alone with you.”
“I’m good.”
“If you need a good spot for a first date, there’s this restaurant called Olive temporary.
It’s like he’s always expecting someone to show up, yet I’ve never heard of anyone staying with him until I got here.
I slide my fluffy socks over my feet. I’m wearing the ones that have all the individual toes. Yeah, it’s weird, but they’re incredibly cozy.
I rub my eyes as I pander out my room into the quiet house. I look both ways down the hall and see no one. Go figure.
I slip out of the doorway and head to the kitchen, hoping it’s equally quiet there. Maybe Rafael has gone to work early today. I wouldn’t be surprised, not with how offended he looked when he heard that I was going to be spending two weeks here with nothing to do except read and simply exist in his space.
I get a glass of water without making more noise than necessary. There’s something about a really quiet house that makes you feel like you should be quiet as well. I hate it.
I slide my feet across the floor as I make my way back to my room, but I halt when I hear a grunt from behind a closed door.
I stand frozen in the hallway. Not sure whether to stay on course, or whether to make a pit stop. Another grunt comes from behind the door, and my curiosity gets the better of me. I place my glass down on the side table that is conveniently right next to the door where the noises are coming from.
I lean into the door, pressing my ear against the wood to get as close as possible.
Rafael lets out another grunt from behind the door, and it sends tingles right down to my nether regions. I look down at my body. “ Stop that .”
Why is my body all of a sudden reacting to this man? Every time he gets a little bit too close to me, it’s like every organ in my entire body holds it’s breath, waiting to see what will happen. I don’t know what they think would happen.
Nothing. That’s what .
Nothing would ever happen except maybe my impulses giving out and my fist slipping into his stomach.
The first time was about a month ago at Ferragosto, when he stood behind me getting the glasses from the top shelf. That’s the first time it felt like my body halted all function in his proximity.
I lean back in and for a while there’s nothing, he’s gone quiet in there. What was he doing? My mind wanders to all kinds of places.
Suddenly I lose my balance, falling forward as the door swings away from me, and I land on a hard, moist chest.
“ Shit .” I yank my hands away from where they were just groping Rafael’s glistening pecs. I jump back, and when my gaze meets Rafael's, his eyes glitter with self-assurance.
“What are you doing?” He asks. He reaches his arms up to grip the top of the doorframe and… Jesus .
I can’t help my eyes from roaming over his half naked body, the muscles stretched out and shining with sweat. Good lord. Pizza guy's shoulders are pebbles compared to Rafael’s boulders. I inwardly scold myself for finding this man so downright attractive.
“Whitley?”
“Hm?” I force my eyes to part with his chest to look at his face instead, but it doesn’t help. Not with the way he’s looking at me. All arrogant and cocky.
“I asked you a question.”
Right. The question. The question being, what am I doing? What am I doing?
I can’t exactly tell him that I was standing here with my ear pressed to the door so I could hear the grunts he was making that made my body tingle.
He scrubs a hand over his face. “Huh, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you flustered, blondie.”
I usually hate it when he calls me that, but this time there’s a tiny part of me that kind of likes the way it sounds from his lips. Someone suffocate her .
I clear my throat and take a step back. “I am not flustered.”
He takes a step forward, and I instinctively take another step back. “Really?”
I nod. No words able to escape my mouth.
He keeps walking until my back hits the wall. “See, the way your cheeks have this little pink color on them, says otherwise.” He reaches his hand up, as if he wants to trace the color on my cheeks, but he pulls his hand away a second later. Good, I probably would’ve smacked him if he’d touched me. Out of pure instinct, of course.
I swallow. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’ve seen bodies far nicer than yours.”
Nice save Whitley.
He crosses his arms, and it just makes everything worse. The way his tan forearms are corded with veins makes my focus jump. I nearly choke on my own saliva when I try to speak again.
“You’re a bad liar.”
“No, I’m not.”
“Whatever you say March. I’m going to go take a shower. Care to join?”
I scoff. “I’d rather jump in a bath filled with piranhas.”
“Obviously.” He smirks and tips his head. “Cute socks.” And then he walks down the hall, slipping through the door to his bedroom.
I throw my head back against the wall and a hand over my chest. Fucking chill, you stupid heart.
I saw him bare chested my first morning here, when he was washing his car. I thought he was fucking hot then, with that backwards cap situated on his head. But now? I think I need to go to a hypnotist. I need someone to erase that image from my mind, because I have a feeling it’s burned into my corneas. Like it’ll be one of those things I see every time I go to close my eyes.
I’ve always found Rafael infuriatingly attractive. But now my stupid cheeks made it obvious to him, and I have a feeling that will come back to bite me in the ass.