King of Players: An Opposites Attract Romance (Billionaire Kings of New York Book 3)

16. Sobering Up

sixteen

Chad

“You sure you can find your way to the bedroom by yourself?” My friend Talia laughed through her open window as she rested her hand over the wheel. “Need help finding the door?”

Staggering, I swayed in the middle of the driveway, chuckling. “Ah-ha-ha, you’re hilarious. Sure you don’t wanna come in?” I offered with a suggestive gaze.

She laughed. “No. And I highly recommend a hurl bucket.”

“You know very well I can hold my liquor. This is nothing.”

“Well, look out. The nothing’s got a hold of your feet.”

“Don’t be a jerk!”

“Nighty night, Chaddy boy. I had fun.”

I waved with a hand as I spun on my heel, trying to direct my steps toward the entrance. “Always a pleasure, darlin’. Always a pleasure.”

Just as I raised my hand to the door, it cracked open. I looked up, expecting to see my housekeeper. Instead, I saw Kaira’s angry face staring back at me. As she stepped aside, I pushed the door further and walked inside. For a second, I wondered if Talia had mistakenly driven me to Kaira’s house. No. No, this was my house.

“What are you doing here?” I asked, walking past her toward the kitchen.

“You’re wasted!”

Opening the fridge, I grabbed a bottle of water. “So?”

“I came to talk to you.”

“How did they just leave you here?” I took a big gulp, which made my stomach turn.

She smirked. “I guess they’re used to your girlfriends being here at all times, unattended.”

“Well.” I shrugged, smiling and rolling my eyes as I staggered back toward her. “So, talk.” I could see that she was livid, but I couldn’t think of what I had done wrong. Since she told me that nothing more could happen between us, I had respected her wishes and stayed out of her way. My head hurt. I felt nauseous. I wished she would get it over with and leave so I could pass out in peace.

“Not while you’re in this state, I won’t.” She marched angrily toward the kitchen, her eyes searching all around.

“What are you doing?”

I heard the clanking and slamming of items on the counter while her hands worked at an impressive speed. “Sobering you up.”

“Wow,” I snorted. “You really can’t bear to see someone having fun, can you?”

“No.” She sternly said without looking at me. I started to smell the coffee, and once again, my stomach turned. “I’m a prude, remember?”

“What?” Surrendering to gravity, I let my body flop down on the couch. I then proceeded to gulp down the rest of the water, at the risk of making things worse. I was just so incredibly thirsty.

Without offering a response, she trooped toward me, handing me a cup of coffee. “Here. Sip it slowly.”

“Th—Thanks? I guess?” Furrowing my eyebrows, I watched her walk barefoot toward an armchair a few feet away. Instead of gracefully sitting down like she always did, she gathered the wide, flowing skirt of her dress in her hands between her legs, hiking it up as she did. She then threw herself into the chair, raising her legs and crossing them in what resembled a yoga pose. I took a sip and realized that she didn’t add any sugar. Cringing, I asked, “What exactly did I do?”

Impatiently, she sighed, squeezing her eyes shut and tilting her head in visible frustration. “Something tells me that I’m gonna have to repeat myself in fifteen minutes… but here goes nothing.” After pressing her lips into a thin line for a moment, she finally said, “Chad, I don’t appreciate the fact that someone other than the two of us found out about what happened.”

Shaking my head, I chuckled before realizing that the hot cup was essentially burning my palms. Quickly leaning forward, I placed it down on the coffee table and blew on my palms. “Okay, you’re gonna have to be more specific.”

“Excuse me? How many people did you tell exactly?”

“Not that!” I shook my hands in the air, trying to cool them down. “What happened? Like, what do you think I told her?”

“So, you admit it. You told a woman something.”

Picking up the mug again, this time by the handle, I took another sip, resigning to the fact that I did need to sober up for this conversation. “I told a friend that I was interested in ‘a woman’—I never said your name—”

“A woman who turned out to be boring, is that right?”

I slowly shook my head, my eyelids getting heavy as I sighed. “I never said that.”

“Then what did you say?”

I felt like a seriously big gulp was needed, so I took it. I felt the heat of her glare on my skin. As I lowered the mug, I said, “That you couldn’t handle my lifestyle. Wasn’t that the gist of what you said to me?”

“And how’s that any of your friend’s business?”

“Excuse me, I’m not allowed to talk to my friends? Where do you get off? Seriously, Kaira!”

“No, you’re right. You’re absolutely right!” Starting to speak faster and with random hand gestures, she stood up and started aimlessly marching around the room. “Where do I get off? What am I but some piece of ass you met at a party and wanted to ‘tap that’ right? What right do I have to privacy, when I so foolishly gave it away when I fucked an actor! You’re right. How na?ve of me to demand respect.”

It wasn’t the coffee that shot a slug of sense into me, but Kaira’s impassioned speech that reflected anger and a sense of betrayal. Putting down the mug, I stood up, struggling to maintain my balance as I walked toward her. As soon as she turned and saw me approach, she recoiled, holding up both hands between us. “Don’t come near me. I don’t need your pity. I made a mistake, and I must own up to it. It’s the only way I’ll learn never to put myself in this position again.”

I did feel sorry for her, but I also respected the fact that she wasn’t crying or breaking down like many people in her place would—at least in my experience. She wasn’t being hysterical, although she was going through a tough moment of self-judgment. “Kaira, will you sit down, please?” I pleaded. “I won’t touch you, I promise.”

Snorting, she ran her hands through her hair, looking up at the ceiling. “You think that’s the problem? We’re way past that now.”

“Just—Just sit down, will you? I’m sorry I’m this drunk. I didn’t know you’d be here and I’m trying to keep up with you.”

“Oh, right.” She suddenly let go of her hair, dropping it down to cascade in a stunning mess around her face and over her shoulders. With the wild look in her eyes and the three undone buttons at the top of her dress, she could have easily been the subject of a deeply artistic photoshoot—‘Beautiful Madness’. “You need to keep up with me.”

“Yes!” I shouted, instantly regretting it. Holding up my hands in an unspoken apology, I lowered my voice as I said, “Listen. Look. You’re incredible. You’re everything I’m not. You’re responsible and generous and giving and… you’re just so good.”

“Oh.” She nodded with a bitter smile on her face, while placing her hands on her waist.

“I do wish I could keep up with you!” I confessed. “How you do everything you do so selflessly, while giving up parts of yourself that everyone else takes for granted… it’s just beyond me.”

“Well,” she sarcastically tittered, pointing a finger at me as she walked around me in a circle. “I’ll have you know that I’m in therapy for precisely that.”

Confused, I furrowed my eyebrows. “You’re—You’re not happy?”

“Happy? Ha!” She let out a mad half-laugh, and even though I smiled watching her, I felt an ache in my chest. “No, people like you are happy, Chad. Floating through life, doing as you please. Grabbing pleasures like you’re picking flowers from a meadow. You have everything, don’t you? The looks, the charm, the spirit. Doors open for you without you even asking.”

“Hey—This isn’t about me!”

“Like hell it isn’t!” she shouted. “Tell me, how many women have you been with since you last fucked me, huh? How many? Two? Three? Six?”

“Kaira!”

“But me? I’m forced to drown in the aftermath of the earthquake you caused, tipping my life over and making me question everything I ever believed.”

“I had no idea!”

“Of course you didn’t. Why would you? Why would you even care about the disposable woman you had to have, then threw away?”

“Hey!” I pointed an accusatory finger at her. “You ended it, remember? You said it can’t be—not me.”

“Oh, and you were so generously willing to tie yourself to the boring charity lady.”

“You’re so much more than that.”

“And so are you, so quit insulting me, Chad.”

“What?”

“You owe me an apology, goddammit!” she yelled.

“For what?”

“For sucking me into your world when you knew full well that I didn’t have a place in it. For… for…” Running her fingers through her hair, she seemed to struggle to utter the words. “For seducing me.” Raising my eyebrows, I couldn’t hide my shock. Not only had I not heard that word in over a decade, but I didn’t think I’d ever heard it from a woman before. The way she stared at me, with a film of tears sparkling in her eyes, made me want to hug her. I knew I couldn’t—I shouldn’t.

The only thing left to do was to give her what she wanted. “I’m sorry,” I whispered.

“Louder!” she demanded, the expression on her face threatening of a crying fit. I wasn’t sure I could handle seeing her cry all that well.

“I’m sorry,” I repeated. “I’m sorry that I made you the object of a stupid, juvenile hunt to feed my ego. I see now that it was a mistake. It was selfish, careless, and wildly inconsiderate.” What struck me was the honesty that accompanied my apology—something I hadn’t seen coming only a minute ago. “You didn’t deserve that. I apologize. And I really do hope that you forgive me.”

Staring at me, she repeatedly blinked, evidently adamant on not letting me see her cry. Her face, stiff as stone, began to soften as she examined me from head to toe. She didn’t move, only her eyes toured the length of me a couple of times. Finally, she sighed. “Thank you.” She paused. “That’s all I needed to hear.”

Before I had the chance to say anything else, she suddenly turned away and walked toward the kitchen entrance. I realized that that was where she had left her shoes when she bent over to put them on. My eyes landed on her purse lying on the chair and then went back to her, watching her brush the hair away from her face and straighten up her dress.

I was speechless, while my mind screamed with a plea for her not to go. Was that it? Was that the end of my little journey with Kaira Bradley? Didn’t I get an apology for the way she forced me to dream of her? If I’d told her now that I hadn’t actually slept with another woman since the last time I was inside of her, would she believe me?

And would it even matter?

The way she grabbed her purse without regard for me with a glance and ran toward the door offered a firm answer to my question.

The Chad Niles chapter was over in Kaira Bradley’s book.

And what was left now was for me to gather the scattered pieces of my mind and move on, with the agonizing knowledge that I almost had a good one.

The one that got away.