Chapter 19
CHAPTER
NINETEEN
EVEREST
It turns out that Owen isn’t so bad when he doesn’t have a stick up his ass. In fact, I credit myself for removing it. And replacing it with my own little rod. Heh heh.
After that first night when he bossed me around in my own bedroom, he’s become fucking insatiable. Every night after we put Ivy to bed, he’s shooing me down to the basement and ordering me to strip. I gladly comply. I haven’t had such regular sex or such good sex ever in my life, and that’s saying something.
I always demand cuddles after we’ve both come our brains out. Owen always puts up a fuss, but then gives in. I think he secretly likes it but is too much of a grumpy gremlin to admit it to me. Although, he always disappears at some point before the morning, which kind of sucks.
It’s weird. I’ve woken up alone in bed for most of my life and it’s never bothered me before. But waking up alone these days, knowing that I didn’t fall asleep alone… it leaves a grimy feeling on my skin that I don’t like.
I mean, I know why Owen leaves early and I have no reason to ask him to stay. But even so, there’s a part of me that wishes he would just give in to the inevitable. That he would give in to us.
This weekend will be interesting. We’ve been careful to act normal around Ivy, whatever the heck normal is. She’s too young to pick up on the changes between me and Owen, but our parents definitely won’t be. An entire long weekend with both sets of parents—I can already see Owen reverting back to his natural state of assholery.
That is, if we ever get to Owen’s parents’ house up in Westchester. Right now, it’s twenty minutes after five on Friday and he was supposed to be home an hour ago. I took the day off work so I could pack all our things, pick Ivy up from school, and be ready to go the second Owen got home. Could Owen be bothered to do the same? Nope. Of course not.
So now I’m fucking pacing the foyer like some worried house husband, switching between checking my phone and peering out the window for any sign of him.
I’m doing my best not to jump to the worst-case scenario because I know Owen would tsk and say I’m overreacting. But hey, guess what, the last time someone was late getting home without a single text or call, they wound up dead. Forgive me for not wanting to live through that horror again.
Ivy’s sitting on the couch, Zuzi hugged to her chest, watching me like a hawk. I’m trying to play it cool, but smart girl that she is, she seems to sense my low-key panic.
Fuck. Jesus. Where the hell is he?
Fifteen minutes later, Owen finally jogs up the front steps to our house. I wrench open the door.
“Seriously?”
He doesn’t even glance at me as he sets his briefcase down on the bench next to the door and yanks at his tie.
“Where the hell have you been?” I hiss at him. “We were supposed to be on the road over an hour ago.”
Owen shoots me an unimpressed glare. “I had a patient. He needed emergency surgery.”
“A patient?” I scoff. “What, like a dog? Couldn’t someone else do it?”
Owen’s at the foot of the stairs and he spins around on me. “Yes, he’s a dog, and no, no one else could do it. It’s called my job. Which saves lives. Which, by the way, also pays for the bills of this house.”
Both of my eyebrows shoot up at what he’s implying. The fucking audacity. “And what do you think my job does? The job that I took a day off of so we can go to your parents’ house for Memorial Day weekend.”
Owen huffs dismissively. “Your job, sure. I’d love to see how far your measly paycheck would stretch with the expenses of a house like this.”
My jaw drops. No, he didn’t. My job at Mars Fitness might not pay as well as his veterinarian job at some animal hospital, but it’s honest work and I earn an honest paycheck. I contribute to the household expenses just as much as he does.
“You—” My blood is boiling, but I cut myself off when I catch sight of Ivy lingering in the doorway to the living room. She doesn’t need to see us fighting over… god, I don’t even know what. But I’m pissed and Owen’s in a bad-ass mood and we’re going to be stuck in a very enclosed space for the next several hours.
I swallow down my anger and irritation. This latest spat can wait until we’re at his parents’ house and Ivy has been safely pawned off onto her grandparents.
“Just go get your sh—stuff.” I grab one of the bags I’ve piled next to the front door. “I’ll load the car.”
“Should’ve loaded it while you were waiting,” Owen mutters on his way upstairs to his room.
Motherfucker. If Ivy wasn’t standing right there…
I stomp out to the car parked on the curb a couple doors down. It takes me a few trips to get everything loaded. By the time I’m done, Owen’s changed into his weekend clothes—slacks and a polo shirt—and is bringing the last of the bags out.
“Come on, Ivy-bear.” I strap her into her car seat and make sure she’s got Zuzi, a juice box, and a bag of crackers within easy reach.
When Owen approaches the car, he holds out his hand.
I stare at it. I know what he wants, but there’s no fucking way I’m giving it to him.
“Give me the keys,” he says, sticking his hand out a little farther.
“No.” I shut Ivy’s door and start walking around to the driver’s side.
“Everest.” Owen grabs my arm. “I’m driving.”
“The hell you are. Knowing you, we won’t get there till next week.” I try to shrug him off, but his grip is strong.
“You don’t even know where you’re going.”
I hold up my phone. “That’s what Google Maps is for, smartass.”
Owen steps in close, his chest presses against my arm, and he glares daggers up into my face. “I said, give me the keys,” he grits out between his teeth.
Fuck, but I want to say no. I want to shake him off, dive into the driver’s seat, and lock the door behind me. He can get in the passenger side if he wants. Or he can stay in Brooklyn for the weekend for all I care. That would show him.
But there’s something dark and dangerous in Owen’s eyes. Something that slithers right into me and makes my dick plump. Jesus Christ, what is wrong with me? I’m fucking angry at him and he’s being a jackass and my dick is like “hot, awesome, yes, let’s go.”
This thing between us is beyond fucked up.
Because I give him the damn keys.
We climb into the car and despite Owen’s claim that he knows where he’s going, I punch his parents’ address into my phone anyway.
We settle in for the long crawl out of the city, inching along with every other family trying to get away for the long weekend. Ivy’s merrily singing along to the kid’s road trip playlist I found, and Owen and I are doing a fantastic job of ignoring each other.
As I expected, it takes us hours , and by the time we’re pulling up to the big suburban house where Owen grew up, we’re all cranky as fuck. Ivy hasn’t stopped whining for the past forty minutes. Owen’s been huffing and grumbling under his breath. I am about to scream.
The second the car rolls to a stop, I shove open the door and scramble out. Fresh evening air hits me in the face and I take in the crisp scent of spring. I stretch, lifting my arms over my head and bending side to side to work out all the kinks and tightness in my muscles.
The front door opens behind me and both sets of grandparents rush out—I’d texted them earlier to let them know we’d be arriving late. I open Ivy’s door and help her with the straps of her car seat. The instant I set her down on the driveway, she’s racing toward the grandmothers.
“Nana! Grammy!”
I watch as the two older women envelop her with hugs and kisses, and the irritation that’s been plaguing me all afternoon and evening finally melts away.
We made it. A few hours later than planned, but we made it in one piece. No one starved to death and no one got strangled, we’re going to have a relaxing weekend, and everything is going to be fine.
The two grandfathers and Owen unload the bags, and with everyone helping, we get all our things into the house in one trip. Owen heads towards the stairs when his mom, Alyssa, calls out.
“Oh wait, Ivy’s upstairs in your old bedroom, but you and Everest are downstairs on the sofa bed.”
Owen’s grumpy scowl deepens. “What? Why?”
“The fourth bedroom is a painting studio now,” Owen’s dad, Martin, says.
“Painting studio?” Owen echoes.
Martin shrugs with a “don’t ask me” expression.
“I took up painting recently and that room has the perfect lighting,” Alyssa explains.
“Since when do you paint?” Owen sounds incredulous.
“Since recently, ” Alyssa shoots back at him with a pointed look.
The rest of us watch the exchange like it’s a three-way tennis match, and I have to say, it’s kind of fun seeing Owen get put in his place by his mom. Go, Alyssa.
“Fine, whatever,” Owen grumbles before shoving Ivy’s bags toward his dad. “You take these. Give me those.”
Martin hands over the bags and Owen stomps his way toward the basement stairs.
“Come on, Ivy, sweetie. Let’s go to your room.” Alyssa holds Ivy’s hand and leads her up to the second floor. “It used to be your Uncle Owen’s room, remember? Isn’t that cool?”
I’m left standing in the hall with Mom and Dad.
“How are things, dear?” Mom asks, pulling me into a belated hug.
I hug her back, sinking into the comfort of her embrace. Dad wraps his arms around the both of us and we all just stand there, enjoying the moment.
A part of me wants to complain, to spew out all the sharp-edged and shadowy worries eating away at my insides and blame it all on Owen. But that’s not fair. Today was a bad day. But otherwise… “Actually, things are okay. Better than okay.”
Mom and Dad both look surprised.
“Really?” Mom asks skeptically.
“Yeah. Really.” A sense of peaceful contentment settles over me, smothering the last remnants of my irritation.
“What about Owen?” Dad asks.
Owen. It always comes back to him, doesn’t it? If I’m having a good day, it’s usually because Owen and I are getting along. If I’m having a crappy day, it’s because Owen’s being an asshat. More than Ivy, Owen’s become this measure of how things are going in my life. When did that happen? When did everything start revolving around him?
“Owen’s… good.” I’m not sure what else to say. I’m certainly not going to tell my parents that we’ve been fucking each other on the DL. But he brings up so many feelings inside me, many that I’ve never experienced before, that I don’t understand or have a name for. He makes me feel things that I didn’t know were possible to feel.
He pushes me and pulls me. Living with him has been so much harder than I thought it would be. But I can tell that I’m changing. I’m growing. I’m becoming a version of myself that I don’t quite recognize, but I like.
Owen’s making me a better person.
“Really?” Mom exclaims under her breath. “Because we thought you two were going to murder each other the second we left you alone.”
I chuckle, remembering the early days when I thought we were going to murder each other too. “You know, maybe I didn’t give him a fair chance before. He’s not that bad. He’s…”
I search for the words to describe his unique mix of surly and strict and vulnerable. I don’t know if there’s a word that would do him justice in the English language. “He’s more than I gave him credit for.”
Mom and Dad exchange a look. They don’t believe me, but that’s okay. It doesn’t matter what they believe. All that matters is I’m beginning to know the real Owen underneath all his bluster. And I’m finding that I like what I see.