14. Self-Punishment
14
SELF-PUNISHMENT
W hat the hell had happened last night?
Coy threw the cup into the sink more forcefully than he planned on the next day.
He couldn’t put his finger on anything even if he tried.
Last night felt like a date to him.
He supposed it felt that way to Angel too.
But the minute he deepened the kiss that she’d started, he’d felt her tense and knew he had made a mistake.
He apologized and she did the same. It was a mistake and now he had to figure out where to go from here.
When his phone rang, he grabbed it off the counter and saw it was Spencer calling.
His best friend was the last person he wanted to talk to right now when he’d had dreams of Angel naked in his bed last night.
Wanting to see your buddy’s sister naked and sink right into her was not something you share.
He could just let it go to voicemail, but the truth was, he wanted the self-punishment to get his head on straight.
“Hey,” he said, answering.
“What’s going on?” Spencer asked. “Am I interrupting anything?”
Only my guilt for kissing your baby sister.
“No,” he said. “What are you doing?”
“Just taking a break from work,” Spencer said.
“It’s Saturday afternoon.”
“I know,” Spencer said. “But I’ve got a lot of shit going on. I’m going to have to go out of town for the week so I’m getting ready for it.”
“Where are you going?”
“San Francisco,” Spencer said. “We are trying to acquire a business there.”
“Are you going to take the bar there?” he asked.
“I haven’t figured it out yet. We’ll see. I don’t think I’ll need to. It’s not like I’m interested in transferring, but who knows? They might want to move the headquarters there.”
It was the last thing he wanted to hear. The thought of his best friend being that far away didn’t sit well with him.
Right now he knew he could go see Spencer spur of the moment if he wanted to with a helicopter trip or a quick flight out of Logan.
“What will you do?” he asked.
“At the moment, nothing,” Spencer said. “I’ll keep my eyes open. I’ve got a lot of contacts. I’m not worrying. These things take time.”
“They do,” he said.
“How’s Angel?” Spencer asked. Like he always did. It went back to Angel at all times.
“Good,” he said.
“I hope she’s getting out and doing things,” Spencer said. “You’re not working her too hard, are you?”
Spencer was laughing. “I don’t think so,” Coy said. “You’d have to ask her. We are out the door before six daily and we don’t work on the weekends.”
“Cake jobs,” Spencer said. “Maybe I’ll give her a call next. She gets all bent out of shape when I check in with her. It’s easy to get the scoop through you.”
Coy snorted. “She’s not happy about that,” he said.
“You told her?” Spencer asked.
“She’s not an idiot,” he said. Though he felt like one right now after last night.
“True,” Spencer said. “She’ll get over it. It’s what older brothers do. I can’t have anyone taking advantage of her. I’m counting on you to make sure that doesn’t happen.”
Jesus, how much more guilt could he take?
“Don’t worry about it,” he said.
“I’m not,” Spencer said. “Shit, someone is calling me. I’ve got to take this. I’ll talk to you soon.”
“Bye,” he said.
Coy tried to find something to take his mind off of last night and nothing was working.
He had to fix what happened. He couldn’t let it go.
He grabbed his keys and left the house. Thankfully he’d heard the apartment number Angel had and went to see if she was home.
Her SUV was parked in front, but he realized he couldn’t get in and there was no way he was going to call his father to get the code to punch in to get through the security door.
He hit the buzzer hoping she’d answer.
“Hello,” she said.
“It’s Coy. Can we talk?”
There was a moment of silence. “I’ll be right down.”
He waited impatiently and hoped he didn’t lose the courage to confront this issue. “Sorry for just coming over like this. We’ve got to talk.”
“Yes,” she said. “We do. Let’s wait until we get inside.”
Which was his plan all along. Too many people knew who he was even if they weren’t sure who Angel was.
When they were inside, he said, “I shouldn’t have kissed you last night.”
“I believe I kissed you first,” she said, crossing her arms.
She looked pissed. “What are you mad about?’
“Did you want to kiss me?” she asked.
“I said I was sorry,” he said.
“That isn’t what I asked.” She held her hand up when he went to talk. “Let’s say I’m not Spencer Jansen’s sister. I’m just Angel that you met and started to get to know.”
“You work for me,” he argued.
“Ignore that fact too,” she said.
“It’s hard to ignore any of those things.”
“My God, you’re stubborn on top of being slow,” she snapped.
His jaw dropped. “Slow?”
She threw her hands up in the air. “Coy, I wanted to kiss you. Maybe I’ve wanted to kiss you for years. That’s right. Years!”
“You have?” he asked.
“Slow. Clueless. What other words can I come up with?”
“Let me catch up,” he said. Things were processing in his head. “I’ll admit the past few months I’ve noticed things changing between us.”
“So you wanted to kiss me too?” she asked more calmly. “Be honest. Don’t answer as Spencer’s best friend or my boss.”
He wouldn’t lie to her. “Yes.”
“Thank God!” she said, waving her hands around again. “At least you’re honest.”
“I’m always honest. I’m just trying to catch up. You said years?”
“Coy, you really are clueless.”
“I can’t be too clueless because there is no way your brother knows that you’ve what? Got a crush on me?”
“Sure, we’ll use that word.”
There was a crazy amount of sarcasm behind those words, but he couldn’t think of it being more than a crush right now.
“Does anyone know?” he asked.
“My mother knows. I didn’t realize that she did. I’ve done a good job keeping it a secret.”
“You’ve done a great job keeping it a secret,” he said. “And it’s not as if I’ve seen you all that much though we’ve known each other for years.”
And he’d talked to her about schooling too.
When she wanted to go be a dentist, he gave her advice, helped her with admissions and anything else she wanted to know.
He’d had her email and cell number for years.
But they never chatted about anything more than school before her working for him.
Had he been that blind?
It appears he had been.
“I had hoped you’d see when I moved here. The fact you asked me over two Fridays in a row, maybe I realized you were feeling it and trying to work your way through it. But then I thought you were just being nice because you felt bad I was alone.”
He ran his hands through his hair. He didn’t want her to feel that way when it was true.
“I like spending time with you. How easy it is to be around you.”
“Like a friend?” she asked.
“More than that and it’s been hard to rationalize it in my mind.”
“Why do you have to do that?” she asked.
“Your brother is my best friend. He asked me to watch out for you. Do you not realize the position I’m in?”
She started to pace around the room. “This is about us and not Spencer. Don’t do that.”
“It’s hard not to do it,” he said. “I owe him a lot.”
“For what?” she asked.
“He was there for me when I needed him in college,” he said.
“Do you mean the pact you two had about not letting the other be drunk alone?” she asked.
“You know about that?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said. “I’m not sure I was meant to. My parents were talking about it one night and I overheard. I know Spencer is always worried about his career. Not everyone else in college was looking toward the future. I think he found that commonality with you.”
“Yeah,” he said. “We understood each other.”
“And now you’re worried he’d be pissed if we started to date?”
“I’m not sure what we’ve got or could do,” he rushed out to say.
“Don’t be so stubborn to not even give this a chance,” she said. “I didn’t expect you to be a coward like that.”
“Whoa,” he said, putting his hands up. “Insulting me isn’t going to help matters any.”
“I’m sorry. I’m annoyed. I can’t believe my brother is going to play a part in my life like this. I just want to not worry about everything I do getting back to him.”
“It’s not as if I told him you were at my house the past two Fridays,” he said.
“I didn’t think you would. I wouldn’t tell him either.”
“I’m not sure what to do right now,” he said. He was never this confused. “You work for me too.”
“Do you think I’m the type of person that would cry sexual harassment or something?”
“No,” he said.
“Come here,” she said.
“What?” he asked.
“Come. Here,” she said slowly.
“Why?”
“Because we are going to kiss, and if you don’t feel anything, then we’ll just chalk this up to me being an idiot and I’ll move on. We’ll forget any of it happened starting with the kiss last night.”
“I don’t want to lose what we’ve got,” he said.
“Enough that you don’t want to risk what we could have?” she asked, lifting her chin.
Damn, he hadn’t expected her to play that way.
It was the right button to push. He reached for her and yanked her into his arms. If she wanted this, then she was going to see how he was with any other woman, and not just what has been in her imagination for years.
He wasn’t going to treat her differently just because of who she was.
His mouth crushed hers, his tongue sliding in. She wrapped her arms around his neck and held on as if he was her anchor. She gave as good as she got and what he felt was more than he ever expected to feel.
What he’d been waiting years for.
He started to relax some when he realized that and held her, the two of them kissing for what seemed like an eternity though it was probably only a minute or two.
When he leaned back, she was smirking at him.
“Don’t lie to me and say you didn’t feel what I did.”
“I won’t,” he said softly. “I can’t.”
But he was fucked and knew it.