Chapter 9 #2
I get up and head into the kitchen to make myself some peanut butter toast, and Winston follows closely on my heels. As I stand there waiting for my bread to finish toasting, I squat down to pet Winston and he rolls onto his back with his legs in the air.
“Damn, you do love a belly rub, don’t you,” I say, but my mind’s not really on the dog. Instead, I’m thinking about how the guy Sierra’s going out with tonight isn’t right for her.
I watched them carefully last weekend when they were saying goodbye, and there’s nothing there.
In his eyes, Sierra could have been any random girl—there was nothing to indicate he was particularly into her in any way beyond getting in her pants.
And Sierra . . . I saw this morning how she looks at a guy when she’s attracted to him, and I certainly didn’t see that when she was looking at him.
They don’t have to be that into each other to fuck, that annoying voice inside my head reminds me.
I’ve certainly slept with plenty of girls I wasn’t into.
I’ve never felt like emotions had to be involved.
Attraction, definitely. But emotions make everything murky—they confuse what should be clear-cut, they make the rational irrational.
But for the first time in as long as I can remember, I’m wondering if maybe the right emotions could make sex even better.
The toaster dings to let me know it’s done, and the sound is like a bell alerting me that I got the right answer on a game show.
But that doesn’t even make sense because how could emotions—which have such a tendency to mess things up—possibly make me better at something I’ve already mastered?
I spread peanut putter onto my toast as I consider this line of thinking. I’m pretty sure that the idea of emotions having any impact on how good sex is between two people is just ridiculous. Attraction and skill. That’s what makes for good sex.
At my feet, Winston whines as he puts his nose in the air and sniffs.
“You want some peanut butter, buddy?” I ask him.
I know he doesn’t understand me, but he can clearly smell it and he loved it when I gave him some yesterday.
I dip a spoon into the jar, and hold it out so he can lick it off while I stand there at the counter eating my toast and wondering if I’ll be thinking about Sierra and her date all day.
I can smell the richness of the chocolate and the creamy roasted scent of the peanut butter as I approach the front door. Sierra must be baking, and whatever she’s making already has me salivating.
When I open the door, the scent hits me full force, and it’s enough to have my eyes rolling back in my head.
I trained hard today, and about half the time it felt like the mountain was winning.
I’m sore in a way that makes me feel old.
This shit never used to happen, and it makes me wonder if the best years of my professional career are behind me.
That’s a sobering thought for a twenty-five-year-old.
I grabbed a burger and a few beers with Lance and Drew after practice, and even though whatever Sierra’s making smells amazing, I’m still uncomfortably full.
That’s another thing that never used to happen.
I’m like a fucking old man already. I make a mental note to ask Nate for pointers navigating this new phase of my life.
In my head I’m already crafting the snarky text I’ll send him while I hang my coat on a hook in the entryway, right next to Sierra’s coat and ski pants. I wonder if she went skiing today? She was still asleep when I left for the mountain this morning, but maybe she got a few runs in.
“Honey, I’m home,” I call out in a singsong voice, hoping to hear her laugh.
“Oh, good,” she says, materializing in the living room in nothing but a sweatshirt that hits mid-thigh and a pair of sheepskin slippers.
I force my eyes away from the smooth curve of her thighs and make myself look her in the eye.
“I made you something,” she says, sounding so damn pleased with herself.
“Yeah? Is it whatever is making this place smell like a bakery?”
She laughs, and the sound is such a delight it makes my throat feel thick and my skin feel hot.
Maybe I’m getting sick. “I made dark chocolate peanut butter cup brownies. I’m taking them out of the oven now,” she says as she breezes past me, grabs pot holders, and pulls the brownies from the oven.
Then she reaches into an upper cabinet and pulls out a small jar of flaky pink salt that she sprinkles over the top of the brownies.
I take a few steps into the kitchen so I can get a better look at them. “You can make brownies that look and smell like this and you’ve been holding out on me? After how many times I cooked you dinner this week?”
She looks over at me and grins, and I pretend not to notice how her sweatshirt got caught on the curve of one of her thighs when she reached up into the cabinet to get the salt, and how I can now see the sheen of her soft leg nearly to where it meets her hip.
“I know,” she says, “I feel like I haven’t been home enough and you’ve been so awesome, making me dinner and helping with the dog. And I just wanted to say thank you. With chocolate and peanut butter, because I know how much you like your peanut butter.”
I know it’s just brownies, but I don’t think anyone has ever made me dessert to thank me for anything. I wonder for a moment if it’s because I don’t normally do things for people that require a thank you.
I open my mouth to tell her I appreciate the gesture, but somehow the words don’t come and I’m standing there with my mouth open.
She’s looking at me like she’s expecting me to say something, and the only thing I can think of is how my dad used to love to surprise me and Jackson when we were kids so that he could tap us under our chins when our mouths fell open in shock and say, in his thick Irish brogue, “Don’t let the flies in. ”
Sierra’s huge brown eyes are lined with smoky eyeliner and her eyelashes are coated with mascara.
They’re the eyes of a woman who’s getting ready for a date, the eyes of a woman who may well be looking at another man tonight with naked lust. But right now, they are looking at me with concern, the unspoken “Are you okay?” hangs between our gaze, but I don’t even know the right answer to that. What’s wrong with me?
I glance down just to break eye contact with her, which is a mistake because my eyes land on the revealed curve of her thigh that’s got her sweatshirt bunched up around it.
Instinctively, I reach out and push the sweatshirt down, making sure I don’t touch her skin when I do.
I’m afraid that my fingers dragging along her thigh might actually make me combust. “Geez, Sierra, put some clothes on maybe?” I say.
I need her away from me, she’s taking up all the oxygen in the room and I feel like I’m going to pass out.
“Oh?” she says, but I can hear the teasing in her voice.
“The guy who walks around flaunting his abs is afraid of seeing a little thigh action? Lucky for you,” she says as she picks the pan of brownies up off the stove and sets them on the wire cooling rack setting on the counter, “I’m going to get dressed right now.
If Jared arrives before I’m back out, can you please entertain him for a minute?
I’m totally late because these brownies took longer to put together than I thought. ”
“Sure,” I say as she slips past me where I stand in the opening of the kitchen. As she turns sideways to pass me, her ass lightly brushes my crotch. I’m almost positive it’s an accident because Sierra doesn’t do shit like that on purpose, especially not to her best friend’s little brother.
“Oh,” she throws over her shoulder as she walks toward the hallway to the bedrooms, “and save me a brownie too, okay?”
“Like I’d eat the whole pan myself.”
She pauses in the hallway and turns, letting out a little laugh. “I seem to remember a time you did just that.”
Oh God, I did do that once when I was like ten. Spent half the night throwing up. “You remember the most flattering things about me,” I say dryly.
“Someone’s gotta know the real you—bring your international playboy-slash-snowboarding god status down a notch.”
I actually bark out a laugh at that one.
International playboy? Snowboarding god?
She obviously has a much different perception of me than I do of myself.
I’m just a guy trying to live life to the fullest, but feeling like the only thing I do well these days is take pictures.
I think I like her assessment of me better.
She turns and heads down the hall again, and once she’s safely ensconced in her room, I feel like I can breathe. Maybe I need to see a doctor, because this tightness in my throat, shortness of breath, heat in my chest—none of this is normal. I must be getting sick.
I don’t even make it to my bedroom to take off my snowboarding pants before the buzzer rings, so I press the button to let Sierra’s date into our building. I call out to let her know he’s on his way up and hear her let out a string of curses before she calls out that she needs five minutes.
I briefly consider chasing him off before she’s ready, but even though I know he’s not right for her, that’s just not the kind of thing I do. It doesn’t stop me from wanting to, though, and that’s a first for me.
“You must be Jared,” I say when I open the door after he knocks.
He’s definitely taken aback by my presence and gives me the quick once-over, sizing me up. He hasn’t done anything but look at me and already I want to kick his ass. He’s a few inches shorter than me, and just smaller all around—I could take him.
“Yeah,” he says. “And you are?”
“Beau Shanahan,” I say, and hold my hand out to shake his. “Sierra’s roommate.”
“Oh, shit,” he says on an exhale as he reaches his hand out. “I know who you are. Huge fan.” He shakes my hand enthusiastically.
“You a snowboarder too?”