15. Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Fifteen
Emily
W e signed all the paperwork at the bank the last week of March for Mullen Mechanics, and Trent moved all of his stuff into storage at the shop and my spare room the same week.
Bruce agreed to stay on for April to help Trent get a handle on the flow of customers, payroll, and all the bits and pieces it takes to run his own business.
Trent has been working such long hours that, coupled with my usual increase of real estate business in the spring, means we’ve hardly seen each other.
On the wall in the kitchen, I’ve put a calendar where I’ve been tracking my cycle.
Even that conversation wasn’t as awkward as I expected as I took Trent through January, February, and March.
I’d started tracking in the new year in case I decided to go with a donor and needed the information for the doctor, and then once Trent and I had our agreement, I kept doing it so I’d have a sense of what days were likely to be important.
But now that we’re here—the important days—I’m freaking out a little.
It’s midweek, but I asked my mom to take Amir overnight, get him to school in the morning.
I used late-night house showings as the reason, which has happened before in the spring when the market is hot.
But I was sure she’d see right through my lie, ask me why I wasn’t being honest.
I’m tempted to text Trent, but he’s been so focused on the shop that I’m not even sure if he’s checked the calendar, if he realized that the important days were here. What would I even say in my text? Please leave work to come home and fuck me?
Just the thought of sending that text makes my pulse do triple time and my stomach seize with nerves. There’s no way I could type those words or say them out loud.
I haven’t slept with anyone since Omar, and while I know the chemistry is there between Trent and me based on those two kisses, part of me is a little concerned I won’t actually be able to go through with it.
I’ll get too in my head, and it won’t feel right.
That even initiating will be awkward or uncomfortable.
That maybe this month will pass us by because I won’t be able to say anything if he comes home too late and hasn’t checked the calendar.
But then, when my worrying is about to hit fever pitch, he comes in the door carrying a grocery bag and some flowers. He hands me the flowers, kisses me on the cheek, and asks what listing I’m trying to price.
I’m at my computer, other listings strewn around me on the kitchen table.
I have an office upstairs and another one in town that I use to meet with clients, but I haven’t used the one in the house since Amir was a baby.
It’s easier to be in the kitchen, which is where Amir frequently asks for help with things when he’s home.
“This one is an older, run-down home, but in the good part of town,” I say. “You bought me flowers?”
“Saw them, thought of you. Call it an impulse purchase.” He glances at me over his shoulder while he unpacks groceries.
But there’s something in the way he’s looking at me that makes me think he knows exactly what day today is, and he’s actually home right at dinner. This week, he’s been dragging his ass in around midnight.
“I bought all the ingredients for that chicken mess we made during our snowed in cooking adventures,” he says, holding up the chicken breasts. “If you’re doing that, I’ll make this.”
“Do you need me to print the recipe?”
“Did it at work before I left,” he says, getting out dishes, measuring cups, and a cutting board.
I’m tempted to tell him that he doesn’t have to treat me like a born-again virgin, which I already said.
But having him take care of me a little is a nice treat.
The rhythm of him in my kitchen is soothing in an odd and unexpected way.
It shouldn’t be a surprise. One of the reasons I knew having him live here wouldn’t be terrible was based on our snowed-in days together, but how natural all of this is still trips me up.
Maybe we both know exactly what’s going to happen tonight, but he doesn’t seem in a rush, and god knows I am really fucking nervous about going through with this, even though it was my idea, even though it’s genuinely what I want.
I try to go back to price matching the house with other things that have sold in the last few months, either through my company or other realtors, but I can’t focus.
Finally, I give up, and I pack everything away. Then I go over and assess where Trent is at with the recipe.
“Do you want some help?” I ask.
“There’s some wine in the fridge,” he says. “Bought it yesterday and stashed it in a drawer, if you want to get it out.”
When I stand up to go to the fridge, Trent follows me with his gaze. “Nice dress,” he says, his voice husky.
“Thanks,” I say, nerves zinging down my spine. It’s not the black dress from my date with Michael, which he said made me look fuckable, but it’s definitely straddling the line between my normal work attire and something meant to entice. Open back, short hemline, but it’s not overly tight.
In the fridge is the exact pinot grigio we had when we were snowed in, and I stare at it for a beat before unscrewing the top and pouring us both a glass.
Here I thought he was so consumed by figuring out his own business that he was completely unaware of the calendar, but it turns out I was the one who got it all wrong.
“You know you don’t have to do this, right?” I say, keeping my voice quiet when I pass him the glass.
“Do what?” he asks, holding my gaze over the rim of the glass.
“Wine and dine me.”
“You mean before I sixty-nine you?”
“Trent!”
“I love when you say my name like that, as though you’re both amused and disgusted by what I’ve said.”
“Usually more amused,” I admit.
“I know.” He gives me a small grin. “That’s why I like it.” He casts his hand over the food he’s been preparing. “And maybe none of this is for you. Maybe I like being wined and dined before someone sixty-nines me .”
I can’t help a laugh. “You’re wining and dining yourself, then?”
“You’re still here in the house, so not quite. And I sure as hell am not sixty-nining myself.”
A beat sits between us, both of us grinning, and I become acutely aware of our flirting and our comfort with each other.
“Tonight and tomorrow are transactions, though, and I’m not sure how I feel about you turning it into something else.”
“You wanted me to come home, throw you on the kitchen table, and fuck your brains out? Wake up tomorrow morning and say, ‘all right, babe, get that pussy out.’ That’s what you wanted?”
“I wouldn’t have put it like that.”
“And I don’t think you would have liked that,” he says.
“Beyond all this, you’re my friend, Em. You’re one of my best fucking friends, and there’s no way in hell I’m treating you like you’re disposable, like you don’t matter.
Maybe this is a transaction , but I think we’d be doing it wrong if it didn’t still feel important in some way. ”
It’s the important part that worries me.
For me it would be that no matter how we did it.
Making myself vulnerable with him in any way is going to feel like free-falling off a cliff.
But I don’t know what to do with my feelings if he also considers what we’re doing important, as more than a deal we’ve struck.
It can mean something , but not too much , and I have no idea how to walk that line.
I’d rather stay away from that line than cross it, but I’m definitely less of a risk taker than Trent.
He leans against the counter and tugs me over so I’m standing between his legs, his hands resting gently on my hips.
“You’re overthinking this. At some point,” he says, leaning in so his lips are close to my ear, “I will have you on that kitchen table, but it’ll be because you’ve had the guts to ask me, maybe even beg me, to do it. ”
“Maybe you’ll hit the bullseye on the first try,” I whisper. That would be best for both of us, I think. Clean. Quick. No chance of more feelings seeping into our arrangement.
“That would be fate laughing in my face. Giving me an A+ for the first time on something I’d actually enjoy doing multiple times.” He gives my ass a light pat as he steps away and continues the dinner prep.
“We haven’t even done it once, so I don’t know how you can say that.” I pick up my wine and take a big drink for courage. “Maybe you’ll be glad to hit the target the first time.”
“You have been starring in multiple scenarios in my head for far, far too long. I get to admit that tonight. It’s one of the only days in the month I’m allowed to cop to sexual feelings about one of my very best friends, so I’m offloading that gem to you. You’re welcome.”
“Multiple scenarios?”
“Oh, yes. All over this house. In your backyard. All over my shop. Just…” He grins at me. “All over.”
Despite the flush across my skin, the way my thighs are tingling in anticipation, I refuse to let myself get carried away.
He’s a flirt. Saying these sorts of things to women is probably his modus operandi.
Any woman would be thrilled to hear that the man they’re about to have sex with can’t stop thinking about them. He’d know that. It’s part of his charm.
“I just don’t think we should lose sight of why we’re doing this,” I say, but I’m not sure who I’m warning.
Trent doesn’t say anything in response, he just finishes prepping the food before sliding it into the oven. Then he sets a timer, tops up his wine, and he takes a sip while eyeing me from across the kitchen. It feels like an assessing gaze, but I’m not sure what he’s trying to decide.
My pulse climbs as the air grows thick around us. Part of me assumed, considering he’s making dinner, that we wouldn’t have sex until we went to bed, but the way he’s looking at me is not remotely PG. Why am I so turned on by a look?
“You all right over there?” he asks, as though he can read my mind.