Chapter 13
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
AMES
It’s been nearly a week of domestic bliss at Robbie’s house while I recover from my injuries, and I’m officially losing my goddamn mind.
Don’t get me wrong, Robbie’s been amazing. But that’s the problem.
His workaholic ass took two weeks’ leave to play nurse, which I still can’t believe.
He went to my apartment and packed my stuff—including Hippyottermus, which I didn’t ask him to get but he knew I’d want.
He’s been talking with Jana daily so he can reassure me everything at Watchfire’s going great without me getting involved directly—which I have to admit was probably the right call.
Otherwise, I’d try to micromanage every menu, schedule, invoice, inventory, and delivery, and end up pissing Jana off since she knows how to run my place as well as I do.
He cooks something new for dinner every night and makes a whole production out of having me pick a number at random from the Recipes Ames Will Like list on his Notes app—which simultaneously makes me feel like a toddler who needs to be managed and like the most exalted royalty.
Once I was cleared to watch television, he sat beside me through four seasons of The Great British Bake Off without complaint—longer than most of the hosts stuck around—and now we can’t hear the words Victoria sponge without giggling.
Robbie even insists on sleeping in the same bed as me in case I need him in the night—with him on one side of the bed and me surrounded by my pillow fortress on the other, listening to him breathe… which makes me feel like I’m low-key stuck in some kind of weird Puritan sleepover porn.
And all of that’s wonderful. The most wonderful. Heaven, honestly .
But it’s not real.
I finally stopped fighting the pull, sometime between the concussion and that first terrible, wonderful shower, and moved back to Delusionville.
I full-on let myself believe Robbie’s hands are intentionally lingering just a few seconds too long on my back.
That his breath catches when he helps me out of my shirt.
That he’s actually staring at my ass, when I catch him looking at me in the mirror, rather than tracking the fading bruises on my back.
That the mouthwateringly impressive hard-on Robbie displayed in the shower that first morning was actually for me and not a biological reaction to being skin against skin in the shower with someone while being choked by my lust pheromones.
But deep down in my soul, I’m not fooled. Like those crazy kids in the Garden of Eden, now that I know the truth, I can’t unknow it: Robbie’s straight, he’s engaged, I’m headed for a pain that’ll make this broken collarbone seem like nothing…
And I’m helplessly addicted to soaking up every single minute of the fantasy.
If there’s one thing I hate, it’s feeling helpless.
Just this morning, when we woke up in bed, Robbie rolled toward me with a look of dreamy contentment on his face, found me watching him sleepily, and grinned so bright my eyes watered.
“Morning! It’s Saturday, baybee. You know what that means,” he’d said with a wink and a smack to my thigh, like this was a thing we did . Like this was our life . Like having the thing I wanted most was actually possible .
He’d been so freaking lovely, so happy, I’d grinned back besottedly and said, “Pancakes?”
And his whole expression had softened. He’d stared at my mouth—no, really, I’d swear he did—just a beat too long in that way you do when you’re imagining kissing someone, reached out a hand to cup my jaw, and stroked one calloused thumb over my chin.
Then he’d launched himself out of bed with a “Hell yes, pancakes!” followed by “Gonna shower upstairs first.”
And while I’d lain there, listening to his feet pound up the stairs, it had hit me all over again that I’m gonna be pushing this same goddamn boulder up the same goddamn hill for eternity.
Delusion, pain, grief.
Lather, rinse, repeat.
Which means this heaven is actually hell .
Fuck. My. Life.
Now we’ve finally made it to the kitchen, and it hasn’t gotten any better.
“Damn, the coffee came out good today.” Robbie’s got one big hand wrapped around an even bigger mug as he stands by the stove, cooking bacon. He’s wearing a pair of baggy sweats and not a damn thing else, because why should he put actual clothes on when he’s chilling with his best platonic buddy?
He gives me a teasing grin and shakes the mug in my direction while shimmying his hips at the same time, and the sweatpants slide one critical inch. “You sure you don’t want some of this?”
Oh, I want some of that. Some of all that.
“Ack, ew, gross,” I say primly, safely tucked on a stool at the island with my sling on. “I’m all set.” I tap my can of Diet Coke with my phone.
But though I try desperately to fight it, I can’t help the tingle in my balls at his little dance… or the snarky comment I spew out as self-defense. “Careful the bacon doesn’t burn while you’re bumping and grinding, there, Beyoncé.”
Robbie turns to check the pan, and I exhale a shaky breath. I genuinely don’t know how I was able to handle being around Robbie all these years without combusting.
Pure hell .
But I’d bet even Sisyphus was allowed to jerk off during his boulder-rolling as a coping mechanism, which is more than I can say for myself. Not with Robbie constantly hovering at my elbow, ready to walk me to the bathroom and wait outside so I don’t plunge headfirst into the toilet or whatever .
I’ve managed to jack off—left-handed, which is weird as fuck—precisely three times in the last five days.
The first was the one and only time I let Robbie shower with me, followed by two furtive, desperate sessions while Robbie was at the grocery store, which barely took the edge off.
And I confess, that second grocery trip was a made-up errand where I’d specifically sent him to find a kind of gochugaru I didn’t think existed within the Winsome town limits in the hopes he’d be gone for a long while…
only for him to be back in twenty minutes after snagging some from sweet, old Mrs. Kwon, the piano teacher, who was only too happy to do a favor for her Robbie-ya.
Robbie grabs a container of flour from the top shelf of a glass-fronted cabinet, and the stretch means those gray sweats are poised on the cliff of his round ass, ready to fall. I nearly moan out loud.
“You’re doing it wrong,” I complain as he digs a measuring cup into the container.
Robbie doesn’t even look up, but he smiles as he dumps the flour into a bowl, like he finds my bitchiness amusing. “I’m doing it exactly how you’ve shown me a million times.”
“Nuh-uh. You need to sift it first. And you forgot the secret ingredient?—”
“Did not. The sour cream goes in last, Ames,” he says patiently. He gets the container out of the fridge and sets it on the counter with a smug smile that I need to kiss off his face.
Fuck.
“Fine. But you didn’t take the eggs out of the fridge.” My tone is pure gotcha . I can’t stand myself. “If you don’t let them come to room temperature, they won’t whisk properly.”
This is true. It’s also pedantic and rude. It doesn’t matter for homemade pancakes… except right now, it does .
“Why don’t you come show me?” he says, then fake-winces at my sling, throwing shade right back at me. “Oooh, wait. My bad.”
I shake my head, fighting a smile. “That was low.”
“Most things with you are, Amesie,” he says sadly, straightening to his full gargantuan height.
“You did not just say that to me!” I gape at him. “Height jokes? Seriously? Are we fourteen?”
“Of course not.” He sucks a tooth and looks me up and down—as much as he can while I’m blocked by the island—then scratches his stubbled cheek thoughtfully. “Though, honestly, you’re about the height I was at fourteen, so?—”
“Oh, you asshole .”
I’m grinning, and so is he. It’s fun and perfect, and I cannot have it. Not the way I want it.
I slide off the stool and stalk around the counter. My ankle was only mildly sprained, and it’s mostly back to normal. Unlike my ribs and collarbone, which are still annoyingly painful when I move wrong.
“Hey!” Robbie says, dropping his teasing. “Sit back down. I’ll stop, I promise.”
“No way. I’ve been challenged. And I can whisk a fucking egg, okay? I’m a professional. I don’t even need my other hand for that.” More than that, I want to feel useful and independent. Maybe that will help break this spell .
“I didn’t challenge you,” Robbie insists, shutting off the fire under the bacon. “There was no challenge.”
I ignore him. I get the carton of eggs out of the fridge and put them on the counter. Then I reach for a bowl in the cabinet by the sink.
I’m using my left arm, and it’s not on a high shelf, so this is not a problem. But sure enough, there’s Robbie, reaching for the bowl anyway, determined to out-useful me.
We’re chest to chest, eyes locked. His breath’s warm on my face, and neither of us seems willing to concede.
“I’ve got this,” we say in stereo. “No, I do!”
And then the most terrible, wonderful thing happens.
His gaze drops to my mouth.
I can feel his stare as much as see it. It’s the tiniest weight—like a butterfly, like a flower petal—but it’s there.
Up close like this, I can’t miss the way Robbie’s pupils dilate.
How his lips part slightly and his breath comes out ragged.
I try with all my might to poke holes in these scientific observations and explain them away as something else, but literally nothing comes to mind.
And Jesus fuck, after a week of relentless torture, the wanting is tearing me apart from the inside, Alien -style.
So I leave the bowl on the shelf. I lick my lips. And I lean closer.
“Ames,” Robbie breathes. It’s my name, but it’s also approval. A plea. A sweet benediction washing over me.
And just when I start to realize this is the most fantastical of fantasies—a thought that, for nearly sixteen years, has come right before waking up alone in my cold bed—Robbie closes the final inch between us and kisses me.