Chapter 29
Chapter Twenty-Nine
RILEY
A shrieking alarm grabs me by the collar and jerks me out of sleep. Sunlight slices through the room, a samurai sword out to blind me. I immediately close my eyes again, but the damage has been done.
Light is seeping past my eyelids. There’s no escaping it.
Why is it so noisy in here?
Blindly, I reach out and feel around my dresser until I get to my phone where I slide my thumb in all kinds of directions until I’ve silenced the alarm.
Strangely, the pulse in my head continues.
I peek an eye open and immediately regret it. The light is like a hand slapping my eyeballs and I don’t remember feeling this awful in my life.
Is this all because of drinking?
I will never put myself in this position again. Consider this lesson learned.
The desire to hunker under the comforters and hide from the light overwhelms me, but my brain kicks into gear.
I have to get to the auto shop. Jimmy, Carlos and Blade don’t have keys and if they see me slacking off, they’re going to slack off even further—which might result in them not showing up to work at all.
Pushing off the bed, I sit up straight. My heart pounds like an engine stuck at full-throttle and my stomach gurgles unhappily.
I hate alcohol.
For as long as I live, I will never drink again.
As my gaze sweeps the room, I notice that my work boots are standing neatly at the edge of my bed. Whenever I take off my shoes, I kick them off haphazardly and leave them wherever they land, so I’m definitely not responsible for putting my footwear up so neatly.
Then it must have been…
I gasp and come fully awake.
Nat.
Scattered memories assault me.
Nat helping me at the toilet.
Nat taking me to bed.
Nat kissing my forehead.
I gasp dramatically again and slap a hand to my forehead. Did I dream that or was it real?
It’s hard to tell.
I really can’t pick apart what’s memory and what’s my own yearning imagination.
Pushing myself to my feet, I slip out of my bedroom and head to the bathroom. Once I’m finished with my business, I wash my face and stare at myself in the mirror.
“Oh, mother of turbine engines!” I fly all the way backwards because who is that witch in the mirror?
I blink.
The cursed mirror witch blinks too.
I take a step forward.
The woman stuck in the mirror does the same.
I reach out a hand.
The mirror lady does too.
Slowly, my hand connects with the mirror and I let loose a garbled sound of dismay.
That’s not a nightmarish being trapped in a mirror.
It’s me.
My hair looks like it had a fight with an eagle and the eagle won.
My eyeliner melted and now gives the impression that I’m bleeding black tears.
There are heavy dark circles under my eyes.
My mascara is thick and hardening at the ends, turning me into that purple villain from The Emperor’s New Groove.
“Please tell me I didn’t look like this in front of Nat.”
The silence mocks me. Of course you did. And you thought Nat wanted to kiss you? You must be out of your mind.
Grabbing either end of the sink, I suck in a harsh breath and try to compose myself.
Okay. Okay… maybe Nat did see me like this last night.
So what?
It’s not like I’m going to see him any time soon. I warned Nat to keep his distance. He’s a gentleman. He’s going to honor that. And even if he doesn’t, Nat has his pride too. I probably won’t see him again unless I go to him first.
I wash my face until all the makeup is gone and brush my teeth. My head isn’t pounding as much as it did when I first got up, but I still feel awful.
I head to the kitchen in search of any edible substance that can settle my stomach.
But something is wrong with my kitchen.
Something is wrong with my entire apartment.
“What the…” My voice trails as I turn in a slow circle, observing the clean floors, the shiny TV stand, and the dishes that have dried on the rack instead of piled up in the sink where I left them.
Who snuck into my house and cleaned everything? Did Nat take a key and hand it over to some stranger from a cleaning company?
At that moment, there’s a knock on the door.
I look through the peephole and see Nat standing there with his hands behind his back.
Miffed, I wrench the door open and blast him without stopping to exchange pleasantries. “Nat, did you let a stranger into my apartment this morning?”
His jaw drops. “What?”
From his reaction, he didn’t do it this morning. “Was it last night? Did you hire a cleaning company while I was asleep?”
That is so incredibly dangerous. Who knows what kind of person was tiptoeing around in my space while I was oblivious to the world. I could have been bludgeoned to death in my sleep.
“I don’t like people I don’t know in my apartment, Nat,” I scold him.
“I didn’t let anyone else in.”
“So who cleaned my apartment?”
He tilts his head, looking boyishly handsome and confused. “Me.”
The word lands in my ear, but my brain rejects it. “Who?”
“I did.”
I freeze and look him up and down. The shorn hair. The square jaw. The brawny shoulders. The veiny-arms more suited to wielding a hockey stick than a broom and mop.
There’s no way.
“You?”
“Yes. Me.” He lifts a hand and I hear something rustling behind his back as he does so. “Nathan Campbell.”
I step back, struggling to make sense of that. “But… why?”
“Because it needed doing and I wanted to do it.”
The answer makes about as much sense as his appearance at my door this morning. While my hungover brain struggles to accept that Nathan Campbell washed my dishes for me, his green eyes slide down my face.
He chuckles and thumbs at a corner of my lips. “Toothpaste.”
A memory of his thumb barely grazing my mouth last night explodes in my brain. I didn’t imagine that. Nat was touching my face last night.
A sudden, self-conscious expression takes over Nat’s face and he pulls his hand back. Eyes darting to the side, he stammers. “I brought you eggs with whole wheat toast and avocado.”
“Did you make it yourself?”
“Yeah, cafe’s aren’t open this early.”
“Oh.”
Nat glances at me and then at the ground. “Can I, I mean, is it okay if I come in?”
“Yeah, sure.” I step aside even though I should probably shut the door in his face.
What’s going on right now?
I’m certain I saw him sitting closely beside Layla at the bar last night. They were there for hours. I kept waiting for them to leave and the more they stayed, the more I wanted to drink.
Nat wouldn’t hang around his ex if he didn’t enjoy her company. And, since they have history, it’s very likely that he still has feelings for Layla.
But if that’s the case, why is he here?
I grip my elbow with one hand. “So, um, are you always up this early?”
Nat strides to my kitchen like he owns it. “Actually, I’m up way earlier than this most days. I try to get in more training where I can.”
My eyes bug. “You play hockey this early in the morning? Do you love it that much?”
“I do.” He smiles.
“Because you like to win?” I tease lightly.
“That’s a part of it.” He opens a cupboard and takes something out.
“I like the way hockey’s both structured and chaotic.
When I’m on the ice, anything can happen, but I know exactly what’ll happen too.
The roles are clear. I do my part and I trust my teammates to do theirs.
The more I put in, the more I get out of it. ”
“Mm.” I pad closer to the kitchen. Is it just me or is Nat being… vulnerable? There’s an openness to his words and his gaze that I’ve never felt from him before.
“Did you see the instructions I left last night?” Nat asks, setting a plastic bag on the counter.
“No, I just woke up.” I move behind the counter. “What instructions did you leave?”
“Here.” He shows me a Post It note on top of a white mug that says ‘FUELED LIKE A PLANE’.
Nat sets the mug aside, takes out a clean pot and pours some water into it.
“I cut some limes and ginger for you.” He turns on the stove and sets the pot on top.
“I was telling you to boil some water and let it steep. It should help with the headache and your light sensitivity.”
“I feel perfectly fine.”
Nat gives me a ‘yeah right’ look and I realize that I’m squinting even now.
Straightening my shoulders, I step forward. “You don’t have to do all this, Nat.”
“It’s just tea, Riles.” He flicks the dial and adjusts the stove’s flame.
“I’m not talking about the tea. I’m talking about taking me home last night and taking care of me while I was sick.
That was already too much. And now you’re cleaning my apartment and bringing me breakfast. I know you’re just being a ‘brother’ or whatever.
” I mumble that last part. “But people might get the wrong idea.”
It’s me.
I’m people.
And my brain is collecting all the data and spewing back to me that Nat might be interested in me as a woman, not as a sister.
None of his behavior lines up with what I know of a sibling.
Chris would never in a million years clean my apartment or be this attentive. Forget tenderly holding my hair back while I puked, he would have been gagging and complaining about the smell and how gross I was.
And this morning, if he came by, it would only be to throw my windows open to let in all the sunshine and snap a picture of my bed head to use as collateral in the future.
Nat goes still. Despite his frozen stature, I notice his throat bobbing as he swallows hard. Finally, he turns, his green eyes holding me in place. He looks nervous and determined all at once and my heart starts thumping up a storm.
“Riles, I have something to tell you.”
I hold my breath.
“You and I have known each other for a long time.”
“We have,” I say hesitantly.
“You’re Chris’s little sister.”
My eyebrows furrow. Why is he telling me things I already know? “I am.”
“So when we met again, I just… I tried to respect that. Chris is my best friend and growing up, I was much older than you and I didn’t—I mean, you weren’t… it was different. Because I was older.”
“Yes, I mean. Yeah, you’re still older,” I point out.
Nat winces and scratches his temple. “But the thing is… I mean, right now we’re both…”
“Older?” I fill in.
“Adults. We’re both adults.”
“I’ve been an adult for a while, yes.”
Nat shuffles his feet. He looks extremely flustered and while I had a feeling about what he wanted to say earlier, now I’m not sure so where this conversation is going.
“I’ve given this a lot of thought because I don’t want to make you uncomfortable and I don’t want Chris to get upset and if this doesn’t work out, I don’t want to lose the two of you…”
Lose the two of us?
I’m so confused.
At that moment, his phone starts ringing.
Nat looks down distractedly at the device.
His face goes pale.
I look at the screen too and arch an eyebrow.
My older brother is calling.