Chapter 22 #2
“I don’t know. We pushed each other’s buttons until we broke, I guess.
” I poke at my cheek with my tongue. “It was only supposed to be one time. It just happened. And we never planned to let it happen again.” I give him an imploring look.
“I tried, Flip. I really tried not to want her. But she just…smells so good all the time, and she’s sassy and smart, and she was there every day, being beautiful and kind, even when I was a giant dick. ”
“So you kept giving her yours,” he mutters.
“I thought maybe it would last a week or two.” I was sure her tolerance would give out. “We said it would stop when she moved, but then I convinced her to stay until after the season started,” I admit.
“Why would you do that?” Flip taps agitatedly on the table.
“I didn’t want her to leave.” I focus on my beer.
I wanted her to be there when I got back from away games, and practice, and on weekends, and every fucking day. I wanted to see her smiling face, to push her buttons, to touch her, be close to her, absorb some of her goodness since I have so fucking little of my own.
“So it was just about sex, then?” Flip grinds out.
“It wasn’t supposed to be about feelings.” That was the agreement. I don’t know when it changed, but it did. And now I’m screwed because she moved with no warning. Just up and left me.
“For the love of fucking God.” Hollis slaps the table.
“What this idiot is trying and failing to say is that at some point, it stopped being just about sex. If it was just about sex, Tristan wouldn’t be a mopey, depressed, lovesick fool.
And we’re learning that he’s apparently more emotionally repressed than most serial killers, since owning up to his feelings seems to be impossible, despite his team’s welfare and his relationship with you being on the line—not to mention his relationship with Rix. ”
“I don’t know if I’m lovesick.” Apparently in addition to being emotionally repressed, I’m also a complete idiot.
“Does all food taste like garbage?” Hollis asks.
“Yeah.”
“Do you intentionally listen to her favorite songs or watch her favorite shows because it reminds you of her, even if it makes it feel like your heart is being shredded? Or, conversely, are you avoiding all those things for the same reason?”
“Uh, yeah.”
“Does it feel like there’s a giant, empty hole in your chest and the only thing that will make it go away is Rix?”
“Yeah.”
“You’re lovesick.” Hollis turns to Flip.
“And maybe I’m going out on a limb, but I’m guessing the reason they tried to keep it under wraps was to avoid upsetting you.
Especially if they both thought they would be able to keep feelings out of it.
That might have worked if it had lasted a couple of weeks, but no one sleeps with someone they claim to hate for weeks if they don’t actually like them. ”
“So you have feelings for Rix that extend beyond getting into her pants?” Flip asks.
It doesn’t make sense to lie anymore, even if my feelings aren’t reciprocated. Can’t say I’d blame her after the way I acted the day she moved. I hadn’t expected to only have an hour. I frittered away my last days with her because I couldn’t tell her how I felt. Feel. “Yeah.”
“So why haven’t you tried to contact her since she moved?” Roman asks.
“How do you know I haven’t?” I challenge.
“Because Peggy lives with her, and I see my daughter every day. There’ve been an unreasonable number of ice cream bars consumed over the past week. And not even the good kind.”
“The no-name brand vanilla and chocolate sandwiches?” I ask.
“Yeah.”
“Bea only splurges on the good ones once a month. The rest of the time, she buys the cheaper stuff.” Her favorite are the Oreo ones, and second are the Oreo Drumsticks. But nothing hits the mark quite like a pint of Kawartha Dairy Moose Tracks.
“Wasn’t she doing all the shopping? And weren’t you giving her money for that?” Dallas asks.
“Yeah, and we kept telling her to buy for herself, too, but she refused,” Flip explains.
“And neither of you could manage a ten-minute trip to the store to pick her up a fucking treat for cleaning your house, making all your meals, and whatever else she did for you?” Dallas looks appalled.
“I bought her a cake and all her favorite candies.” After I ate her treat with her name on it for the second time, but he doesn’t need to know that part. “And I got her ice cream a few times.”
“You two have been sleeping together for two months and you bought her ice cream a few times ?” Ashish is looking at me like I’m the biggest idiot in the world.
“I took her out on a date, too. But it had to be low-key, ’cause no one was supposed to know,” I admit.
“When did that happen?” Flip asks.
“Before Thanksgiving. I would have done more of that, but for obvious reasons, I couldn’t.” This whole conversation is making me antsy and uncomfortable.
“Maybe you should check on her,” Roman says.
“What if she doesn’t want to hear from me?” She wasn’t responding to my texts when she was still living with us. I don’t know why she’d respond to them now.
“You won’t know unless you make a move, will you?” Hollis asks.
“And it wouldn’t hurt to send her something nice,” Ashish adds.
“Noted.” I can’t believe I’m getting relationship lessons from these guys.
Roman turns his judgy eyes on Flip. “Rix isn’t very impressed with you.”
“I’m not the one sleeping with her best friend behind her back.”
“You freaked out and didn’t let either of us explain, and then you gave her the silent treatment for a week,” I say.
“You’re the one who said all you were doing was fucking,” Flip points out.
“Because that’s what we were supposed to be doing!
I didn’t expect the feelings part.” I still don’t know how to manage that.
But the guys are right. If I don’t make a move, I’ll never know if I’m alone on feelings island.
“And you sure didn’t help things by bringing home women we’d been with before after you found out. ”
“You did what?” Roman looks like he wants to flip the table.
Dallas shakes his head. “Are you telling me that after you found out Rix and Tristan were sleeping together, you brought home women you and Tristan had previously tag-teamed? While your sister was sleeping in her doorless, wall-less loft above you?”
Flip looks at the table.
“Yes. That’s exactly what happened,” I say, since he won’t confirm or deny it.
“That was a real asshole move.” Ashish sounds disgusted.
Dallas shakes his head in disapproval.
“I thought they both needed a reminder of what Tristan is really like,” Flip says, then grimaces as he takes in the horrified expressions around the table. “Which was a really shitty thing to do.”
“Ya think?” Hollis scoffs. “Like the stakes weren’t already high enough with Rix being your sister, then you gotta throw his past, which you’re complicit in, back in their faces?”
“I didn’t think about it that way until now.” Flip looks embarrassed.
“Going behind your back was a shitty thing to do, though,” I say. “And I didn’t mean for it to happen. Or keep happening. Or to catch feelings for Bea. But I did. Catch feelings.” I rub the back of my neck. I feel like I’m about to have an allergic reaction.
“I mean, you passed up a repeat with Tiff and Trinity, and those two were up for anything,” Flip says.
“I don’t want to talk about other women’s pussies. Especially not other ones I’m familiar with, because it makes me feel like a steaming pile of garbage, and I already feel shitty enough.”
“At least I’m upfront about who I’m sleeping with instead of hiding it,” Flip counters. For a moment it seems like he’s going to say more, but then he takes a swig of his beer and sighs. “I guess if you want to try to date my sister, I won’t punch you out again.”
“For real? You’d be okay with it?”
“Yeah. For real. Just don’t break her heart,” Flip warns. “If you do, I get to punch you in the face again.”
“That’s fair.”
Dallas claps me on the shoulder. “Look at you two. That’s some real personal growth.”
Now I need to grow a pair of balls and apologize to Bea for being a giant asshole. If I’m lucky, maybe she’ll let me do more than make up for that orgasm I shortchanged her. Maybe she’ll let me try to date her, too.