Chapter Twenty-Nine
I n the morning he was gone.
I had an unfamiliar flutter of panic as I patted my hand over his side of the bed. Usually, I’d have the opposite reaction. When was the last time I’d truly cared if a guy stuck around? That’d be never.
However, Stephen couldn’t be lumped in with other guys. That had never been more apparent to me as that morning. The sense of loss hit me hard, and I would’ve felt pathetic if I hadn’t reminded myself that I was still adjusting to this newfound love. Was it normal to have something feel so incredible and suck monkey balls all at the same time?
My heart leapt into my throat and would’ve kept going if I hadn’t remembered that I was in his bed in his house. Wherever he went, it wouldn’t be far. Relief flooded through me. All right, maybe I was just the teensiest bit pathetic, but it wouldn’t kill me. I could be both pathetic and proud .
I rolled over and buried my face in the sheets, his scent awakening me a little more. That’s when it all came back to me. Work. Those fuckers had called him in the middle of the night because of a severe outage, something about a major system crashing. All I knew was that it was important enough to take him away from me. We’d just wound down and I was dozing in his arms. Actually, I was closer to comatose, but I did remember him either swearing or apologizing while throwing on clothes. I’d been so thoroughly fucked that all I could do was mumble incoherently and fall back asleep.
I was kindled all over again from the memory. His initial gentle thrusts had made me moan out his name while I drank in his expression, but his hard ones took away any last remnants of control. I forever became lost to him. Over and over and over again.
I knew he felt the same because he’d reminded me of that often. And every time he made love to me, fucked me passionately, took me in a different position, came inside me, he forever became lost to me too.
Man, was love always this sappy? Fuck if I knew, but it did make for some mind-blowing sex with a person I adored even outside the bedroom. That had to account for something.
All this reminiscing about the best night of my life had me spreading my legs, sliding my hand down my stomach, smoothing over—ow! Damn, I was sore. I could barely touch myself. I wondered how well I’d be able to walk that day. The man was truly blessed.
I hobbled downstairs instead to get something to eat. My stomach was raging at me. I didn’t think I’d ever been so hungry in the morning. Lots of firsts to celebrate lately. I’d just popped a cinnamon bagel in the toaster when my phone went off. I went into the family room where I’d left my purse and pulled it out.
This is without a doubt the worst timing I’ve ever experienced in my life to date. Looking forward to later when you can make it all better .
My face almost cracked in two as I held the phone to my chest. Fuck it. I gave myself permission to be as pathetic as I wanted.
Can’t wait. Any idea of a time?
I waited for a response. And waited. And thought about the ways I’d make it all better for him while squeezing my thighs together. Ow! I heard the toaster pop so I went back to the kitchen. I wished I could type out everything I wanted to do to him, but since he had a company-issued phone, it was better to keep it tame.
I ate my bagel, took a shower, did some cleaning, and by the time afternoon rolled around and I still hadn’t heard a word, I decided to get out of the house. I was going way too stir-crazy.
I drove down to my soon-to-be new apartment and parked in the lot. Despite anything that happened between us, it was still time to get my own place. I didn’t want to make it awkward by continuing to stay there when we needed to talk about where things were going between us. He didn’t sound like it was only a one-night deal for him, and it definitely wasn’t for me. And he did promise that nothing would change between us. Well, at least it’d be a quick drive to his place whenever we needed each other. For anything. Fuck, I was getting horny.
I got out and tooled around a bit. I hadn’t signed the lease yet, so I couldn’t get inside, but I could walk around the yard. It was a basement apartment, but it was only underground in the front of the building. The back had a small patio that opened up to the communal grassy area.
Since there was only so much I could see, I headed out the lot and down the sidewalk to check out the neighborhood. I spotted a coffee shop a few doors down from the daycare and decided to pop in. I could use something sweet.
As I scanned over the bakery case, I noticed a shock of honey-colored hair in the corner of my eye. Are you fucking kidding me? Of all the coffee shops in this city, she has to pick this one? I turned for the door. I’d come back later.
“Perry?” I didn’t turn around. “Perry!” She ran over to me and grabbed my arm. “What are you doing around here?”
I wasn’t about to tell her that I was moving to the area, so I said, “I could ask you the same thing.” I looked down at my arm and she dropped her hand.
“I’m meeting someone. He picked the place.”
“Then I won’t keep you.”
“No, wait! Please.”
I sighed. Did I want to do this? No fucking way, but part of me was urging to stay and resolve things once and for all. I’d been almost three months since I’d caught them, and while it still hurt, it was no longer that raw, oozing pain. Everything felt different with me. New beginnings and all that shit. It gave me an invincible feeling like I could tackle anything.
And for the first time ever, it dawned on me that they’d done me a favor. I had no idea why I’d never seen things in that light before, but if I hadn’t walked in on them, then nothing would’ve ever happened between Stephen and me.
“Okay,” I said, and she smiled wide.
“Oh my God. Thank you so much.” I followed her over to a corner table and sat down, waiting for her to make the first move. “How have you been doing?”
“I’ve been fine, Christa. Better than fine, actually.”
“I’m so happy to hear that. You know, it’s still our place and—”
“No, I’m good.” I stopped her right there. I was willing to talk but not jump right back into the best friend role.
“I’m so sorry, Perry.”
“You’ve already told me that.”
“Will you let me explain?” I nodded. “I’ll start at the beginning. I had feelings for him for a long time, but I was good at ignoring them. I knew he was off-limits, and I never wanted to hurt you. ”
“How long’s a long time?”
“Since high school.” My mouth dropped. What? “I kept going from guy to guy hoping to find someone else while secretly wishing I was with him. It really sucked. But again, I never acted on anything, not even a kiss, even during all your off periods. It was so hard seeing you two go back and forth, screwing other people, making up, basically acting all wrong for each other.”
“Did he, um, have feelings for you too since then?” How did I not see any of this?
“No. I’m pretty positive of that. It was all one-sided. But then one night, about nine months ago now, during one of your off-periods, I ran into him at Tally’s on the east side. He was pretty trashed so I offered him a ride home. I helped him inside and… that was the first time.”
“Why wasn’t it also the last time?”
She was shredding a napkin into flakes all over the table. “God, Perry. You have to believe me when I say I wish it was. I wished it had never happened at all. I felt like total shit and I deserved to. I don’t have a good reason why it continued, and I don’t want to make excuses. It just did.”
I was curious as hell how many times they’d actually hooked up over those six months, but what would be the point in having that information? “Are you still fucking each other?”
“No! Not since you…. He won’t even talk to me now.”
“What if he did talk to you?”
She didn’t say anything, just looked down and swirled around the white bits. I had no doubt that if Dre pursued it with her, she’d jump on board. It was what it was.
“I can’t help being in love with him, Perry. I’m so sorry. I want so badly not to be, but I just can’t stop.”
A flicker of compassion bubbled through me. She still shouldn’t have acted on her feelings, or lied to me about it for half a year, but in some way I understood. Dre and I were so screwed up and should never have been together in the first place. Looking back, I wish we hadn’t been. Then Christa could have gone after him openly, and I’d still have my best friend.
“There’s more,” she said, glancing up. “I want to get everything out in case I don’t get this chance again.”
“Okay.”
“The shit we did to his truck? I was so messed up that night, and not just from drinking. I felt like I was being torn apart and my head was in chaos. I hated what I was doing to you, I hated that I loved him, I hated that he didn’t love me back, I hated that I thought he was getting his dick wet in some slut at the gym.” She took a deep breath. “I hated that he talked me into fucking once without a rubber, and I hated knowing that if I would’ve been pregnant that time you sat with me all night in the bathroom, he wouldn’t have been there for me. And most of all, I hated myself for being so fucking weak and letting it all happen.”
I took a deep breath as well. Okay, wow. I had my suspicions that it would’ve been his kid, but… holy fuck, thank God that test was negative.
“When I said the shit ‘we’ did to his truck, I should’ve said me . The reason you can’t remember anything after we went out there was because you passed out. I propped you against the wheel, then injected that nasty piss through his door. I was so furious with him, I wasn’t thinking straight. After I was done, I somehow got you inside and put you to bed. You had nothing to do with any of it.”
“What the hell, Christa?” It was the first time during our conversation that I was upset. “You told him it was all me. You let me feel guilty for something I didn’t even do!”
She looked like she was going to cry. “I know, I know. I told you I was so messed up then. I didn’t want him mad at me and….” She shook her head. “No excuses. ”
“Is that at least everything now?”
She turned her head towards the window. “Yes.”
“Christa?”
We both glanced over at the clean-cut, polo-wearing guy standing by our table. Not exactly her type, but then who knew what that was anymore? “Oh hi, Cole. This is my, uh, this is Perry.”
I stood up and smiled. “Nice to meet you. I’ll just get go—”
“You don’t have to leave yet,” she said.
“I have some things I have to do.”
“Oh, okay.” I went up and stood in line. Might as well get my double fudge frosted brownie first. A moment later she was right there beside me. “Do you think we can get together again sometime?”
“I can’t, Christa. I’m glad we talked, and mainly I do forgive you. I just can’t… trust you right now.”
“I understand.” She gave me a hug, which I partially returned. I never imagined even getting to that point with her yet, so I considered it an achievement. “When and if you change your mind, you know where to find me.”
“Yep.” She headed back to her whatever he was. “Hey, Christa?” She looked back. “Good luck. Hope he’s the one.”
Still nothing from Stephen.
Before I’d left the house, I’d posted a note on the fridge saying I was going out and to call if he got home before I did. I checked my phone once again, making sure it was still functional. It was. Bummer.
I slipped it back into my purse, then verified that Dre’s truck was there before going inside the gym. One down, one to go. It felt good to get closure. I hadn’t realized I needed it until after speaking with Christa. I even felt sorry for her, and that was something I never thought would happen. She was always the one who had all her shit together. Apparently not.
I beelined straight for Dre’s office. I rarely showed my face around there, and the last time was probably a year ago. Even still, no one seemed to care when I bypassed the equipment bearing sweaty guys and went to his door, not bothering to knock.
A woman wearing what amounted to a workout string bikini jumped back from his desk. Oops. Didn’t mean to startle anyone.
“Perry? Holy shit, Perry!”
“This looks like a bad time.”
“No, no. Come in. What are you doing here? Holy shit.” He faced the woman who looked like she wanted to pluck my eyeballs out. “Jenny, can you give us a minute?” Ah, the infamous trainer, I’d bet. She huffed and stomped out.
“I didn’t mean to interrupt.”
“Shit, Perry. You’re not interrupting. That… that wasn’t what it looked like.” He dragged his hands through his hair, looking nervous as hell. “Nothing was going on. You just surprised us, that’s all.”
“It doesn’t matter, Dre. You’re free to do whatever you want.” I wouldn’t have cared even if I’d walked in to see him bending her over the desk. I searched for a jealous twinge. Nothing.
“I don’t want to be free. Are you finally ready to hear me out?”
I didn’t want to mislead him, and I didn’t have that same need to hear him explain as I had with Christa. “Thank you for respecting me enough to leave me alone when I asked you to. It made things a lot easier for me. But you have to know, at least on some level, that we’re never getting back together. I’ve moved on and I forgive you. You don’t have to explain anything to me.”
He leaned back against the desk, his jaw ticking. “Moved on. What, with that guy all over you at the Brewhouse?”
“No, that was just a friend messing around. ”
“Then the dude who came after me in the parking lot?”
I didn’t respond and his jaw clenched harder. He was going to crack teeth soon.
“You and I were over no matter what. That wouldn’t have changed no matter who did or didn’t come into my life.” His knuckles were losing color against the desk edge. “The reason I’m here, Dre… well, I just came from speaking with Christa.”
“Okay?”
“How could you treat her that way for all those months?”
“I can’t believe you’re asking me this. How have you forgiven her but not me?”
“I just told you seconds ago that I forgave you. And Christa and I are over too. We’re not back the way we were, and probably never will be, but I do understand some of what she told me.”
“So I’m the bad guy in all this? I never cared about Christa. I cared about you . I fucked up royally, Perry. I had a moment of weakness.”
I almost laughed. He had a moment of weakness, as in singular? “That’s what I’m getting at here. You never cared about her, but she cared about you. You took advantage of that.”
“Not intentionally. How the hell was I supposed to know how she felt? She told me she was just looking for a little fun.” That I believed. Christa would never have opened herself up to him.
“Would you have been there for her if she would’ve been pregnant?”
He sucked a bunch of air through his teeth. “She told you about that?”
“I was fucking with her the whole night she thought she was! She was terrified as hell. Would you have been there for her?”
“I’m sure, eventually. Man….” He scrubbed his hands over his face. “It was fucked-up, all right? She told me that she’d had a scare right before I was supposed to be with you that weekend. It freaked me out bad. You know I don’t want kids. I had to take off after that an d think about shit.”
“You don’t want kids, yet you convinced her not to use a condom? What the hell, Dre?”
“It didn’t take much convincing. She said she was probably safe.”
“Because she cared about you so much that she would’ve done anything, you ass!”
“How the fuck did I know that at the time?”
All right, this was just going in circles. Didn’t matter. It was over. I didn’t even care to bring up the point that he was so freaked out, yet he came back and fucked her again.
“It’d be good to talk to her, Dre. It’s really none of my business anymore, but it’d be a decent thing to do. She said you haven’t spoken to her since I found you two together.”
“That’s right.”
“Well, think about it. Maybe, I don’t know, it’ll give her some closure in all this shit too.”
“So there’s nothing I can do, Perry? Nothing will change your mind about us?”
“No.”
He tilted his head back and exhaled loudly. Then I saw his body relax. I had hope that it was sinking in. I just wanted this to be truly over for all of us.
“Yeah, okay,” he finally said. “I’ll fucking miss you, baby, but I get it. I fucked up too badly.”
“We were never right for each other. One of us was bound to fuck up too badly at some time or another. You just beat me to it.”
He snorted. “Yeah, I guess I did.”
I eyed over the ink covering his arms and was hit with a crazy idea. But maybe not so crazy after all, since it felt so right. It got me excited enough to bounce off the walls.
“Who’s your tattoo guy?”