Chapter 10
Emma
“ A re you keeping warm? I can send thick socks.”
“I’m warm, Ms. Ang,” I chuckle. “We only have a few days left here.”
“Okay, sweetie! You know I worry about my girls.”
Like mother, like daughter.
Angela Garvey will ship heaters and a wardrobe full of flannel if I sneeze wrong. She hasn’t stopped loving me since Justice invited me into their home twenty years ago. She taught me about curl patterns. She showed me how to care for my thick hair without using the flat iron my mother pushed to “tame” it.
I learned about unconditional love from her. I still smile, years later, when she asks if I’m drinking enough water or getting enough sleep.
No judgment.
No snide comments.
Only acceptance.
“When will I see you?” Pots clamor on the other end of the phone. Ms. Ang loves cooking, even on a Friday night.
“Not sure,” I say. “You know how work goes.” I always try to swing by Alexandria to see the Garveys. Their place still feels like home twenty years later.
“Always on the go.” Pride shines in her voice. Justice is a carbon copy of her mother, from her face to her heart. “Make sure you take time for yourself. Are you drinking water?”
“Yes, ma’am,” I smile.
“How’s the retreat? Any prospects?”
Come for me again.
I swallow hard. “I’m keeping my options open,” I say.
“Good for you, sweetie. Whether you decide to take a life partner or not, never settle. You’ll know once you’re with the right person.”
“How will I? Just curious.”
“When the love feels safe for you to be your full self,” Ms. Ang says with the warmth of a woman in a healthy relationship. “Is Justice around? I haven’t heard from her since you two first arrived.”
“She’s…busy.”
Getting her guts rearranged in her room.
Justice and Terrence are making up for lost time. They are trying every sexual position possible in a hotel room. There are a lot, for the record.
Terrence showed up at the salsa lesson this afternoon. Jay doesn’t know that he all but begged to meet me earlier this morning. He wants his wife back and the past behind them. One thing is clear: Terrence never pursued Madison. Their run-ins at the retreat have been coincidental, though I don’t put it past her to have put a tracking device on him.
Justice and Terrence finding their way back to each other tugged at a desire buried deep. I’ve never pictured myself with anyone, and now I’m telling myself that whatever I feel is a fluke—a moment of weakness—because of him .
Every time I close my eyes, I see his lusty, maple eyes. I recall his joggers, outlining the dick I felt but have never seen. Miles took care of me the night we played in Ravenous. He put my needs above his, with a kiss to my curls frizzed from the room we set on fire. What started as a battle of will became a comfort I always avoid.
He threw me off my game so hard that I might need training wheels the next time I ride a man.
“Emma, you there, sweetie?”
“Yes—sorry.” I push out a breath. Get your shit together. “You were saying?”
“I’m holding you up. Go enjoy your night. Have a ball. Please tell Justice I called and to talk to Terrence when she’s ready.” She chuckles. “What are the chances they’d both end up at the same retreat? Love always finds a way. Love you, sweetie!”
“Love you too, Ms. Ang. Thanks for calling.”
Her laughter is warm, like the chocolate chip cookies she bakes on Saturdays. No one gets close enough to attach their heart to mine. Except for Justice and her family, who pulled me in and never let me go.
“What did I tell you about that thank-you?”
I smile. “Not necessary.”
“Exactly. Go enjoy that singles’ retreat to the fullest.”
Plan to.
I’m downstairs in the main restaurant for a nightcap with the person I matched from speed dating. The invite in a gold foil envelope was vague, but I need a reset fast.
No name.
No photo.
Instructions to be here at nine.
I lift a smile at the brunette in a black button-down and slacks and give my name before following her to my match, who’s waiting at our reserved table. A match with a fighter’s body outfitted in a form-fitting V-neck sweater with almond-shaped eyes, a thick nose, and heavy lips.
My glitter heels startle on the stone tile that leads to the cognac leather booth where Miles waits with a glass of brown liquor. It’s a sin how good the color lavender looks on him.
“Oh, hell no.” I shake my head in the spirit of Maya Wilkes, wishing one of those Girlfriends was here now. I played around with Miles to get off, but this can’t happen.
“There’s a mistake.” I shift to the hostess with furrowed brows. “I’m here to meet—”
“Your match,” she says with a smile. “He’s your match.” The clueless woman extends a hand to the man I’ve despised..
The resort determined our matches based off of our scorecards. Someone didn’t carry the two, because I didn’t mark Miles. At least, I don’t think I did.
“I got it. Come here, Emma.” My pulse skitters at the command and outstretched hand.
I glance at the hostess, who’s waiting for me to get my head out of my ass. She takes one look at Miles and walks off with heart eyes. Let her take this date if she’s that sprung.
My hand slips into his, and I sink into the memory of the last time our fingers touched. A bolt of heat scorches my body. Miles’s fingers cover mine, and I let him guide us to the booth in a haze of musk. I settle opposite him and shift my legs behind me so as not to rub knees as he spreads his wide thighs.
“We need to talk.” Hooded eyes roam down my olive-green dress and trace the contours of my body through the material.
There’s no disguising my reaction to Miles. Not the way my chest expands to accommodate the low, steady breaths through my parted lips, nor how his focus darts to my tongue instinctively swiping the edge of my mouth.
“There’s nothing to discuss,” I say. “We played. You left.”
My body might want him, but my mouth is ready to cuss him out. Everything I told Justice was true. I’m unsettled. I’m also confused and frustrated. Confused at my reaction to the man sizing me up from across the booth. Frustrated with myself for allowing a man to unsettle me in the first place. Every moment alone with Miles takes a piece of my guard with it. I can’t do this kind of naked.
“Left?” Miles takes in my frustration. He rubs his index and pointer fingers over his bitable lip. “Is that how you have it?”
“It’s what I know.”
“Which is shit.”
“Excuse me?” I fold my arms over my dress. Diners pass our silent showdown. I should leave, but part of me wants to hear his explanation. The other part wishes I didn’t care. No emotions is safe. It’s what I know, what I’m good at.
Miles’s voice is soft with a tenderness I’m not used to from him. “I was working in the other room, Em. I sleep alone and didn’t want to disturb you. When I woke up, you were gone.” He gauges my reaction, which is stuck somewhere in denial. What is happening?
“Come back to my room.” The request surprises us both, but Miles holds steady. “We’re not done.”
“No.” My tone is firm, the final nail in a coffin I refuse to exhume. No penis will leave me this rattled again. Distance worked for us before and will have to now.
“Here you go, treating me like a stranger,” he says with a playful chuckle and the smile he wields to sear the panties off of women who fall under the spell of his charm and big dick energy.
I’m not wearing panties tonight, but I still clench my thighs.
“What are you afraid of, kitten?”
Everything.
I can compartmentalize the act of sex from any attachments that come with it. That was true until Miles, and I won’t risk getting caught up more than I already am.
“What happened was a mistake, one we won’t make again.” It’s a lie, and a shitty one at that.
“A mistake.” Miles tilts his head and weighs the word. “Bullshit, Emma. You can’t hide from me, kitten.”
My eyes threaten to roll into the back of my head at his smirk. Under normal circumstances, I’d stop our flirting before things got out of hand. Distance and willpower made me immune to Miles’s wiles, but I’m damn near feral. A lack of action will have you doing wild things. Like entertaining whatever is about to come out of his mouth.
The word “risk” waves in front of my face, daring me to be stupid. The problem is, I’m curious if his stamina matches the precision of his fingers.
“How does this play out for you?”
Miles flashes a grin. “Simple. We fuck until it’s time to leave. There are only a few more days left, and last I checked, our best friends are too busy getting busy to care. Once Monday hits, we go back to not speaking to each other.”
“Just like that?”
“Just like that.”
Using a man to tide me over on vacation is nothing new. I love sex and consider it weekly cardio. I never miss a partner once it’s time to pack up and go our separate ways.
But this is different—it feels different. There’s an energy between me and Miles calling us together, and that alone makes this proposal a problem.
“We don’t have to tell them,” he says about Justice and Terrence, reading my mind. “I guarantee they’re still in your suite and will be for the rest of the night—if not the weekend. Come with me to mine.”
The fact that I haven’t told Miles to find another woman to keep the sheets I slept on warm is another warning that the wall I erected between us is on the brink of collapse. I’m ready to list all the reasons we need to find other partners, but I stall. Behind the desire swirling in his eyes are embers of hope. His entire demeanor shifted, and he’s ready to cling to every word I’ve yet to utter—not because I don’t want to say the words, but because of the man making his way to our table.
One who shouldn’t be anywhere near this resort but threatened to come and get me if I didn’t get on a plane to see my father. The event is tomorrow, but Carter is here today.
His stride is a tailored trajectory of arrogance and disruption. I haven’t seen him since I visited my parents for Thanksgiving, which turned out to be a catered interrogation about my career and lack of promising suitors. There’s no reason for Carter to be here, but his wide grin and calculated eyes tell me he didn’t fly in to hit the slopes.
He stops inches from my side of the booth and peers down at me. “There you are.” With our height difference, I’m eye level with his tan designer belt—his crotch is in my face. Dick . “Aren’t you going to say hello”—he tosses a glance at Miles—“and introduce me to your friend?”
Said friend keeps his attention fixed on me, unwilling to entertain the man who’s demanding his. Laid-back and unserious is Miles’s default. His body language reflects it, with his outstretched legs under the small wooden table and the finger casually tracing lazy circles over his half-full glass. He’s unbothered on the outside, but the amusement faded from his gaze the minute Carter interrupted our date.
Date.
One thing at a time.
“Carter.” I aim a glare up to reach its target and set my mouth in annoyance. “Why are you here?”
A dry chuckle rattles the camel sweater over hunter-green slacks. There could be six feet of snow on the ground, and Carter would still model those bony ankles in Italian leather shoes with no socks. I’m no better in my heels, but every man I’ve met with sockless ankles thought he was God’s gift to women, and their ringleader is standing next to me.
Unlike Miles, Carter moves with a confidence sponsored by an Ivy League education, the opinions of low people in high places, and years of his fan club feeding his ego. The man is fine, but I never fell in line, which makes me both irritating and intriguing to him.
The corner of his mouth twists before it settles into a stiff smile, one formed after years of practice on Capitol Hill. “I told you I’d come for you.” Bitterness spills into his voice as he cuts his blue-green eyes at Miles, who hasn’t moved. “Who’s your friend?”
I sigh. “Go back to wherever you came from, Carter. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“I’ll leave in good time. Does he not speak?” He flashes a grin. “That’s a new one for you, Em. Maybe he—”
“Maybe he’s trying to figure out who the fuck you think you are coming over here so reckless.” Miles leans back and waits with a grin of his own, challenging Carter to keep up his antics.
Twice Carter’s size in muscle, Miles would have no trouble knocking his ass out if he wanted. I’m sure he wants to, but grown men don’t engage little boys in their childish games. Boys like the one still hovering over me. The entitlement and lack of basic manners for anyone he perceives to be beneath his social status is why I stay far away from Carter, and most of the people in our families’ circles.
Maybe that’s the reason I fix my lips to utter words I never imagined coming from my mouth. But they slip out with ease as I turn to face Carter and raise my chin. “Miles is my man, and I won’t tolerate any more of your disrespect.”