Chapter 23
23
Drew
Thump.
Thump.
Thump.
Pounding in my head drags me from a peaceful sleep. I fight to remain in the fuzzy state, warm from Juni being next to me, my body still exhausted from having sex again just past two. But efforts fail as the sound of trumpets blaring from a mariachi band win this round. Slamming my arm on the side of the mattress, I growl, “That’s it!”
I roll to my side to apologize. “Sorry. It’s my annoying neighbor and their nighttime cooking concerts.”
At least one of us can sleep through anything. Or I just wore her out. I’ll take the credit.
Last night was nothing less than spectacular. And I’m not just talking about the sex, though that was as well. I can’t pinpoint the moment I knew I wanted to be with Juni because if I think about it, I believe the attraction was bubbling under the surface all along. Were we fooling ourselves that we could remain friends? Wasting time having conversations about remaining platonic? It seems that way, and now we’ve boiled over.
There’s no going back from here.
I don’t harbor regrets when it comes to the past couple of weeks because in the scheme of things, we figured it out pretty damn fast. So I don’t have a complaint regarding how we got here. It’s figuring out where we go from this point on now that we know we’re more than we once intended.
I lean forward to kiss her head, but my lips end up pressed to a pillow. When I reach out to touch her, though, the bed is empty. That’s odd.
I turn toward the bathroom. The light’s still out, but the faintest of lights is slipping down the hall. I flip the covers off and land on my feet. Grabbing my boxers from the floor, I slip them on and head for the door.
The music is louder, and the sound of a pan scraping against the metal grate reaches my ears. The scent of cumin and the onions cooking fills the air. I keep walking until I see the light of the kitchen shining bright against the backdrop of night.
The smell of the food.
The beat of the song.
The hour.
All is too familiar.
I rub my eyes, making sure I’m not imagining things or trapped in a nightmare. I see her first—a white T-shirt that looks like one of mine. Her hair is down and the strands a mess from rolling around in the bed. She’s incredibly sexy. If she wanted to distract me, she’s doing an excellent job.
It would be so easy to tempt me back to bed if suspicion— confusion —wasn’t sitting like a rock at the bottom of my stomach. I’m tired and not thinking clearly. That has to be because this is just too familiar. And extremely odd.
While she’s happily humming, not in time with the song at all, under the bright lights of the kitchen, I try to figure out how to approach without startling her. I’m not sure how to make my presence known otherwise. I move from the shadows and grip the back of a dining room chair. “Hi.”
Whipping her gaze to the side, she finds me in the dim lights, and joy fills her eyes. “Hi there, sleepyhead. Thought you’d never wake up.”
“Most people are sleeping at four thirty in the morning.” I hate how serious I sound, cautious as if she’s a snake ready to strike. Innocent before proven guilty, I remind myself. “What are you doing?”
“Making tacos.” Her tone is lighthearted as if this is perfectly normal. “Since you didn’t have tortillas, I’m using lettuce wraps and calling it taco fusion.” Pondering that thought, she adds, “Maybe they should be taco wraps?”
“That works.”
She browns the ground beef as I take in the scene before me.
The island is covered with containers and the knives and utensils she’s been using to cook. A part of an onion is chopped on a cutting board, and diced tomatoes fill a bowl. Cheddar cheese is grated on a plate, and leaves of lettuce are drying on paper towels. “How long have you been awake?”
“Not long,” she replies, trading the spatula for the knife on the cutting board. After a few chops, she lowers it as she comes closer. “I like to think I can cook better than I do. I’m a work in progress.” It’s the first I get of the full view of her. Legs that haven’t seen the sun for a while dip out from under the hem of the shirt. They’re toned, shapely, and I have visions of how they looked wrapped around me that make me hard again. She says, “No kiss for the chef?”
I kiss her, wishing I was kissing her like earlier in the night. But trust has diminished, and I don’t deal well with lying despite my dick’s wishes. She licks her lips and asks, “Hungry? I’m starved.” Dicing the rest of the onion, she says, “I don’t know if you realize, but we missed dinner.”
“I didn’t.”
“Neither did I until my growling stomach woke me up.”
“Do you cook much?”
She sets the knife down to tend to the skillet, not letting me stop her one bit. Clicking it off, she says, “It’s done. Now we eat.” So easily distracting . . . but is it on purpose?
Moving to the other side of the island, I say, “I don’t.”
“You don’t what?” Handing me a plate, she adds, “Help yourself seems rude since it’s your food. But yeah, help yourself or I can make you a plate?”
I fucking hate that my stomach growls, my traitorous body making it difficult to stay on track. I have to. This conversation is long overdue.
“One or two tacos?” she asks, holding up the lettuce.
“Two.” Yeah. Yeah. I know. I’m such a guy who’s easily pleased. Sex. Food. Money. I’m that asshole. Seeing her take such care in putting the toppings on each leaf of lettuce has me softening the accusations in my head. Why am I mad?
She’s never told me where she lives. Technically, she hasn’t therefore lied. I think. Yet . . . this doesn’t sit right with me.
Why is she hiding something so basic as where she lives?
I stare at her, trying to figure out my angle, but then my gaze dips to the taco buffet. The best approach is direct, kind, and on a full belly. But this is so incredibly confusing.
My gut has never led me wrong, but I’m starting to think I’m just hungry.
Carrying her plate, she kisses my bicep when she passes. So much sweetness in the gesture that I hate to ruin the mood. I watch as she settles on the couch and starts to eat. I’m blowing this out of proportion. It has to be a coincidence—the music and food, cooking at odd hours.
I don’t let people into my life this easily. Once I got to know Juni, her intentions were pure. Innocence coated her every move. She looked at me for a friend, and I was happy to oblige. Well, after we realized the inevitable. The universe gave us signs. Did we read them all wrong?
There’s only one way to find out . . . right after I finish a taco. I wipe my mouth with a napkin, and say, “It’s really good. Thank you for making them.”
She leans forward with pride filling her eyes as she rubs my knee. “My pleasure.”
I finish one taco and toy with the other casually . . . as nonchalant as I can be without this coming on like an attack. If given the opportunity, I believe she’ll have a perfectly good reason for not telling me. I can’t think of one off the top of my head, but it is five in the morning. I say, “I usually wake up at this time to fit in a workout.”
Nodding, she swallows a bite, and then says, “I don’t love working out. I’ll do it when I have to. It’s a necessary evil.”
“I like it. Guess we’re different that way.”
The comment doesn’t seem to bother her, but she is eyeing me. “Are you all right?”
“Fine. Yeah, I’m fine. So where’d you say you live again?” Subtle. As subtle as a bulldozer.
She levels me with a glare. “What?”
“Huh?” It’s not that I’m afraid of her, but I don’t want to lose what we’ve become. Whatever that is.
She gets up and heads back into the kitchen. “All that cooking has made me tired.”
I reach for her, but she eludes me. Setting her half-empty plate on the counter, she asks, “Do you mind if I clean the kitchen tomorrow?”
“Juni?” I stand, not sure what the fuck I’m doing. I could destroy everything if I’m wrong. If I’m right, she already did. I just wasn’t made aware until it was too late. “Where do you live?”
“Why are you asking this at five in the morning?” She starts for the bedroom. “Let’s get some rest, and we’ll talk in the morning.” There’s a noticeable tremble to her voice, and she moves quicker.
She’s doing what she does best—distract from the topic at hand. I struggle not to let her win. Anything I do to disrupt the status quo means I lose, even asking her. “We said honesty and trust were pillars of our friendship.” Stopping with her back to me, she crosses her arms over her chest. “Now we’re more, or I thought that was the direction we were headed.”
When she finally turns around, she says, “We are. Last night was so good.”
“Then why won’t you tell me.” She makes no move to come forward. “Do you live downstairs?”
“Yes.” I barely hear her. She crosses her arms and tugs her bottom lip under her teeth.
Offering nothing more, I ask, “Did you know this entire time we’ve been seeing each other?”
“I didn’t know at the park. I didn’t know at the coffee shop.”
I don’t know why I’m so angry, but it’s hard to keep inside. But with a steady voice that I conjure from dealing with work catastrophes, I say, “Our relationship doesn’t span years, not even months. We’re a few weeks in, and you’ve already lied. And for what? There’s always a gain in play, a reward for winning. What’d you win, Juni?”
“I’ve wanted to tell you?—”
“Then you should have.”
“It was a lie that snowballed.”
“I’d call it an avalanche. The one thing I don’t do well is allow people into my life. I allowed you.”
“I don’t understand why you’re upset.” A plea coats her tone as she covers the distance between us. “So I live in the same building.” Touching my chest, she says, “That’s good news, right? Now we can be close.”
She makes it so hard not to comfort her, to make the welling tears that glisten in her eyes go away. I resist. “This wasn’t a little lie.” I move to the window, remembering all the times just outside. “You dragged it out. You walked down the sidewalk like you were going to another building. You know Gil and pretended you didn’t.” I rub my temple and take a deep breath. “Look, Juni, I have enough stress in my life. I got caught up in this chaos, but I think it’s best we end this now.”
“End it because you don’t like me, or end it because you do, and that scares you?”
I cross my arms over my chest, digging in my heels. “It doesn’t matter now.”
Her lips part, but she struggles to speak, her eyes closing as if in disbelief. When she reopens them, a glare full of daggers is aimed at me. “You’re upset because you have feelings for me. Well, guess what?” When I don’t say anything, she adds, “I did, too.” She pads down the hall in bare feet, leaving me to stew in the feelings I was so close to denying.
It doesn’t take but a minute before she has her skirt pulled on and her shoes, purse, and sweater in her hands. She looks smaller in her pain. Stopping in the doorway to the hall, she doesn’t look back, but says, “This is why I didn’t tell you.”
“And that’s why we’re saying goodbye.”
The door closes, and the automatic bolt locks in place—me on one side, her on the other, and deceit left between us.