25. Faye
25
FAYE
As the party wound do wn, Faye slipped away to swap her heels for fluffy socks and returned to help clean up the kitchen. With seven pairs of hands – yes, even Uncle Mortimer pulled a tiny fraction of his weight – the array of dishes were all in the sink and dishwasher, the leftover foods were stashed in foil containers within the fridge, and the house lingered with the mixed scents of thirty different perfumes and colognes all before eleven p.m.
She left Bash talking with Matt in the living room and said goodnight to everyone else before turning herself in. It’d been an arduous day and her feet moaned at her with each step she took past the bed to the bathroom. She didn’t want to shower again, and even though she didn’t have the spoons for it, her skin would hate her in the morning if she didn’t remove her make-up.
Faye peeled herself out of the dress she’d never expected would gather so many memories tonight and switched into something more comfortable before sending out a text.
Faye
I told Bash the news.
Sienna
Oh no …
Maisie
How did he take it?
Faye
Better than I deserve.
The knock upon the door was slow and purposeful. The first knock that door had received all day.
Smiling to herself, Faye could imagine how Bash would be on the other side of this divide between them, like a lost puppy waiting to be let in. She called but the door never opened, so she went and peeled it back herself.
Bash stood with his eyes closed, hands clasped behind his back, and a pinkness to his cheeks reminiscent of the glass of wine he’d sipped throughout the night.
“I hope I’ve found the right room,” he said, sardonically smirking, “and you’re not my mother standing in her underwear.”
“No … but who said I’m wearing any?”
“You— What ?” Two blue eyes shot open then snapped shut again. Dots of red on Bash’s cheeks doubled in size. Faye’s stomach hurt from how much she tried and failed at containing her laugh to not disturb the two sleeping girls down the hall.
“Relax. I’m dressed.” Bash hadn’t looked at her for long enough to see the sleep shorts and camisole she wore.
He squinted his eyes open one at a time but still they landed straight on her midriff.
“You’re evil,” he said.
“For the pyjamas?” Faye looked down at herself. The high waisted shorts were a red and white Nordic print, but covered everything that needed to be covered, and the cropped camisole was simply white.
“No, no. Not the pyjamas. The pyjamas are nice. Very … nice.” The red darkened another shade on Bash’s face as he stumbled over his words adorably, fingers playing with his ear.
His thoughts had drifted to when he’d walked in on her naked – Faye knew they did because hers did too. She internally begged that the white cami, which in hindsight might not have been a good idea, wasn’t see-through in this low, warm light. Bash’s attention made her nipples halfway hard and she put her faith in the thickness of the ribbed cotton.
Maybe she was ovulating, because so many times today the way Bash looked at her so intensely made her want to climb him like a tree. He did it right then; that look of a thousand different meanings in his eyes like he wanted to reach out and touch her but resisted.
Something irrevocable had shifted between them since arriving in this house and Faye didn’t know what to do with herself anymore.
“Faye?”
“Yes?” Her breath trembled like a young filly for having a man at her door.
Bash peered at her plainly. “Can I come in?”
“Yes! Yes,” she blustered. “Sorry.”
Bash looked down at her as he passed, wordlessly telling her she was acting strange. Faye knew she was, she just didn’t know why. She’d always been good at keeping her attraction to him locked down tight – not letting it show. But today it was as though the screws on that lock untwisted one by one.
Perhaps she’d lost the key this week? Or her mind?
Maybe the one glass of wine had gone to her head more than usual tonight. Why else would her inhibitions seem to have evaporated?
“I want to apologise again for earlier.” Bash’s quick shift to solemnity wrangled Faye somewhat to the present.
“It’s alright.” Light and breezy. She crossed one ankle over the other and waved her hand through the air, the skin of her bare legs prickling with awareness for no reason. “I know it’s not the first time you’ve seen a woman naked. I haven’t tainted your virginal blue eyes.”
Why would you say that – she could hear Ellie hiss from a hundred miles away.
Oh god, why did she say that? The last thing she needed was Bash remembering what she looked like naked and unprepared. His laugh was far too low and sexy and Faye had no choice but to smile along.
She wanted to die.
She might have when Bash took one long, languid step towards her.
“You know, if you wanted revenge … ” he said slowly, and Faye didn’t like the sound of where this was going for her already rocky sensibility. “Then I could walk around here in a towel? Maybe bend over?”
“Yes please,” is what she wanted to have come from her mouth, but instead she said, “Bash, it’s not tit for tat.”
His gaze skimmed down every inch of her skin to her uncovered legs. “You haven’t got any tats . And I’ve already seen your ti?—”
Faye’s fingers smashed to his lips whilst all of her internal organs fired up furiously. “You know what I meant.” Bash playfully nipped at her finger and she snatched it away at the graze of his teeth.
Seriously, what was happening between them? Was this what it was like to be flirted with by him, or was her imagination spinning out a different scenario?
Hormones. It was definitely her hormones.
Bash pulled at the front of his jumper he’d put back on for returning downstairs, his eyes narrow and colouring with mischief. “You don’t even want a little peak?”
“No, Bash.” But her body was aflame with yes.
He hummed like he didn’t believe her before raising the jumper up over his head. Faye had half a second to curl her lip at the band of taut, tanned skin where his buttoned shirt rode up.
“Okay. Well I’m going to get washed up then.” Jumper in hand, Bash stuck h is thumb over his shoulder in a gesture at the bathroom door.
“Mm-hm.” Faye decided she wouldn’t speak anymore whilst they were in the same room. This sudden spike in her libido was safer to handle that way.
“Okay … ” Bash simultaneously smiled and smirked at her as if he could see the thoughts behind her eyes. Thoughts which grew progressively dirtier and dirtier, like how his thick neck would look between her hands with her straddled above him on the bed.
Was she supposed to carry on as if those visions were normal?
When Bash finally pivoted for the bathroom and the click of the door signalled Faye was alone, all of the air left her lungs and she bracketed her face with her hands.
This is so wrong.
She couldn’t be having sexual thoughts about her best friend after he’d told her how proud he was of her, saved her life, pinned her body from chest to toe, seen her naked, called her stunning , and definitely flirted with her, all in one day.
If this was any kind of normal first date/getting-to-know-one-another situation, then she’d definitely say he was attracted to her - there were too many signs.
He’s been flirting with you for ten years, Faye, you’re just too daft to see it.
“No. No. No … ” Faye paced.
What if Ellie was right? What if Bash was attracted to her? Why now after so long? What was she supposed to do, ask him?
“Hi, are you attracted to me? Do you want to bonk my brains out in this bed?” As if that wouldn’t make things awkward when he answered “no.”
Before these flittering, skittish thoughts could get their wires tangled up any further, Faye buried herself under the duvet, realising that with the way her body tingled, this bed was now an unsafe zone. Because being flirty was who Bash was; he was good at light, innuendo-filled banter like they’d had a moment ago, and given his record, he was good at saying the right things to make a woman all hot and bothered too.
It was her who was the hesitant one and Faye didn’t know what gamble she might take if he said anything leading whilst they were under the same duvet tonight. She needed to cool down and calm down before Bash came back.
When it came to making a move upon a prospective date, Faye was all or nothing. All usually ended in disappointment, a large dash of embarrassment, and a hefty retreat to the safety of her flat where she could forget all about it, alone .
Nothing was better. Nothing meant she wouldn’t risk making a complete fool of herself.
Bash emerged from the bathroom wrapped in nothing but a towel below the waist – a towel – and Faye’s throat made a strange sound as it clammed up.
The old pipes hadn’t clanked, therefore he hadn’t showered, so what on earth had he washed to require such nakedness? Why did that matter? Only one of those soft white cotton rectangles separated her view from all of him as he paraded through the bedroom.
“Forgot my pyjamas.”
Faye adamantly didn’t look at him as he two-handedly rummaged under his designated pillows, bending forwards. The fact that sheer force of will and whatever lay underneath the towel kept it held up, like Bash was tempting fate to let it fall, set her body aflame with stray sparks flying everywhere.
Where was the opening fold in the towel? Which way had he wrapped it?
Don’t look.
Don’t look.
Don’t groan either!
“Aha.” Triumphantly, Bash tossed the shorts in the air and snatched them again, replacing one hand over the knot of the towel.
Damn it. He was barely five feet away. Lean. Tall. Strong. Shoulders wide, ar ms freckled and defined and dusted with hair, and Faye had nothing in her hands as she sat up awkwardly to say she’d been doing anything other than sitting here waiting for him.
A small flicker of pride and admiration worked its way between the frantic beats of her heart that he’d let her see him this way at all when she knew how vulnerable he’d feel to show his body off, even though for her own sake she tried not to look at it.
Maybe he mistook her wistful attempt at keeping her eyes off of him for tiredness, because he wandered off back to the bathroom without saying anything else. Her gaze lifted slowly towards his retreating back and the muscles that subtly danced as he went. That towel hugged his backside like it did so for an award. She didn’t know if it was on purpose or not, but the desired effects of his peacocking definitely happened with the dryness of her mouth and impulse to press her thighs shut.
Bash never turned. With one hand, he nudged the door shut in his wake, but with the other …
As the last foot of the open door closed itself, the towel dropped.
Faye audibly gasped.
And then Bash was gone.
She’d seen all of him. His bare bottom on full display. Magnificently round, she might add, but that was beside the point. She’d seen him. For years and years she’d thought just a glimpse might satisfy her.
She was wrong.
Faye slumped down and pulled the duvet over her head, kicking her feet and silently screaming as she grinned into the darkness under the cover.
Had Bash known she’d been watching him? Of course he did. It was the kind of thing that he’d assume, and she’d bet as he finished washing, it was with a smirk on his lips.
Someone’s phone began to ring. Ripping the covers off of herself, Faye crawled to the sound.
The name “Bennet” popped up on Bash’s phone on his nightstand and Faye knew his business partner well enough socially to answer for him.
“Hi, Bennet.”
“Faye?” She didn’t blame him for sounding surprised. “Is that really you?”
“Yes it is,” Faye said as she unwound her legs from under the duvet, intending to take the phone to Bash.
“Oh, cool. Sorry it’s late. I was just calling to tell Bash to check his emails. Woodrow and Sturridge have sent another offer through and he needs to take a look.”
Faye slowed as she padded to the closed bathroom door, a frown forming.
“ Woodrow and Sturridge ?” Intrigue got the better of her. She’d never heard those names before, not that she knew of every client the pair had.
Bennet sounded distracted. “The American firm that wants us to move out there as a part of their team.”
Ice doused all of the fire that’d been burning within her tonight. Bennet didn’t recognise her silence, and she’d stopped listening.
“Anyway,” he carried on, “the new offer is better than we could have asked for, could you tell him to take a look?”
American firm.
America.
Offer.
“Faye? You still there?”
Her feet were stuck in place right outside of the bathroom door. “Yeah … yeah I’ll tell him, Bennet.”
“Great, thanks. Good to speak to you, Faye. And Happy Christmas.”
“Happy Christmas,” she said numbly.
The phone went dead.
Static silence swept the room except for the thundering beat of Faye’s heart ech oing out of her chest. Her body went still like a ghost had passed through her and had taken her soul with it.
The bathroom door opened three inches from her face and Bash caught himself before he walked right into her.
“Hey—You okay?” He lowered his stance when she didn’t answer and grasped her shoulders like she was a bomb about to detonate. “Faye? What’s wrong?”
Faye dragged her gaze up from the carpet, finding focus on the creases of concern at the corners of his eyes.
“Who are Woodrow and Sturridge ?”