Chapter 15 #2
I extract myself from the blanket fort wreckage, my joints popping in protest as I stand.
The living room looks like a tornado hit a sleepover—cushions everywhere, sheets drooping from their ceiling anchors, the snack debris scattered across every available surface.
I should clean this up. Put the sectional back together.
Do something productive with the remnants of last night.
Instead, I head for the guest bathroom to brush my teeth and splash water on my face. If Charlie has “something to show me,” I should at least be presentable for whatever fresh chaos she’s cooked up.
The face in the mirror looks different than it did a week ago.
More relaxed around the eyes. Less tension in the jaw.
There’s something almost soft about my expression that I’m not used to seeing—a looseness that wasn’t there before.
I haven’t been thinking about my insurmountable problems with their haphazard solutions.
I’ve been investing in a relationship that actually gives something back.
Charlie Riley is dismantling my carefully constructed emotional fortress brick by brick, and the most alarming part is how little I want to stop her.
I dry my face, run a hand through my hair in a futile attempt at presentability, and head down the hallway toward her bedroom.
Past the kitchen where the Rotel pan is soaking in the sink.
Past the windows showing off another aggressively sunny Miami afternoon.
Past the spot where Black Cat is lounging in a patch of sunlight, watching my approach with an expression that suggests he knows something I don’t.
“Kiss-ass,” I mutter at him. “You only favor her because she overfeeds you.”
He blinks slowly and goes back to grooming his paw. Zero loyalty when it comes to food.
Charlie’s door is closed when I reach it. I knock twice, the sound echoing slightly in the quiet hallway.
“Come in.”
I push the door open.
And stop breathing.
Charlie is standing in the center of her bedroom wearing a black teddy that looks like it was designed by someone who wanted to cause highway pileups.
Lace and silk and strategic cutouts that leave approximately nothing to the imagination.
The straps are thin as spider silk, looking like they might disintegrate if I stare at them too hard.
The neckline plunges to somewhere around her navel, held together by sheer optimism and probably some kind of fashion tape.
The whole thing barely qualifies as clothing.
She’s also standing next to a chair—one of the decorative ones from the corner of the room, now pulled out to face the bed like a throne awaiting its occupant.
“Took you long enough,” she says, with a confidence that almost masks the nervous energy vibrating beneath her skin.
I can see it in the way she’s holding herself, shoulders a little too straight, chin a little too high, hands clasped in front of her like she doesn’t know what else to do with them. “Sit.”
I don’t move. I’m not entirely sure I can move. Every functional brain cell I possess has redirected its attention to the task of not staring at the way that lace hugs the curve of her hips.
“Charlie. What is this?”
“It’s a chair.” She gestures to it like I’m being particularly slow. “You sit in it. With your butt. I’m sure you’ve done this before.”
“I meant—” I gesture vaguely at her entire situation. The lingerie. The staging. The obvious premeditation of whatever is about to happen. “This.”
“Oh, this?” She does a little spin, and the teddy flares slightly at the hem, offering a glimpse of black underwear that matches. My mouth goes dry. “Do you like it?” I think she’s trying to smile sexily but it’s coming off like she’s in pain.
“Are you okay? Did you sleep enough?”
“Yeah. Taio.” She holds her palms to the ceiling. “I’m trying…to seduce you. I read a couple articles about how to get his attention and take your relationship to the next level.” She shrugs innocently. “It was either this or BDSM.”
I blink slowly. “Our relationship? Next level?”
She shoots me a cool glare. “Please. Sit. Down. I’ve been practicing this all morning. Just let me do my thing. Please?”
Oh, fuck me. I sit.
The chair creaks slightly under my weight—these decorative pieces aren’t exactly built for function—but it holds.
I’m positioned about six feet from the bed, giving me a clear sightline to what is apparently about to be a show.
Charlie pulls out her phone, scrolls through something with the focus of a surgeon selecting their instrument, and a moment later music starts playing from the bedroom’s built-in speakers.
The opening notes of “Gangsta Lovin’” fill the room.
“Old-school. Okay, I’m feeling it,” I say, as she tosses the phone onto the bed and turns to face me with determination etched across every feature. “You really don’t have to do this though. We can talk.”
“We’ve been talking…a lot.” She rolls her shoulders back, like she’s preparing for an athletic competition.
Cracks her neck side to side. Shakes out her hands.
She looks less like a woman about to perform a striptease and more like a boxer entering the ring.
“And plus, you gave me that whole speech about confidence and not caring what people think and being unforgettable…”
“Yeah, I have a feeling I’m never going to forget this.” Except I’m staring at her in deep concern. “You sure this is how you want to go about seducing me? Because I know dancing isn’t your favorite.”
“It’s fine. There’s this stripaerobics instructor that does tutorials on TikTok. I watched her routine to this song like fifty times. I mostly learned it. It’s going to be spectacular.”
“I don’t think spectacular is where this is heading.”
“Rude.” She points at me sternly. “No heckling from the audience. This is a supportive environment.”
“My apologies. Please continue.”
“Thank you. I will.”
When the bass line throbs through the room, that unmistakable groove that’s launched a thousand amateur stripteases, Charlie starts to move.
Move is a generous term.
What she’s actually doing is a sort of aggressive hip sway that looks less like seduction and more like she’s trying to dislodge something stuck to her lower back.
Her arms come up over her head in what I think is supposed to be a sexy stretch, but the movement is jerky and uncoordinated, like a marionette being operated by someone who’s never actually seen a human body in motion.
“How am I doing?” she asks breathlessly, attempting to body roll and mostly looking like she’s experiencing mild gastrointestinal distress.
“You’re doing great,” I manage, biting the inside of my cheek hard enough to taste copper. “Very…athletic.”
“Athletic wasn’t the vibe I was going for.”
“Sexy. I meant sexy. Incredibly sexy.” Maybe if I keep saying it, she’ll believe me.
She shoots me a suspicious look but continues her routine, now attempting to incorporate my chair into her performance. The idea, I believe, is to drape herself seductively over the back of it while I watch in stunned appreciation.
What actually happens is she misjudges her balance, rolls off the back, and hits the ground with an audible thunk, then lets out a very unsexy “ow, shit, motherfucker.”
I leap up only to find her clambering back to her feet. “You okay?”
“Fine. Sit back down.” She rubs her hip vigorously, wincing before retreating back into position. “It’s part of it.”
“Injury is part of it?” I ask over the thumping music.
She ignores me, refocusing as the song swells into the chorus.
Charlie makes her move toward me. This part is actually working—she’s got a decent walk when she commits to it, all swaying hips and deliberate steps.
The lingerie helps. The lighting helps. My pulse picks up despite the comedy of the situation.
She’s beautiful, even when she’s being ridiculous. Maybe especially when she’s being ridiculous. Her complete commitment to this disaster makes my chest tight in ways I’m not prepared to examine.
She reaches my chair and does a slow circle around it, trailing her fingers across my shoulders as she goes. The touch sends sparks cascading down my spine, pooling somewhere low in my stomach.
“See?” she murmurs near my ear, close enough I can smell her perfume—warm and sweet and definitely new. “I can indeed be sexy.”
“I never said you couldn’t be sexy.”
“Your face said it. When I fell. Your face was very judgy.”
“My face was concerned for your safety. There’s a difference.”
She completes her circle and positions herself in front of me, so close I could reach out and touch her if I let myself.
Which I won’t. Probably. The teddy looks even more enticing from this angle, the way the lace stretches across her collarbones, the shadow between her breasts, the ridiculously dainty straps that look like they’d snap if I breathed on them wrong.
“Now for the grand finale,” she announces, with the gravity of someone unveiling a grand work of art.
She whirls around, presenting me with a view of her back—the teddy dips dangerously low, exposing the delicate architecture of her spine, the dimples just above her hips—and attempts what I can only describe as an ambitious controlled descent toward my lap.
It is not controlled.
It is not even close to controlled.
Her knees buckle at an awkward angle. She overcorrects by grabbing the arm of the chair.
Her center of gravity shifts catastrophically to the left.
She pinwheels her free arm in a desperate attempt to regain balance, catches a fistful of my shirt, and ends up in a sort of sideways sprawl across my thighs that is approximately zero percent what she was going for.
“Nailed it,” she says, from her position of tangled limbs and wounded dignity. “Exactly as planned.”