Chapter 16
CHAPTER
SIXTEEN
Letti
When I hear the door slam shut to the bathroom, a giggle escapes me. Two can play that game he started. “Chingada madre,” I mutter, calling him a motherfucker underneath my breath.
I try to busy myself by ordering dinner and pulling up one of the many streaming services he has on the television so we can choose a show to watch together instead of sitting around, stewing.
My inner girl is doing exactly what I told him I’d do, place our entire relationship underneath the lens of a microscope.
“Why do men think it’s a good idea to do this to women?” I whine. “Now my brain is going to be stuck on… we need to talk.”
The pipes in the house turn off letting me know he’s jumping out of the shower.
My nerves suddenly take a nosedive and fall into an abyss of the unknown.
With nothing left to do to keep myself busy, I start wiping down the already clean kitchen and start making a grocery list. Which I won’t be able to contribute to since I no longer have a job thanks to Slayer and his overreaction.
That’s another subject Viking and I need to discuss.
My unemployment. Nobody should have the right to decide when or who I get to work with or where I do it.
He comes strolling into the living room, his sweats hung on his hips and rubbing his hair with a towel, drying it. “You took your braids out,” I complain.
“Needed to scrub my scalp,” he states. “There was a lot of dust at the rodeo grounds and it was making me itch.”
This isn’t the first time I’ve re-braided his hair and I doubt it’ll be the last time I do so.
“Go get your supplies, and I’ll redo them,” I instruct him.
Thankfully, there’s a channel aired online that gives step-by-step instructions on how to give the perfect Viking braids.
I had to use it the first two times I did this, but now, I think I’ve got it down to an art form.
I stretch my fingers and pop my knuckles because this is a long process since his hair hits mid back.
As he comes in with his hands ladened down with his separating comb, jar of gel, clips, and a pack of rubber bands, the doorbell rings. He drops the items on the coffee table and tells me, “I got it.”
I eyeball the things he set down and am slightly disappointed.
He didn’t bring any of his rune beads. Even though they’re a pain to add to his braids, I love the look of them.
But it’s not me who has to wear them, sleep in them, and have them whipping around my head so I swallow my sadness and plaster a smile on my face.
“Food first?” he asks as he places the bags down at my feet before settling on the floor and elbowing his way between my legs.
My eyes nearly cross at not only his close proximity, but because his heat solicits a different type of want to flow through me.
I feel wanton as my womanly desires take center stage.
I don’t know how to be a seductress, but I want to learn.
I wonder if they have a tutorial for that?
“I’ll take bites in between braids,” I decide. “Otherwise, we’ll be here for hours and I’ll get full and want nothing more than to wrap a blanket around me and snuggle into these cloud-like cushions.” I’m obsessed with his couch and it has become my favorite napping place.
“I’m suddenly jealous of my custom couch,” he mumbles.
Teasing him, I say, “Money well spent, my Viking. You did good.”
“It’s sad that I prefer it over my bed, huh?
” he asks, reaching into the bag and pulling out our meals.
He pops the styrofoam lids on them and sits mine beside me on the couch as he starts digging into his.
“Nothing better after being on the road for half the day than a greasy burger and homemade fries.”
“Goes straight to my hips, but I can’t resist a good burger, especially when it’s made with Angus beef and comes from a Mom and Pop diner,” I say, agreeing with him. “You know that it’s made with love.”
A slight chuckle escapes him. He knows I have a love/hate relationship with food.
I love it and it hates my body. I wasn’t lying when I said it goes straight to my hips because it most certainly does.
It also settles in my ass and tits and makes a home for itself.
Damn genetics. No matter how physical I stay, and even if the doctor claims I’m in great shape, I always feel the weight of those feminine attributes.
They follow me like a long-lost friend that’s attached themselves to you like a suckerfish, one that you wish you could yank yourself free of and kick to the curb because they’re that annoying.
I shake my head at my wayward thoughts and pop open my lid so I can snack on my meal as I make my Viking look like himself again.
“I like your hips,” he claims. “I’m not scared I’ll break you.”
“I’m made of some tough stuff,” I jeer. “I’ve proved that time and time again.
” I reach up and start the tedious task of sectioning off his hair and clipping it to separate it.
I like to start in the middle and work my way out to the sides.
It’s a template of how thick to make each row, like follow the leader.
“You have,” he confirms. “We both have.”
Out of the two of us, I’m not sure who had the more traumatizing childhood. We both walked on eggshells never knowing where the next strike was coming from or why it would happen. He had more freedom than I did, but he was just as trapped as I was.
“We’re warriors, Viking.”
“With the scars to prove it,” he amends.
“Internal and external,” I add.
“Quite the pair,” he grinds out. “I can’t help but get angry when I think about the way you were treated, my Letti.”
“Ditto,” I whisper. “You know, I never knew if I should pity my siblings or be thankful that they escaped the mad house that was the Trejo clan.”
“All we can do is hope for the best where they’re concerned,” he rumbles. “Booker has no way of tracking them to see what type of lives they have. And he’s tried numerous times to locate them but there’s no trace of them or proof of their existence.”
“They’ve always been good at covering their tracks. I knew it’d be an impossible task for Booker when you gave him that mission. The bitch that birthed me never saw a doctor while she was pregnant nor did she have one present when she birthed them. It was a family affair.”
“Yeah, well, your family sucks,” he states.
“That they do,” I mumble, finishing the first braid and reaching over to take a bite out of my burger before wiping the grease off my hands and starting on the next one.
There’s an elephant sized boulder sitting on my shoulders.
We talk about bullshit as we eat and I work, but eventually, the weight feels like it’s suffocating me and I blurt out, “What did you want to talk with me about?”
“You lasted longer than I thought you would,” he says, laughing. “I’m not sure if we should talk about it while you have my hair in your hands.”
“I thought you were a tough guy,” I say, taunting him. He’s not getting out of having this conversation. Now. I can’t take it anymore and need to know what’s been on his mind in regard to us. “You can handle a little hair pulling.”
“Not sure my scalp can, though. You’re already pretty heavy-handed, Letti.”
“Is what you want to talk about something that’s going to infuriate me, Icer?”
“There she goes again,” he mutters to himself. “I’ll always know when you’re pissed at me because you revert to calling me by my road name.”
“I guess I do,” I state, not realizing until he pointed it out that it’s exactly what I do. “Guilty as charged.”
“I still don’t have all my thoughts lined up or in order, Letti. I’m not sure if I won’t jump from one thing to the other with how scrambled everything is.”
Mulling that over, I suggest, “Choose the most important thing that’s been on your mind and we’ll nitpick our way through.”
“In a nutshell, it’s us. Everything about us,” he confesses.
“That’s pretty broad, Viking.”
“Hence my dilemma. I don’t know where to start,” he says, sighing.
“Do you want me to ask questions to give us a place to start?” I ask, because I have plenty rummaging their way through my head.
“That might be for the best, Letti. I’m not great at communicating as it is. We both know it. I always stumble over my tongue.”
“There’s nothing wrong with being a man of few words,” I convey, defending him.
“Then ask your first question and let’s see where it leads us,” he declares.
“First, the whole us thing, like I said before, is pretty broad. What do you want from us, Viking? Do you want us to remain friends or do you want us to be more?”
I can hear him swallow as he spouts out, “More. But I don’t know how to do that or what it means.
Riptide says you’re my girl because we do things couples do, and I feel like an asshole because I didn’t pick up on that.
And since I didn’t, I don’t know how to read you, which confounds me because it’s literally my role in the club to read people and act accordingly.
With that said, I don’t know if that’s something you thought also or if it’s even something you want. ”
“Well, that’s something I can clear up for you and it may make it easier for you to know what direction this talk needs to go.
I want more, and I’d hoped that we were going out on dates and building something, but I never wanted to put pressure on either one of us so I decided to let things naturally run their course.
We don’t have to rush into anything, Viking.
We can let things develop without forcing a label on them. ”
“What if I want to label them, Letti? What if I need that to move forward. Would you be opposed to it?” he asks, and it’s the first time I’ve ever heard him sound vulnerable.
“What label would you give us?” I ask, gulping and mentally crossing my fingers since my hands are otherwise occupied.
“You’re already my best friend,” he confesses. “But that’s not enough. I want you to officially be my girl, but you’ll have to tell me what all that consists of because I’m basically going into this wearing a blindfold.”
“We may have to learn what it means together,” I tell him. “It’ll be the blind leading the blind. I have no experience with relationships either. But as long as we stick together and talk things out, I think we’ll be okay.”
“Together. I like that,” he acknowledges. “Not going to lie, this petrifies me. What if we try and things don’t work out? I don’t think I could lose you and not become your stalker.”
“Stalk away,” I say, snorting, meaning every word. “I give you my permission to hound me like a dog. Because, Viking, I don’t feel like me whenever you’re not around. You brought me to life once you brought me into your house and put me in your bedroom.”
“You knew? How? How did you know this was my house, Letti?” he asks.
“A woman knows the way the man who she’s obsessed with smells. And, Viking, your scent is embedded in your sheets.”