8. Evan
8
EVAN
“ M r. Black, you didn’t have to do this.” My stomach was about to burst by the time I finished the enormous meal we had put away between the three of us. The remnants were scattered across plates in the center of the table.
“And you don’t have to call me Mr. Black,” Barrett reminded me with a fatherly grin. “I thought we were on a first-name basis by now.”
Some lessons were impossible to shake after being drilled into a guy’s brain his entire childhood, even after fifteen years of acquaintance. “Okay, Barrett. ” I chuckled. “Thank you for dinner.”
“It was my pleasure.” His cheeks puffed when he blew out a sigh. “I don’t know why I thought I could put that much food away. I used to be able to, back when I was your age. The two of you make me feel young again. I’ll blame my indigestion overnight on you.”
We laughed along with Colton, who refilled our glasses with the same rich merlot we’d enjoyed throughout the meal. “I’ve been blamed for a lot worse than that,” he muttered, smirking at his father when their eyes met. Only faint wrinkles and graying hair set Barrett apart from his son. It was almost freaky how well he’d aged.
“Water under the bridge, son. At least, that’s what I hope.” Barrett slid me an apologetic glance. “Evan here didn’t come out to listen to us rehashing the past.”
“If anything,” Colton continued. “It’s been a little unnerving. You haven’t criticized me nearly enough in the past few months. Not even for getting my girlfriend pregnant.”
This was taking an interesting turn. I was unfamiliar with this level of honesty between a father and son. It wasn’t that I had a bad relationship with my parents. More like a distant one. Surface-level shit, nothing deeper than that.
It was the way Dad was raised by his emotionally crippled father, and the cycle continued. It would end with me since the chances of my settling down and starting a family were minuscule. Not all of us were lucky like Colton, with loving parents who hadn’t left him alone to basically raise himself the way mine had. I wouldn’t know the first thing about being a decent husband or father and couldn’t see putting anybody through living with me, no matter how happy my friends seemed now that they were settling down.
Another foreign thing. The pang in my chest at that thought, and the discomfort and disappointment.
The image of Valentina that filled my memory. She had been on my mind lately, and it made sense she’d show up in my mind’s eye now. There would always be what could have been.
Everything worked out for the best.
I still believed that.
“Rose has been a good influence on you,” Barrett pointed out, swirling the wine in his wide glass. “You’re a changed man. Finally living up to your potential. Settling down, starting a family, that’s a good thing. It makes your mother and I very happy to see you stepping into this next phase of your life.”
He then turned to me, raising his glass. “And you’re making the wedding possible. Nothing like short notice, right?”
“It’s a pleasure.” And it had been in more ways than one.
Part of my attention was always on Valentina, meaning my dick twitched in my pants when I remembered just how much of a pleasure the past few weeks had been. She drove me crazy and invaded my concentration time and again, but the payoff? More than worth it every time we were together.
“When will it be your turn, do you think?” When I blurted out a laugh at the sudden question, Barrett lifted a hand and shook his head. “Sorry, I’ve spent too many years married to my wife. I’m starting to think like her. But you’re practically a member of the family. That gives me the right to ask an uncomfortable question every couple of years or so.”
Colton’s mouth twitched like he was trying not to grin. “Yeah, Evan. When will it be your turn?” he taunted, leaning back in his chair with his eyes crinkling at the corners the way they did when he busted my balls.
“I’ve yet to find a woman who can handle me.” I sighed, making them both laugh. Good. Let them laugh. Humor was my fallback, getting me out of a sticky situation once again.
Though not for long.
“You have to stay open to the possibility. I know, I sound like some dating advice column.” Barrett ran a hand over the back of his neck, squinting. “Do they still have those? ”
“I have no idea,” I admitted. “I’ve never looked for advice with women.”
“Anyway, it’s good advice,” he insisted. “Enjoy being young and single, definitely. I sure as hell did.” That came as no surprise.
We all knew stories of the stuff he and his friends got into when they were our age. The hunk holes, they were called, partying and fucking their way through Manhattan without giving a damn. Years spent with the family left me with plenty of stories and legends overheard during get-togethers.
“No problem there,” I assured him, chuckling and sipping my wine. This turn of conversation had me feeling pretty fucking uncomfortable, but I couldn’t be rude to a man who, at times, seemed more like my father than my own ever had.
I never understood the contention between Barrett and Colton all those years—at least, not when I looked at it from my point of view. Barrett was hard on him, but at least he gave a shit.
“Years from now…” Barrett continued, “… the partying and the women and the freedom… it will get stale. Trust me on that. No party can last forever. I couldn’t have imagined it at your age, but the satisfaction I got from being a father and a husband? No amount of anonymous sex could top that.”
“Nice, Dad,” Colton muttered, snickering. “Hang on. Let me grab my notebook and jot this down.”
“Be a smartass all you want,” Barrett retorted. “You know I’m right. Or are you not happier now than you were before you and Rose got together?”
Colton rolled his eyes, grumbling. He didn’t like being backed into a corner, which his father had successfully done. “Fine, whatever you say. You’re right. But I’m not going to be that asshole who finds a woman and decides everybody he knows needs to commit the way he has.”
“Fair enough.” Barrett gave me a wink. “For now, you can be satisfied knowing you’re making Rose extremely happy. The rest of us too. I know it can’t be easy, putting something like this together at the last minute.”
“You can thank Valentina for a lot of that.” Speaking her name had a weird effect on me. My heart swelled, and a warm, peaceful feeling settled over me. “She’s bent over backward, called in every favor she’s owed to make this work. I swear, I don’t know when she sleeps.”
“Well, we always did know she’s the ultimate Type A personality,” Colton pointed out. “We couldn’t have a playdate when we were kids without her trying to set an itinerary.”
I could easily imagine that. “She’s driven,” I agreed.
“Like her mom,” Barrett suggested with a fond smile. One thing was never in doubt. He adored his sister, Evelyn. “Once she gets something in her head, you can’t change her mind.”
Like the idea I would hurt her again.
Like the idea I was some heartless fuck who couldn’t be trusted.
Once Barrett settled the check, I shook his hand and thanked him again for the dinner. “It was a pleasure,” he assured me. “Now, I expect you’ll head out to see who you can find tonight?”
Normally, I would have. Countless clubs and bars to choose from. Countless women too. The problem was, only one woman held any interest since the fateful night I sunk my dick in her again.
“Something like that.”
I promised Colton a phone call soon before setting off on foot from the restaurant. Somebody happened to live only a few blocks away. The only person I wanted to see tonight. There was no way I’d get a minute’s sleep without seeing her and doing a lot more than that.
Valentina was close to the top of my list of text message threads. I pulled her up and sent a message while strolling down Thirty-Fourth Street in the direction of her building.
Me: Where are you? It’s important.
If she wasn’t at home, I would find her. It was starting to become a quest. Something I had to do before my head hit the pillow.
My phone buzzed, and I couldn’t remember the last time my heart leaped at a new text message. She was turning me into somebody I swore I’d never be. At the moment, anticipating her response, I couldn’t be bothered to care.
Valentina: At home, but not for long. Why?
Me: Need to meet you there ASAP.
The foot traffic and passing cars meant nothing. I barely noticed them. She was home, and I was beyond sick and tired of pretending it was possible to ignore the permanent hard-on I had for her.
Valentina: Can it wait until tomorrow? I’m in the middle of something.
Like what? Getting ready to go out so some asshole could try his luck? That wasn’t going to happen.
Me: What’s so important?
Valentina: I just got out of the shower, if you need to know.
What an image.
Me: It’s an emergency. I have to see you. Tonight.
She didn’t keep me waiting long, offering a short reply.
Valentina: Fine.
Me: Good, because I’m outside your building. Be right up.
I chuckled to myself, imagining her reaction while the elevator crawled up to her floor. Now that I knew what I wanted, I couldn’t wait another minute to have her. She wanted me too. That was obvious. Time to stop acting like there was anything we could do about it.
Her front door opened within moments of my fist striking the wood. Her hair was in a bun, wet strands hanging around her fresh, shining face. The tank and shorts she wore clung to her damp skin. “Well?” she demanded, tits heaving like she had run down the stairs.
Desire stole my voice before I stepped over the threshold. The floral scent of her body wash hung in the air, wrapping me in a cloud of sensory input I couldn’t begin to process when lust took up so much of my brain.
“What’s so important?” She was wide-eyed, standing with her hands on her hips and her shoulders pulled up around her ears. “Please, tell me there’s not a conflict or cancellation. I don’t think my nerves could stand it.”
I had a bigger problem on my hands. Like the fact I couldn’t stand much more of being this close to her without putting my hands on her. I closed and locked the door, my heart pounding with determination.
She threw her hands into the air. “Hello, asshole! I barely had a chance to dry off after my shower because you said it was an emergency. What is it, already?”
I wanted to find the words. I did. A way to tell her I was sorry for what happened, the way it happened. To tell her I wanted to start over again. We couldn’t pick up where we left off, but we could start fresh if she would let us. I didn’t need a commitment. I only needed right now, this moment, and I would have said anything to make that happen.
Except, I couldn’t find the words. I had no practice apologizing and even less when it came to explaining my feelings. What I needed .
The next best thing was taking her by the waist and pushing her up against the door before holding her there with my body. “This,” I whispered before my self-control shattered, and I covered her mouth with mine. It was always like this, the rush of claiming her. The sense of coming home, where I belonged, where I never should have left.
She indulged me for a few heart-stopping seconds before turning her head sharply to break the kiss. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” she whispered, her chest heaving, eyes burning when they found mine. “You don’t get to drag me over here for a booty call. You don’t have booty call privileges.”
“Are you sure about that?” Trailing a hand down her side, I could barely contain the shiver of anticipation that ran through me when her breath caught, her back arching and pressing her tits against my chest. “Because you don’t seem to mind this.”
“My body might not, but my brain is another story.” Her nostrils flared over clenched teeth which she bared at me in a snarl.
I couldn’t lose this. Not when I had her here, so close. “Tell your brain to shut the fuck up,” I suggested, grinning when she rolled her eyes. “I don’t know about you, but I cannot spend the next four weeks pretending I don’t want you. You know I do. Not a day goes by that I don’t wish I could be inside you.”
“Evan…” she whispered the way a person did when resistance was fading. She was getting weak, but then she had never been that strong to begin with. She only wanted to believe she was.
“And that’s going to keep going as long as we work together.” My already hard cock turned to steel when I dug my fingers into her ass. “Why are we wasting time fighting this?”
“Because…” Her tongue darted over her lips to moisten them, and the sight made me groan. That was what she did to me. All it took was a simple gesture, and I was hooked.
“You can’t come up with a reason, can you?” I dragged my thumb across her full bottom lip, and she sighed, eyes sliding shut, her breath hot on my skin. “Why bother trying? I’m not going to bother trying to pretend I don’t want you.”
My lips replaced my thumb, brushing softly over her mouth, leaving her whimpering. She was as helpless against this as I was. Heat raced through my veins, compelling me to do it again, to make her melt against me, to make her part her lips and touch her tongue to mine. I had never been this hard, this desperate to sink in deep and fuck her until she forgot every reservation she ever had.
“God, why are we doing this?” She gazed up at me, looking dazed and hungry. “Why am I letting you do this to me?”
That much I knew beyond a doubt. “Because it is so fucking good when I do,” I reminded her, grinning at the understanding in her gaze before kissing her again.
This time, she didn’t stop me.