Chapter 37
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
ariana
It’s late and I’m exhausted. I hadn’t realized that day-after parties contained so much drinking.
It was an all-day and all-night activity.
These Canadians need to discover new hobbies beyond socializing and alcohol.
I’m ready to shower and get to bed to prepare for three, likely terrible, back-to-back flights tomorrow.
I don’t even have the energy to pack, so that will have to wait until morning.
Tomorrow-me is going to be so mad at tonight-me.
We’ve been back at the hotel for a few hours, but I spent a majority of that time chatting with my brother and Arden in their room. I only stumbled back to my room half an hour ago, after Arden fell asleep face-down on the bed and my brother begged me to stop talking.
I grab my pajamas from the foot of my bed when there’s a terribly quiet knock on my door. Frowning, I drop the clothes back on the mattress and pad to the door. It’s late. Nobody should be knocking at this hour unless it’s a booty call.
I peer out the peephole and a smile takes over my entire face.
Look who's seeking me out now.
Fluffing my hair, I adjust the pink dress that I have yet to change out of and open the door.
Boston Black, clad in a black compression shirt and gray sweats, glares at me as if I managed to offend him within the two seconds we’ve been face-to-face. His arms are across his broad chest, expression all broody and serious.
Still looks ridiculously hot.
“What a pleasant surprise.”
He glances over his shoulder like he’s about to be arrested by a SWAT team that’s hiding around the corner, waiting for him to make another misstep.
“Can we talk?”
“About?”
He shoots me a look. “Ari.”
Ah, it’s about the bathroom blowjob. Shocker.
I roll my eyes, but flatten myself against the wall, letting him pass the threshold into my room.
I shut and deadbolt the door behind us, immediately heading for the bed that he’s awkwardly pacing around the foot of.
I have a feeling this is not the booty call I was hoping for. This is the crash-out.
I drop myself down and wait.
He runs his hand over his face, exhausted and drunk enough to have this conversation.
If I’m being honest, I have been waiting for this meltdown since I was on my knees in that bathroom.
He’s later than I expected. Our short conversation at the party had foolishly tricked me into thinking it might not come at all.
“We crossed the line,” is what he finally says. He drops his hand and looks at me, green eyes wide and full of regret. Hate that. It hurts a bit, as much as I loathe to admit it. This guy has always had a little too much power over me. “I can’t do that to him, Ari.”
“You did do that to him,” I remind him, and I get another glare for that one. “It’s okay, Boston. I am a great secret keeper. I told you. Nobody has to know.”
“That's not the point.”
“I wanted you and you wanted me,” I tell him, plain as day. “Who cares? That’s life. It’d be a shame to never know, wouldn’t it? Because of some imaginary rule about my brother needing to pick my suitors and pay them a dowry like I have no agency of my own.”
He groans, rolling out his shoulders. “It’s not about rules, it’s about respect. Your brother is one of my best friends. We work together. We take care of each other. I knew this would kill him and I did it anyway.”
I stare up at him. “Because you wanted to.”
“That doesn’t matter.”
“Yes, it does,” I snap. “Spare me the pity party. You were not complaining when your dick was in my mouth, and you were not complaining when you flirted with me at the party today. You wanted it. You wanted me. Let’s not act like I’m some innocent virgin who you deflowered, who now has no prospects of marriage left because I’m damaged goods. ”
“For fuck’s sake,” he grumbles, shaking his head. He storms forward, planting his hands on the edge of the bed. “Do you not understand that this has the power to dismantle my friendship with him, my career, and your relationship with your brother? Is that not clicking for you?”
“But why?” I ask with a shrug. “Why is this such a big deal? Because he’s protective and he swings before he thinks? I am my own person. I make my own choices. Why does what I want never factor into things?”
“Because you want the things you can’t have!
” he snaps, scanning my face. “Don’t pretend like that isn’t the exact reason you have been toying with me this whole time.
You knew that you were off-limits to me.
You knew I was the one who was least likely to cave, with the highest stakes because of how close I am with your brother. ”
My eyes narrow. “Contrary to what you might think, Boston Black, I am not a master manipulator. I have been toying with you because I find your personality thrilling, and because even before I knew you, you’ve had an uncanny ability to make me desperate for your attention by just looking in my general direction. ”
He freezes, his eyes burning into mine now.
“I am not doing anything to hurt my brother,” I seethe, jumping to my feet, “but I’m not living my life to prevent him from being hurt, either.
I needed to know, alright? I needed to know if you lived up to the idea of you in my head.
It has been driving me crazy for years and I will not apologize for it. ”
He swallows, but I march right to the door. Screw this conversation and screw him. This is why I don’t waste my time with good men. Men who care. I grab the handle and whirl on him.
“Get out.”
He blinks. “What?”
“I’m not going to sit here and listen to you talk about how what we did was some ploy to piss someone else off. Like you were some notch on my bedpost. It’s not what it was for me, and I’m pissed off at the insinuation, so get the hell out, Boston.”
He sulks toward me, and I move to open the door, but I only manage an inch before his palm slams it shut above my head.
I’m acutely aware of how close he is, but I’m too scared to turn around when I can feel his body hovering at my back.
I trust him and his stupid moral compass, but I don’t trust myself.
I know what I want, and I know what he doesn’t want. That puts me in the world’s most terrible position. Between him—him, and the door that separates us.
“Did it?”
I swallow, staring at the door instead of facing him. “Did what?”
“Did it live up to your expectations?” His voice is low. Gruff.
Mother fu—he needs to decide what he feels and who the hell he wants to be, because he can’t talk like this immediately after reminding me that we can’t cross the line he’s dreamed up in his head.
He’s crossing it by asking these questions, by standing so close, by being in my room at this ungodly hour.
I can’t keep up. I don’t like games that I’m not in control of and I clearly don’t have any control right now. It’s all him.
“Exceeded them,” I admit, my voice quiet.
He leans down, his lips brushing the shell of my ear.
I suck in a breath, my eyes fluttering shut.
What do you want from me, Boston Black?
“I’m not saying this shit as an excuse, okay?
I’m saying it because it’s killing me to coexist without touching you.
I hate knowing that I have to act like nothing’s happened because nobody can ever know.
It took everything in me not to crawl across this hallway on my hands and fucking knees last night, begging for one more minute of your bullshit. ”
That. Isn’t. Fair.
“If you can’t get over this stuff with my brother, then get on your knees and crawl right back to your room.”
His hands find my hips—they finally find my hips. I suck in a sharp breath as he gently pulls my body against his. “It’s not that simple.”
“Then just go, Boston.”
“Is that what you want, or are you proving a point?” he asks quietly against my hair.
“Proving a point, obviously,” I say, finally turning in his hands to face him. I tip my chin up defiantly, leaning my back against the door. He follows me, unwilling to let go of my waist now that he’s touching me again.
“I haven’t stopped thinking about you,” he tells me, his green eyes earnest. My heart sputters, trying to decipher that serious expression—the knot between his eyebrows. “It’s driving me fucking crazy that you sucked me off in a public bathroom, and I didn’t get to return the favour.”
Damn him. I’m supposed to listen to him talk like that and hold my ground at the same time? Not a chance in hell. Not when he’s this pretty and I know how good his mouth feels.
“All day, I was wondering if you were wearing pink for me,” he murmurs, reaching up to tuck a piece of hair behind my ear.
I was.
“If you touched yourself when you got back last night, thinking about what we did.”
I did.
“And all night, I’ve been wrestling with what I want and how badly I want it, knowing who it will hurt,” he says, his thumb brushing my hip. He angles his head, meeting my eyes. “I can’t just…stop caring about that, Ari. It’s not how it works. You have to give me some leeway there.”
“We can end it here. Right now.”
“We can,” he says, stepping even closer. His hands slowly slide up my body until they’re cupping my face. He sweeps his thumbs along my cheeks. “Or we can…not do that.”
“I like that option better,” I admit breathlessly. Probably too quickly, but I’m just a girl at the end of the day, and he’s just the most magnificent man on the planet.
“It has to stay between us,” he murmurs, leaning in until his lips are gently brushing mine. My breath hitches and his eyes ignite, hearing the implications in such a tiny, insignificant noise. “And it ends tonight.”
My heart hammers against my ribs. Sounds like the perfect arrangement. “Deal.”
He crushes his mouth to mine.