Chapter Forty-Six
Tera
It isn’t until I’m home, showered, and in bed that what happened hits me.
The glowing contentment I’ve been operating under shatters suddenly, and I curl up beneath my blankets with wide eyes.
I just had my first real orgasm with a man too perfect to be real. I ate almost half a bowl of fettuccine in one sitting without a single problem. I even considered dessert before my stomach reminded me I was way too full for that, no matter how good the cheesecake looked in the picture.
The quick burst of joy gets wiped out with remorse in a blink.
I let a guy finger me in a public bathroom. I begged him for it. He talked dirty to me, and I didn’t even blink at all the curse words.
What would Max say?
I suck in a breath as a sharp stab of pain hits my heart. I miss him. So much. And now I’ve done something he could never forgive me for. When the tears start falling, scalding my cheeks, I let them. They aren’t the violent, wrenching sobs I’ve gotten used to and fought so hard against. This is a quiet mourning of a delusion’s death.
I debate for a second on calling Max to confess. I’m too emotionally drained to let it be more than a passing thought for now.
And Asher. He was so smooth and calm about it all. Eating with a smile, walking me to my car with a chaste kiss on my cheek. Making rude comments that Shade ignored with a smile.
I wonder if he’s done this kind of thing before. Being perfect to get what he wants. Satan does. Maybe they’re the same.
I bury my head in my pillow as the tears fall faster. The negative thoughts circle around without stopping, filling me with shame. I doubt I’m going to hear from Asher again.
I’m almost asleep as I come to terms with myself when my phone starts chirping. I don’t want to pick up, but the thought that this is really late in the night to be calling prompts me to fling my hand out and pull it over to me.
Asher’s name pops up, along with the time. It’s three o’clock, and he’s awake?
“Asher?” I answer, sitting up and suddenly wide awake. Is he calling to say thanks, but we’re done now?
“I miss you,” he says softly, and I sit in stunned silence.
The loneliness of my own empty bedroom weighs on me as I glance around and confess in a whisper, “I miss you too.”
Maybe if he was here, all this negative self-image would take a break for a minute.
“Come over,” he instantly replies, the quiet hesitance gone from his voice.
“I can’t do that,” I hiss back and glance around.
I don’t know why I’m so scandalized. It’s not like I’m some kid under curfew. Shade can’t even hear me talking with our walls so well insulated. I don’t need to whisper.
“Hmm, I guess the afterglow has faded. You should come over so I can get you back in that headspace.” His soft laugh makes me want to giggle and agree.
Wait a second.
“Is this a booty call?”
“What!?” His laughter gets louder, and I huddle, a little insulted that it isn’t, even though I felt insulted at the thought it was.
Once his laughter settles, he says, “I don’t want just sex. I’m trying to behave myself. I don’t think your roommate would appreciate me showing up this early.”
“Then, why are you calling?” I ask, bewildered.
“This is me calling you to tell you I’m a pathetic sap who wants you near him all the time.”
“You aren’t a pathetic sap,” I tell him sternly. “Don’t talk about yourself like that.”
He makes a thoughtful sound, and we both lapse into silence.
“Talk to me,” Asher’s voice deepens as the humor washes out of his tone, and my body loosens until I’m lying back with my head on the pillow again.
“What about?” I ask softly. If I close my eyes, I can pretend he’s right here with me.
“What are you thinking about?”
“You,” I blurt out and cringe. Too honest, Tera.
“What about me?” He presses gently, but his tone has lowered in a way that makes my body warm.
“I was actually just thinking I wouldn’t see you again.”
Splat goes that feeling. What is wrong with me?
“Why?” The question comes out sharp, and I sigh.
“You’re too perfect,” I say thoughtfully.
“I’m really not,” he assures me with a little laugh.
I move on to my next logical thought. “Then you’re luring me in because you’re a serial killer.”
“No!” His laughter comes back, and there’s a shuffling sound as if he had to take the phone away from his face. “No booty calls or serial killers.”
“That’s a relief.” You never know. Why I believe him, I don’t know, but I do.
When his laughter dies down, he says, “What else are you thinking? I’m really curious now.”
“I think I messed up,” the words fall out of my mouth, and I gape in horrified surprise. Too honest! Why does this stuff keep happening around him? He’s like a truth magnet.
“You regret it,” his voice goes soft and strained. I start shaking my head quickly, even though he can’t see me.
“I can’t regret it. It was beautiful.”
Idiot, it was a public bathroom hookup, not a flower petals on the bed love scene.
Because I can’t stop my mouth around him, I add, “I just feel like my one selfish act will hurt a lot of people.”
“You aren’t the only selfish person here. I should have waited for you to be ready-”
“I was more than ready,” I cut in and wince at that humiliating truth. I begged.
“Angel,” he says in a warning tone that shuts my mouth. If only he had said that at the beginning, I wouldn’t be burning up with embarrassment right now. “Don’t make excuses for me. I should have waited before getting physical. I don’t want you to think that’s all I’m here for. We should have talked.”
This. This has been what I’ve needed. A person who can give me clear-cut rules to follow so I don’t make a mess of everything.
“Please talk to me now,” I chew my lip nervously. “I don’t want to walk on a tightrope anymore.”
“Me either,” he lets out a frustrated breath, and there’s a silence over the line.
“Asher?” I break in nervously.
“Yeah?”
“Can you step off the tightrope first? I feel like one of us should be there to catch the other, and I’m scared to be first. I have weak arms.” I add the last sentence in the hopes it would be funny, but my voice trembles when I say it.
“Ok,” he lets out a deep breath as if he’s bracing himself. “I’d rather tell you in person, but you’re in a safe space right now.”
“I’m at home,” I glance around in confusion.
“I’m going to say something, and it’s going to make you want to run. I’m asking you not to do that. Not demanding, I’m asking. Please. Can you do that for me?”
I sit back up with a frown. I don’t think I want to make that promise. My body is beginning to tense up, and it reminds me of how I felt when the doctor told me Joe didn’t make it. My mind hasn’t caught up to the danger, but my spirit is already wilting.
“Put your phone on speaker and set it across the room from you,” he says in a tight voice when I don’t respond. I hear him curse himself, but it’s muffled.
I do as he says and set the phone in front of the closet doors before sitting cross-legged on the floor to stare at the phone. “Ok, I’m ready.”
“I shouldn’t have said-”
“Please just tell me?” I interrupt as my nerves take over. I draw my knees up to my chest and hug my legs, hiding my face.
“I know Max. He’s in my class,” he says in a strangled voice.
He knows Max? Grumpy Max is in a yoga class of his? That’s not so bad. Wait, why is he bringing this up?
Clarity hits me like an anvil dropping on my head.
He knows Max. How well? Enough that he’s bringing it up now. What have they said about me? Did he tell him how naive I am? How easy it is to boss me around? That I’m easy?
Was this a test? Toss Asher at me and see if I fold like any other woman would? The questions won’t stop, and it begins to get harder to breathe as they loop around. I guess I don’t have to confess anything to Max. He already knows.
The wrenching pain in my chest radiates down my arms and is overshadowed by nausea as the need to be sick attacks me. I must make some sound because Asher’s voice snaps at me.
“Tera. Stay with me, angel. I’ve got you. Let me-”
His words fade out as I hyperventilate. He really does have me. The same way Trevor had me. This is the throwaway I was stupidly hoping wouldn’t come. I heave and stumble to the bathroom to be sick.
I must be too loud because Shade comes in and curses, holding my hair back as I empty my stomach and continue heaving even after it’s empty. When I’m done, I go limp. Shade flushes and leaves, coming back with a cool towel to wipe my face off.
“Let’s just go,” my voice comes out hoarse from straining as I rest my forehead on the toilet seat. My arms are feeling too weak to hold me up without the added support. “I give up. I can’t get away from them. We’ll have a great life in Mexico. We can send Andi postcards.”
“First of all, Mexico is overrated. Two, we don’t run, remember?” he says. I struggle with a groan of defeat.
I flop back, and he’s there with his legs on either side of me to support my weight as we sit on the floor and contemplate the toilet.
“Asher said he knows Max.”
Shade pauses, “He probably takes a class of his.”
“Why would he bring him up to me?” I ask grimly.
Shade sighs. “Now that the initial freak-out is out of the way, let”s think about this.”
“I don’t want to,” my shoulders hunch, and Shade’s arms wrap around me, his knees pulling up to really cage me in.
“Too bad,” his arms tighten threateningly.
“Really?” I whine, and my chin drops to my chest. He essentially has me in lockdown. I’m too tired and weak to put up a struggle and get away.
“It’s talking or getting black-out drunk at a strip club. I’ll pour oil all over you and convince you the stage is a slip-and-slide. Choose wisely.”
“Don’t threaten me with a good time,” I chuckle weakly.
“You’re right, that was a really shitty threat. We’d have a great time until we got arrested.”
“So true,” I sigh as I agree. “I have bail money, and I’ll be a cheap date.”
“What did he say?” The dictator insists on continuing.
“That he knew Max.”
“And you freaked out because?”
“He was acting shady. He told me to put my phone across the room from me on speaker and tried to make me promise not to run.”
Shade’s fists clench and loosen a few times before he speaks again. “So he was making sure that you couldn’t just hang up on him.”
I shrug, not really caring what he wanted right now.
“Let’s think like him for a second.”
“No.”
But Shade is a relentless force.
“He has something big to tell you, and he’s scared you’re going to pull a runner. He knows you will because you’ve proven it in class.”
“Don’t care,” I lie. He took a big chance, and he failed. I didn’t even try to grab his hand when he stepped off of the tightrope. I watched him fall right along with my heart.
“He wants to confess so badly that he called in the middle of the night instead of waiting until he saw you. He’s probably feeling pretty shitty right now.”
“I don’t care,” this time, the lie comes out as a whimper as the tears overflow. I try to draw my knees up, but I can”t with the way Shade is holding me. He rests his chin on my head with a sigh.
“Of course you do, Tera. You always care, even when you shouldn’t. You forgive people for unforgivable shit all the time. You can turn just about everything around to be positive until it comes to you.”
“Rude,” I feebly protest his accurate description.
“Listen. You’ve been so focused on other people’s happiness that you don’t know how to deal with it when your own gets smashed to pieces anymore. You need to make adjustments and figure out how to get a handle on it. Without running away.”
“It’s ok for you to run, but I can’t?” The bitter tone is dredged from someplace that bubbles up inside more often than I like. How can I drag him through the mud when he”s virtually in the same boat I am right now? I”m ashamed of myself.
“I asked for an in-town transfer.”
That brings my head up with suspicion. “Doing what?”
“A team lead.” He groans in frustration. “I’ll sit on my ass at home and set everything up for people remotely. No hands-on. More pay. No lost contact with Matthias.”
I say the first words that come to mind. “I am so proud of you. Now you can get your favorite tea at the coffee shop without complaining about costs.”
“It’s too fucking expensive, stop being a little shit. This isn”t the point. You need to get off the floor and go get ready.” He pats my arm as he lets me go and stands.
“Where are we going?” He just said he wasn’t leaving. Now we’re running away?
“Nowhere. You need to brace yourself for when Asher shows up.”
“What?” I ask in surprise. That’s done. I hung up on him or ran from the phone, whatever. I’m not going back to his class, and I”ll never see him again. I”ll block his number. Problem solved.
“I get it,” Shade opens the door and stands there as he smirks down at me. “You’re used to the ‘Oh no. Tera is upset. We need to give her space’ shit. Asher doesn’t play that way. He faces things head-on. If you think you’re going to avoid him when he wants you this bad, you’re dead wrong.”
As he finishes speaking, there’s a heavy slamming on the front door.
“Time’s up,” Shade says with a smug grin and closes the door in my face.
The knock that sounds more like someone is trying to break the door down comes again. Music starts up in Shade’s room, soft but probably deafening in his bedroom. He”s just going to ignore the threat to our door and go to bed listening to depressing music?
I sit there in a stupor. I’m not getting that. I don’t care if he wakes the neighbors.