Chapter Nineteen
CHAPTER NINETEEN
TOBIAS
Write a book with your best friend, they said. Make it steamy, they said. You can write sex together. You’re both professionals. You’ll get your spark back. Just do it.
Okay, okay, so it was me who said all those things to myself, but hell, I had no idea what I was getting myself into.
Two weeks. Two whole weeks have passed since Natalie and I started writing together.
That’s fourteen days in a row where I have pictured the scene she wrote on day one over and over.
Holy shit.
Natalie can write. And an even bigger holy shit, she knows her way around the male body and the bedroom.
You’d think this bodes well for me and us as a writing pair, but it’s only caused me to take more cold showers than I normally do.
If writing a book together was supposed to enhance my creativity and imagination, it’s working.
Not exactly in the way I hoped, but it’s working.
Like right now, I turn the water on and step under my rainfall showerhead, soaking up the arctic water.
In less than an hour, Natalie and I will be heading back to Lovers for a few days. Not only is it the fall festival, which lasts five full days, but Grandma Betty’s birthday also falls during the time we’ll be there.
I didn’t expect Natalie to come with me, but she wouldn't have it any other way, and despite my newfound feelings for her that I have successfully been pretending aren’t there, I wasn't about to argue.
I want every second with her that she’s willing to give me.
Just thinking of her smile this morning when I walked into the kitchen makes me hard. I can't remember a time in my life when waking up and walking down the stairs was so exciting. Natalie is the first person I see each day, and it’s everything to me.
I grip myself; her smile in my mind and her sex scene playing on repeat.
I dropped to my knees, unzipping his pants, face-to-face with the erection in front of me.
It didn’t shock me that he wasn’t wearing underwear. It shocked me that he sprang free from the jeans and that my mouth drooled to have him on my tongue. I’d never wanted someone the way I wanted him.
I wanted to lick him and suck him until he fell to the floor, joining me on my knees.
I wanted to own him. Control him.
I gently took him in my hand, gripping with just enough pressure as I leaned forward and licked his tip.
“That’s right, baby. Open your mouth and suck.”
My hips jerk forward as I imagine Natalie doing this to me, the warmth of her mouth and her hand sliding up and down my shaft as the other one cupped my balls, squeezing softly.
“Fuck,” I say with a sharp breath, my hand moving faster and faster.
I’ve been guilty of putting things I like into my sex scenes—is that what she’s doing? Is this how she wants to be spoken to in the bedroom?
I could picture it. Her on top of me, twirling her hips and obeying my commands to move faster. Harder.
I feel that sensation zing into my spine and rest my other hand on the shower wall to brace myself.
The force of my orgasms lately is enough to do exactly what she’s written: bring me to my knees.
No one, and I mean no one, has done that to me before, and now just the thought of Natalie has me ready to break.
I come fast and hard, stroking every last drop out of me, and then clean myself up, regret settling into the pit of my stomach.
Thinking of Natalie this way isn’t right, but hell, I’ve never craved another person the way I’ve wanted her since that night on the couch.
Was I just fooling myself all these years? Was I in denial?
I dress quickly and brush my teeth.
One thing is for certain. Not once since that night has Natalie hinted that she felt something too.
And that feeling of not knowing what she’s thinking kills me inside.
How long after a breakup is it too soon to ask someone what they're thinking? If they think of you? If their body buzzes with electricity when you’re near them?
Even if I knew the answers, at what point do I risk losing the best person who has ever come into my life?
* * *
“Oh, yay! You brought Natalie with you.” Quinn rushes past me to hug her.
As soon as she pulls back, she looks between me and Natalie and then smirks. “You two look … I don't know. Is something different?”
Natalie laughs and looks up at me, shrugging. “Outside of us being roommates? Nope.”
“Not a thing,” I add as my sister basically stares right through me. I roll my eyes to hopefully throw her off. “Okay, well, where’s Grandma?”
“She’s next door with Mike. Calm down.”
“Why is she next door?”
My sister pins me with a look that says I need to stop asking questions. I clearly don’t get the hint. “Is she … are they …”
“Dating,” Natalie adds before I say something I have no doubt I'd regret asking.
“It seems that way. She’ll deny it day and night. Now I know where you get it from,” Quinn adds and playfully slaps me on the side of the head. “In the meantime, there are brownies.”
“Always brownies,” Natalie says, following my sister to the kitchen.
“Grandma Betty isn’t allowed to date,” I say, right behind them.
“Just because you’re a curmudgeon who can’t commit or doesn't want to doesn't mean the rest of us need to be like you.”
“I can commit,” I say in my defense, my gaze flickering to Natalie briefly. She’s just watching my sister and me with a smile on her face.
“Really? When and with who?” my sister asks.
“With …” I trail off.
She turns to Natalie. “Have you ever seen him with someone?”
Nat scrunches her nose and shakes her head. “I can’t think of anyone,” she says.
This is really not a conversation I need Quinn to bring up in front of Natalie, not now that I want her to be more than a friend. She’ll never look at me that way if that’s what she thinks.
My sister spins and crosses her arms, waiting for me to spar with her. Her look says she isn't going to lose, and to be fair, she probably wouldn't.
But at the same time, maybe I never found someone to commit to because I haven’t found the one yet. Or maybe I have found the one and just didn’t have a clue.
I have no idea.
This is new territory for me.
Fuck. Either way, I need to change this conversation.
“See, you can’t answer.” Quinn shrugs at Natalie.
Hell.
I pinch the spot between my eyes.
This is not going well.
“When does Grandma plan to be back? Is she going to the festival tonight?” I ask.
“Of course. The dance studio has something special planned, and Mike is taking her.”
“She’s not going with us?” I’m about to ask more, but Natalie snickers.
“What?”
“I love how defensive you are with Betty. You’ll make someone a very happy girl someday.”
“If he could commit.”
Jesus.
“Quinn. Stop.”
Natalie is full-blown laughing now, and I know it’s at my expense. I’d let my sister make fun of me day after day if I got to hear that laugh.
“Let’s go put our things away,” I say to Natalie and then nod at the stairway. “Quinn, are you on the couch while we’re here?”
“What? No.”
“Oh, I don't want to put her out,” Natalie says quickly.
“She’ll be fine.”
“Why can’t you both stay in your room, Tobias?”
“I could sleep on the couch,” Natalie offers. “It’s not a problem for me.”
“You’re not sleeping on the couch,” I snap. My sister is still glaring at me with a questioning look, but it quickly morphs into something else.
A sly grin I absolutely do not like appears on her face.
“Oh my god,” she says. “Oh my god.”
I know the moment she figured it out because her smile is wider than ever before.
“I’m fine sharing a bed if you are,” I say to Natalie, ignoring Quinn.
“Yeah, I’m fine with it.”
“Okay then.”
I walk out of the kitchen, grab our bags, and head upstairs to my room.
I assume the footsteps behind me are Nat’s, so I leave the door open.
I’m just setting the bags on the bed when the bedroom door slams shut.
My head snaps up to a wide-eyed Quinn.
There are a lot of things I could say right now, but shit is all that comes out of my mouth.
“It happened, didn’t it?” she asks.
“What?”
“You figured it out?”
“Figured what out?” I play dumb. Quinn can’t keep a secret if her life depends on it, and I’m not about to let her ruin something I don't even know how to start.
Or if I should start or not.
“Don’t do that. Come on. You like Natalie, and you finally figured it out.”
I have two options here: I can keep pretending I have no idea what she's talking about and risk her trying to put me into a situation that makes both Natalie and me uncomfortable, or I can admit it and get this conversation over with.
I’m a grown man who shouldn't be afraid of what his little sister could do to embarrass him, but still, I choose the latter.
“Do not say a word.”
“Ahhh!” She cheers and claps and spins.
“Quinn. Stop that. Right now.”
“God, look how cute you are.” She pushes my shoulder and points at my face. “Are you blushing?”
“What’s going on in here?” Nat knocks on the door. “I can hear you cheering from downstairs.”
Quinn’s lips form an O as she looks at me.
I shake my head.
Little sisters can be such a pain in the ass. Even as adults.
“I got this,” Quinn whispers and opens the door before I can object.
“Tobias admitted to loving Gram’s new beau.”
Like I said, total pain in my ass.
“That’s great.” Natalie smiles. “Because they’re downstairs and ready to go to the festival.”
“Fuck,” I say, and Quinn laughs on her way out the door.
“Be nice!” she shouts.
Natalie leans against the doorframe, slowly crossing her arms, as I typically do when I’m about to ask a serious question.
I clear my throat, prepared for whatever she’s ready to say.
“You do realize this is the first time in our entire friendship we have ever shared a bed, right?”
Oh, trust me, I know.
I nod. “Do you want me to kick her out of her room? I’ll do it,” I say with a smile.
“I know you would, but no. I’m ready to find out the one and only thing I don’t know about you, and the only place I’m going to figure it out is in bed with you.”
She pushes off the doorframe and walks toward me.
Oh, hell. What could she be talking about? Sex? Has she really been thinking about me too?
She stops right in front of me and taps my nose.
“Does Tobias Banks snore?”
My heart feels like it drops to my stomach. Am I relieved or bummed?
I let out a chuckle, and she steps back, grinning.
“Oh, that, um, nope. I don’t.”
“Oh, that?” She mimics me. “What did you think I was talking about?”
“I … honestly, I have no idea.”
She smirks again, her eyes slowly looking me up and down. When they return to meet my own, she nods to the door.
“Let’s go.”
I follow her, my eyes only once drifting to the sway of her perky butt in her jeans before I make it down the stairs to greet Grandma Betty.
If I’ve learned anything in the last five minutes, it’s that when I think of Natalie and me in bed together, snoring is the last thing on my mind.
Maybe I should take that as a sign of where she stands with us.
Friends.
Just friends.