Chapter 16
LONDON
L iam’s view is better than mine , I thought groggily as I cracked open my eyes. And then it hit me.
I was looking at Liam’s view instead of my own because I’d slept in his bed last night. With him. Naked.
After…
I swallowed hard, my eyes flying wide open. I sat up and looked around, but mercifully, the stud in question was nowhere to be found. Relief spiraled through me and I pressed my hand to my chest, closing my eyes as the panic receded.
As I became more aware of my surroundings, I realized that the scent of toast and something else was wafting through the air. Ah, so that’s where he went.
A tiny stab of disappointment pricked my gut. As relieved as I was, it might’ve been nice waking up to him. I’d enjoyed cuddling up to him last night.
Last night after he’d licked me thoroughly. I brought my hands up to my face and groaned into them. Do not go there. We said nothing would be different this morning, and now it’s morning and nothing can be different.
Collapsing back on his bed, I breathed in the faint, mingled scents of us and mental images of everything we’d done drifted across my mind unbidden. I couldn’t believe the night we’d had together. I didn’t know how to feel about it, but that didn’t mean I wouldn’t do it again. I absolutely would.
Any day of the week and at least four times on a Sunday.
I turned my gaze to the soft swells of waves rolling through the ocean and the gulls soaring through the blue skies above. Liam had been the best time I’d had in ages. This, what we’d had right here with that incredible view as a backdrop, had been something I would never forget.
For the first time in my life, I’d had so much fun with a guy in bed that I’d let go completely and it’d been amazing. And before we’d come to bed? That had been pretty dang fun too.
Suddenly eager to see him, I got up and ran across the upstairs landing, ducking into my closet bedroom to grab a robe. Breakfast was smelling amazing, the scent of toast now joined by what I was willing to bet would turn out to be omelets.
Bounding down the stairs, I slowed when I reached the first floor. I didn’t want to look desperate to see him. Keeping my footsteps slow and measured, I walked into the kitchen to find myself looking at his broad, bare back.
Muscles rolling, he flipped an omelet in a pan and turned to slide it into a waiting plate. As he did, he must have seen me, because he suddenly pretended to be shook. Throwing up his free hand toward me, he widened his eyes like he was terrified and even leaned back a little bit.
“Ahhh! The creature is awake!”
“For the love of…” I rolled my eyes and strode toward him. “Find a new joke, would ya? That one’s as old as your crusty dusty blanket upstairs.”
He looked at me with his eyebrows inching up. “Hey, don’t hate on my blanket. It’s one hundred percent linen.”
“If we didn’t just have the night we did, I’d say your brain is one hundred percent linen.” I hit the Start button on the coffeemaker and cocked a hip against the counter.
Liam was still looking at me with amusement and a bit of pride shimmering in his eyes. “Yeah, but I rocked your world so you can’t say that, huh? Don’t deny it. I know I did.”
“Buddy, after all the practice you’ve had, I’d have been worried if you hadn’t rocked it.”
A thundercloud seemed to form above his head, the backhanded compliment hitting its mark. “I’m not that bad. I swear, I’m catching strays left and right this morning.”
“Oh, you’re not that bad? I’m sorry, but how long did it take you to go off with that girl last night? Did you ever get your T-shirt back?”
“What you should be focusing on is how long it took me to come running when you summoned me. I sacrificed that shirt for you.”
“Fair enough.”
He sighed and pushed a plate in my direction. “This is why I knew I had to have breakfast ready as soon you opened your eyes. You’re really mean when you’re hungry.”
I pursed my lips at him, but then I dropped my gaze to the food he was offering and my mouth watered. The ice in my veins immediately started to melt. “Cracked pepper on the avocado with only a dash of hot sauce and an egg white omelet?”
“Yes and yes.”
I broke out into a grin so wide, my cheeks hurt. “You’re forgiven for saying I’m mean when I’m hungry. Thank you.”
A soft smile spread on his face. “Truce accepted. How’d you sleep?”
“Like a drunken sailor,” I said honestly. “You’re a surprisingly comfortable bed buddy.”
“There’s that word again.” He dragged both hands through his hair, mussed it up a bit, and then grabbed his own plate and dropped into a stool at the island. “Will you please just quit calling me buddy ?”
“Why?”
“I can’t stand it,” he admitted after a brief grimace.
Sincerity shone from those sea-green hazel eyes, and somewhere deep inside my being, something gave just a little bit, but he kept explaining anyway.
“What you and I have is special, Walker. Childhood friends who are still close, who work together every dang day, and who supplement the other the way we do? That’s rare.
I’m not just your buddy. We’re London and Liam, Liam and London. ”
“That’s surprisingly profound for this early in the morning.” I swiped up the cutlery he’d had waiting for me and sat down with him. “I hear what you’re saying and I agree. I’ll stop calling you that.”
“Thank you.” He shoved a huge bite of his omelet into his mouth and pumped his eyebrows at me, speaking around his eggs. “Look at us being all civilized and polite.”
I laughed, sliced into my omelet, and took a tiny, delicate bite, chewing and swallowing the fluffy awesomeness before I replied. “Miracles never cease, huh?”
“Definitely not.” As he tucked into his meal, eating with a gusto I truly admired, I checked him out in a whole different light.
All that gorgeous, thick dark hair was still sticking up in all directions from having my hands in it so often last night, all those lightly tanned abs on full display. Remembering what that body had felt like against my own made me squeeze my thighs together again.
Remembering everything we’d done together, everything we’d talked about, and everything he’d made me feel? Well, that just made me want to drag him back to bed.
He suddenly focused on me again. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
“Do you cook breakfast for all of your hookups?” I deflected and smiled sweetly when his face fell. “That’s a lot of omelets. No wonder you’ve nailed the recipe.”
“I haven’t slept with that many women. What the hell have people been saying about me?” He chuckled and shook his head.
“What? I’m just asking. I never took you for the morning-after type.”
“That’s because I’m not. I never cook breakfast afterward, but to be honest, I hardly ever spend the night with any of them either. And I’ve certainly never been living with them before.”
“Lucky me,” I said, picking at my eggs. “I got breakfast because you’re stuck with me. Good to know your feelings aren’t wrapped up in this.”
Silence fell between us as we both dug into our meals again, the only sound in the room for a while the clinking of our knives and forks against our plates. The food was divine and I’d desperately needed it after last night. He had given me a workout.
Savoring every bite, I cleared my plate, then put it in the dishwasher. With that done, I went around collecting everything he’d used to cook and rinsed it before packing it into the dishwasher too.
After collecting Liam’s plate once he’d pushed it away, I started the machine and wet a cloth with warm water, spraying the countertops and wiping them down. All the while, I hummed under my breath, not at all minding that I could feel the after-effects of last night with every step I took.
If I was being completely honest, I’d tell him that he was the reason for the song in my soul this morning. Those orgasms had blown my mind and curled my toes. Who wouldn’t be in a great mood after that?
At the same time, however, he and I needed to set some ground rules about what had happened. Turning back to face him, I cleared my throat and waited for him to look up. He’d been reading the news on his phone, but he set the device down when he saw me waiting for his attention.
“What’s going on?” he asked, eyes tightening at the corners as if he was suspicious. “Did I leave some eggshells in there? I try to be careful but sometimes they break weird and I miss the little bits.”
“No, the omelet was superb. It’s more just, uh, last night was pretty amazing, right?” I felt my cheeks grow hot, but I pushed through it. This was too important to be deterred. “Truly, it was the best.”
Liam lips curved into a slow, sexy smirk. “Is this your way of asking me for a second?—”
“No,” I said quickly. If I’d let him make the offer, I might’ve just taken him up on it. “What I’m trying to say is that it was incredible and I don’t regret it, but I really hope that we’ll keep to the agreement we made about it not affecting our friendship.”
“Sure,” he said easily. “We already talked about this.”
“I know, but I want to be absolutely sure that there are no crossed wires.” I looked deep into his eyes. “At the end of the day, we’re friends first and our friendship needs to be our priority. I’d really hate for things to get weird between us.”
“Some people might say that we’re already weird.”
“We are, but that’s the whole point, isn’t it? My weird matches your weird. That’s why we’ve managed to stay friends even on the days when we can’t stand each other. Our weirdness works so well together. We need to keep being just friends.”
He chuckled, rising from his stool but not moving away from the island.
“Save it, princess. Last night was a no-strings kind of deal, and as it happens, I agree with you. It probably shouldn’t happen again.
You don’t have to treat me with kid gloves, London.
I’m a big boy. I knew what it was going to be going in, and you’re right. It was incredible, but it’s over now.”
Relief trickled through my body and I nodded, feeling my features relax and the tension bleeding out of my muscles. Jeez. I was more worried about that than I realized.
“You’re sure that we’re good?” I asked, watching him stride toward the door.
He paused when he reached it, looking back and shooting me a huge grin. “We’re good. But if you get lonely and you miss my rocking abs, you know where to find me.”
“That’s not going to happen,” I called after him when he left, needing him not to harbor any illusions about me climbing into his bed late at night. “And what did I tell you about calling me princess ?”
His laughter sounded from the stairs and I smiled before I finally slid my coffee out of the slot. I wrapped my fingers around the mug and leaned back against the counter, doing my best to gather my thoughts.
At this point, I couldn’t deny that I was terribly attracted to him. There was no other way of putting it. I’d always known that my friend was good looking, but now that I’d felt the explosive kind of chemistry we had, it was so, so much worse.
Yet we still couldn’t be together. Liam still wanted what he wanted and so did I. In addition to the very different goals we had in life, a relationship could ruin what we had going on the work front and that was just too good to mess with.
When we’d first gone down to Houston, I’d tried taking on projects without him. I learned that I didn’t need him to do a good job, but the work was infinitely better when we combined forces. He had discovered the same issue.
We complemented each other so damn well, our strengths and weaknesses slotted together like two puzzle pieces who had to work together to make a whole.
I would also never admit this to him, but working with him was just more fun than working alone.
I faced the challenges of every new day with excitement, as long as he was at my side.
Having him on top of me, under me, or inside me would complicate everything. We would get all tangled up in each other, and when our relationship failed because we wanted different things, we could never go back to the way things were. Our friendship would never be the same.
Maybe there’s an alternative, though. Like Lorelei said, maybe there’s a way we can have fun without ever attaching any strings, and maybe if we manage to get it right, we can work this attraction out of our systems before it ultimately derails everything anyway.