Chapter Thirteen
Being Friends with Benefits with Vi was a good thing, Nick told himself as he grabbed a can of FaeFruit bars off a tall shelf and stacked it in Rosie’s cart.
It wasn’t a love confession, but it was a hell of a lot more than he’d had before.
Not that long ago, he’d had a mate who hated him.
Now he had a mate who was openly friendly with him, whom he got to give semiregular orgasms to—they’d had sex twice in the four days since they’d agreed on their arrangement!
That was a clear win. Even if it made him feel a little empty afterward, as casual sex always did these days. It was with Vi, so it was worth it.
He might even be grateful, he considered, as Rosie instructed him to grab a carton of milk she was fully capable of reaching.
Dating always made him feel out of his depth.
Letting someone see him was terrifying. This was just .
. . easing them into it. If a few months passed and she still didn’t like him—really like him, enough to date instead of fool around with—then that was that.
He would confess. Finally get the secret off his chest. She would reject him properly, and he could go through mate sickness for real, get over it, and finally put his hopes away. Until then, he had a chance. And he wasn’t about to waste it.
“You’re miles away,” Rosie said, wings fluttering stiffly behind her. He’d never seen her fly, but it was important to keep the muscles stretched. “What’s going on in that big head of yours?”
“The usual,” Nick said, rapping the aforementioned head. “Nothin’. Were you saying something about berry clusters?”
“Oooh, yes, please.”
Nick slotted them neatly into the cart.
Rosie beamed. “That’s lovely. You could be one of those boys who put it in bags at the register.”
“Good to know I have options if Duncan ever gets tired of my shit,” he replied.
He’d started off just throwing the food in.
Then she’d given him a disapproving look, and Nick had to decide if he was going to go all in and start basketball-throwing them from across the aisle—infinitely funnier—or start stacking them—the polite, nonjackass thing to do.
He went with stacking. There was now a neat pile of cans in the bottom of the cart, arranged according to size.
Nick could tell the difference between the jackass thing to do and the polite thing.
It was just that the jackass thing was always funnier, and Nick’s life philosophy had long revolved around doing the funny thing, even if it backfired horribly.
Everything was easier when it was funny.
Failing high school. Your dad going to prison and not calling you when he got out.
Your mom dying from a stroke when she went for a run one day.
Meeting your mate and discovering she hates your guts.
If Nick didn’t laugh about it, he’d have to actually confront it.
Nick would rather have a thousand old women give him disappointed looks in the breakfast aisle than confront anything.
“We’ll hit the breakfast foods next,” Rosie told him. “Oh, this is so much faster. Usually, I have to wait for a staff member to walk by, so I can have him get the peanut butter down. What’s your favorite? Smooth or chunky?”
“Chunky.”
Rosie made a face. “Well, to each their own. Do you have a favorite jam?”
He thought about it. “Orange Orc. Childhood favorite, can’t help it.”
She laughed. “Orc pride! Me, I’ll take anything but raspberry. All those little seeds make me shudder.”
He smiled as he pulled the cart into the next aisle.
He felt like he should be annoyed at her constant chatter, all the pointless questions.
But he liked it. And she let him talk, too.
She even let him ramble about how golf was the stupidest sport ever invented after she mentioned her husband had liked it.
She didn’t even seem offended by Nick demeaning her late husband’s favorite pastime, only told him that she always found it boring, too.
“So nice when young people want to get involved in the community,” she said as Nick reached for the smooth peanut butter on the top shelf. “Claw Haven has gotten so much busier since that Musgrove woman got the word out about us. It feels so nice to help with that, don’t you think?”
“Feels great,” Nick said, sarcasm leaking into his voice automatically. He glanced over to check if he’d pissed her off, but she just looked amused.
“It is pretty nice,” Nick admitted grudgingly. “I see why Vi does it so much. The helping stuff. Even though she takes it way too far.”
“Hear, hear,” Rosie said. “That girl needs a break, poor thing. Everybody needs some couch time.”
Nick desperately wanted to tell her that their last tryst only happened because he talked her out of attending a town meeting about changing the font on Claw Haven’s welcome sign. It had been nice to see her relax for once, naked and dozing on his chest. That counted as couch time, right?
He stayed silent instead, stacking the peanut butter in the cart.
Rosie nudged him toward the frozen vegetables. “What’s your favorite book?” she asked as he loaded peas and prechopped carrots into the cart.
“I mostly read motorcycle magazines,” he admitted.
“I don’t know. I like this week’s book more than the last one, since I don’t have to put it down every few pages because I’m so exhausted from translating old-timey speak into now-speak.
Mostly. But I’m halfway through and I’m pretty worried about these crazy kids. It’s a sad one, right?”
“We do a sad one every once in a while, for Suze. She loves a tragedy.” Rosie pointed into the next freezer. “éclairs next.”
“Great,” Nick said. “I just won’t get invested.”
Rosie cackled, a great whooping thing that made several people look over. “Good luck! Whatever happens to these two, it’s going to destroy me. I’m betting he’ll sacrifice himself for some poor waif, and she’s going to get bombed over in London.”
Nick tried not to imagine it as he loaded the éclairs into the cart. He was, in fact, quite invested in the lovers. The other day, he’d zoned out at work imagining a happy ending for them.
Rosie sighed. “I wish we read more smut. But it scandalizes Joshua, even if he pretends it doesn’t. I don’t want him missing a meeting just because I want to talk about something I can talk to Suze about when she comes over for lunch.”
“Smut,” Nick repeated. “Like . . .”
“Sex.”
“Right.” Nick felt his lips twitch, like he’d just heard his health teacher say vulva. “I won’t lie, ma’am—”
“Rosie.”
“I never want to talk to you about sex books, Rosie.”
“Your loss! Anywho, Vi said this book is a doozy. She read it in college and she hates it.”
Of course she does, Nick thought bitterly. She hates fated mates.
“I’m sorry she won’t be around next time,” Rosie continued, unaware of Nick’s inner turmoil. “You should give her a call when you finish. She’d love to chat about it.”
Nick laughed wryly, pretending to look through the freezer. “I’ll leave that to someone she actually wants to talk to.”
Rosie tutted. Nick hadn’t been actually, genuinely tutted at since grade school. It was oddly charming.
“Give it a try,” she said. “Call someone, at least. The way Vi talks about this book, you’re going to need someone to vent to.”
Nick laughed again, deeply uncomfortable. With the suggestion, sure. But also with how much he wanted that—to have Vi be happy to hear from him. They only texted, and he didn’t know what facial expressions she made when she received his texts.
“I won’t need to call her,” he reminded Rosie. “I won’t get invested.”
Rosie gave him a knowing look and patted his arm.
“Come on,” she told him. “Let’s head to the checkouts. No, not that one. Go to Lisa, the mermaid at the end. I want to hear how her date went.”
* * *
Three hours later, Nick was wide-awake on his bed. The book sat on his chest. His eyes hurt from staring at the ceiling—and not at all because the ending made him tear up in indignant anger.
His phone sat in his hand. He’d leaned over to grab it right after finishing the last page, then he’d stopped.
The thing was . . .
The thing was. He didn’t have anyone else’s number. Except Rosie, who probably didn’t rush home and finish the book right after their shopping trip, and who was definitely asleep by now.
Nick held up his phone. He’d had stupider ideas. Way stupider. In terms of stupid ideas, this barely ranked a two out of ten. It wasn’t that weird to call your Friend with Benefits to talk about a book, right?
The phone rang. Nick imagined Vi in her living room, which he’d glimpsed when she’d invited him over.
The lamp would be on as she read on the couch, the TV on in the background, turned to those calming nature documentaries she liked.
He imagined her unearthing her phone from her skirt’s many pockets—or maybe she was in pajamas by now, comfy pajama pants with something cute on them—and frowning at the caller.
She could just ignore it. Say she was asleep.
She could text him tomorrow morning and ask . . .
“Hello, this is Vi. How can I help?”
Nick burst out laughing. He couldn’t help it.
“That’s . . . That’s how you answer your phone?
” he gasped, breathless with it. “What, have you said that so many times, it’s just ingrained in you?
Like that incubus down at the bank, who worked at the airline for thirty years and if you catch him while he’s distracted, he’ll go, This is Delta Airlines, how can I help you? ”
“It’s automatic,” Vi defended herself, sounding suspicious. She paused. “So . . . how can I help?”
Nick winced. “I . . . finished the book?”
Silence. Nick waited for a dial tone. After a polite goodbye, of course.
“What did you think?” was what he got instead.
Nick blinked. Rosie had said she’d want to talk about it. Maybe it was like Nick and motorcycles. It didn’t matter whom he was talking to; he’d talk however long they’d let him.
“I can’t believe that happened,” he blurted. “We get that happy ending, the fated mates finally get to be together, and then bam, that last part coming in with a steel chair! What the hell was that?”
He fell back against the bed, panting. More silence. That was strange. Vi was rarely lost for words.
“Anyway,” he continued. “I’ll let you go.”
“No,” Vi said, too fast. “You can keep talking.”
“You don’t have to do the polite shtick,” he assured her. “Seriously, I won’t be offended.”
“Can’t hurt you,” Vi said. Her tone was off, like she was quoting something. Then it softened. “I’m not doing the . . . polite shtick. I like talking about books. Shocking, I know. So what else did you think?”
Nick opened his mouth. Only air came out.
He wanted to tell her about the deep betrayal he’d felt when he’d reached the last part of the book, the truth finally revealed.
When the story he’d been clinging to got ripped away from him, a happy ending replaced by a small, ugly story of two fated mates never reunited.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I loved it. Then I fucking hated it.”
“The last chapter really ruins it,” Vi agreed. “They should’ve gotten their happy ending.”
Nick blinked. “Wait. I thought you hated it.”
“I do! Because it’s so unhappy.”
“But they’re mates,” Nick protested. “You hate that.”
Vi paused. Nick waited, heart in his throat.
“I don’t like it when they don’t have real chemistry,” she said eventually.
“When the only thing that attracts them toward each other is some stupid bond. What do they talk about when they’re not making speeches about how much they love each other?
It feels fake. Sure, they love each other. But do they like each other?”
“Oof,” Nick said. “You and your liking.”
Vi sighed. “I can’t help it. I want more than passionate declarations and saving each other from pirates, or whatever. I want to see them hang out. And I don’t know, I always liked the idea that you build love with someone. You work on it. You don’t find it in a crowd and everything is perfect.”
Nick snorted. That, he could get behind.
Vi paused. “You’ve never had a mate. Right?”
“Most monsters don’t,” Nick said, sweating.
“But you’d like one.”
“I like the idea of it.”
“What if they’re wrong for you?”
“They wouldn’t be,” Nick said. “I mean, I’ve never worried about that. I always thought the problem would be—”
He bit his lip, fang digging into his cheek. Shut up shut up shut up.
“What?” Vi asked.
Nick shook his head. He’d been about to admit something truly stupid: that he’d always been worried that if he got a mate, they wouldn’t like him.
That even being mates with someone wouldn’t be enough for them to fall for him.
Then he’d met Vi, and his worst fears had been confirmed until she’d kissed him in the back room of her shop.
“Nothing,” he rasped. He squirmed against the bed.
He wanted to tell her. He wanted to say that seeing her at that barbecue had felt like the world had tilted on its axis and had never come right.
That he’d spend the rest of his life trying to be the kind of man she could like.
But he was embarrassed and worried that all this mate talk would make her suspicious, so he said the first thing that came to mind: “What kind of bone is Rosie’s cane made of? ”
“Her own.”
“Excuse me?”
“It’s her own hip,” Vi told him. “They let her keep it after her surgery last year.”
“That’s incredible,” Nick said, the nerves dissolving as he reveled in it. “That’s amazing. Shit. I want to break my own hip now.”
She laughed. “So, um. Anything else you want to talk about? Buddy?”
“Buddy?”
“I panicked,” she admitted. She sounded embarrassed. “I just . . . I actually thought this was a booty call? Not that this wasn’t really nice! I love talking about books when I’m not trying to make someone buy them.”
Nick sat up, squinting into his dim room. There was something in her voice. Disappointment?
“Did you . . . want it to be a booty call?”
Vi paused. He imagined her sitting in the dark, twisting her ponytail around her finger. Beautiful. Resplendent. Waiting for him.
“Maybe,” she admitted.
“I can be there in ten minutes,” Nick promised.