CHAPTER 37
MYLES
The buzzer goes off at an eerily punctual seven o’clock on the dot.
When I open the door to the flat, I’m relieved to find Sheridan in exactly the same clothes as she was at the school earlier—a matching purple stained denim jean and jacket combo with a black turtleneck and black hi-top Converse. Her hair has been put into those space buns, the newly dyed purple tips peeking through each little twist.
Time apart hasn’t dulled my attraction to her. If anything, it’s worse. She looks incredible, if a little tired.
And I’m a bastard.
“You came,” I state, like a complete moron.
She’s pulled the sleeves of her jacket right over her hands, hiding them. “I said I would.”
“I know, I just…wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t.” I admit. When she doesn’t say anything, I take a step to the side, opening the door wider. “Come in.”
“Thank you.”
She takes her jacket off and I mourn the co-ordination of her ensemble, but I take it from her and hang it on the hooks in the entryway. Wordlessly, she follows me into the kitchen.
“Can I get you a drink?”
“Water is fine. Please.”
I nod, and silently fill a glass with water from the kitchen tap. She gulps half of it down in one.
“Are you hungry—did you eat?”
She gives me a long look that feels something between pity and scathing. “I didn’t come here to eat, Myles.”
“Right, yeah. Um,” I absently scratch the back of my head, “shall we sit down?”
We migrate to the sofa, where I sit at one end, and she sits at the other. As far away from me as possible. That seems…fair.
“I, er,” I clear my throat, “don’t know where to start even though I’ve been thinking about it for…a while.”
“Why don’t you start with why you just disappeared with nothing but a two line text message?” She suggests, with only the tiniest hint of hostility.
Alright. “I panicked. I’ve been in a position like that—in trouble, in the crossfire—so many times it’s normal. But the difference is, this time, you were there, too. I’ve always been by myself with these things, Sheridan. If I ever got myself in any kind of trouble, I was alone, so it didn’t matter. The only person getting hurt was me. But you were there, and Brin was there, and it got way out of hand.
“Then to make matters worse, it got filmed and put all over the fucking internet because your brother happens to be a celebrity. I’ve wondered every single day since Sam and Jamie showed me that video, if it wasn’t Beau involved, would it have been filmed in the first place?
“If Brinsley, who, apart from a few choice words for her brothers, was a practical bystander, got suspended, what might happen to you if your boss caught wind of it? And if it escalated?”
“But, Myles, nothing happened,” she says with a little frown. “I called Marina and asked her outright if she was going to sack me, and she said no. Adamantly. And if you’d have answered any of my calls or texts, you would’ve known that.
“Also, so what if I was? None of it was your fault. You didn’t hit anyone. You got hit. The school board is frankly ridiculous for suspending the two of you in the first place. And I can just get another job, but I would never have blamed you if I did get sacked.”
“I’m sorry,” God my throat feels awful. “I just couldn’t handle the thought of being responsible for anything bad happening to you, and I thought the easiest way to do that was to leave.”
“Well then, you’re an idiot,” she says simply. “You’re so caught up in all the ‘ifs’ you don’t look at the actuals. You need to stop living like that, Myles, it’s not healthy. You’re such a good man and anyone with two brain cells to rub together would be able to see it. I wouldn’t have blamed you and I wouldn’t have left you. Because I love you. And I don’t say those words to just anyone.”
Christ, my chest hurts. To hear Sheridan say she loves me in present terms is like taking a defibrillator to my still heart.
“Unfortunately for me, I’m not in a position to look at another man ever again.” She says with a sigh. “You’ve ruined me for other people so if you don’t want me anymore then I’m destined to a life alone. With my twin for a roommate.”
I shake my head adamantly. “No. No, Birdie, that”s not true at all,” I insist, the nickname slipping off my tongue without thinking. “I hate that I ever gave you that impression because it’s not the case. I want you. Always. I just about choked a lung when I saw you at school because time apart has done literally nothing to temper the effect you have on me. I’m so in love with you it’s pathetic—”
“It’s not pathetic,” she interrupts with a frown. “Don’t say shit like that.”
“I never thought I’d be beholden to anyone, Sheridan. But I am to you because you’re like oxygen. You’re not a drug—something to enjoy. You’re a necessity. And I let you go because you deserve better than me.”
Sheridan stares at me for a moment, and then says, so quietly, “I really wish other people would stop telling me what I do and don’t deserve.” Then, with determination, “Here’s the black and white of it, Bear. Even though you left me and made me feel like a fool, I still love you. That’s not gonna stop any time soon, either, because you are easily the most selfless person I’ve ever met.”
I’m trying not to repeatedly trip over the fact that she called me Bear without a hint of disdain, but rather as some term of affection. “Even though I’ve physically battered your brother on more than one occasion? Doesn’t seem very selfless to me.”
“I’m going to choose to ignore that over the fact that you are, according to hot gossip, fostering a boy out of the system because his shitty home life is relatable to you. I don’t know many people our age who would do that.”
“You’re painting me like a martyr,” I grumble.
“I am not. Don’t know many martyrs who go four rounds with their girlfriend’s brother.”
I sigh and cover my face with my hands, and I’m pretty sure Sheridan is laughing at me on the other side of the sofa.
“You’re so fucking daft, Myles. I don’t know what you want. You asked me here to apologise which gave me a terrifying injection of hope, and now I’m here you’re just stressing why you don’t think you’re good enough for me to stick around. Are you pushing me away? ‘Cause if you are, can you just tell me so I can go on with my life?”
Fuck, fuck, fuck. “I don’t want you to go anywhere, Birdie. I’m quite clearly rubbish at this, but of course I fucking want you. I do love you, I’m just petrified of fucking it all up again. I’d never do it on purpose, but I’m a man, and I think we’ve established that all the men in your life are stupid.”
“Maybe if you talk to me instead of running away, you’ll fuck up less,” she deadpans.
“Christ, I—,” I stop myself from telling her I don’t deserve her again because she clearly doesn’t like it. “I’ll take anything you give me. If you’ll still have me, I’ll be happy with whatever you let me have from you, and I’ll work my arse off to make sure I’m good enough for you.”
“Right, well,” Sheridan scratches her head, hands still covered by her jumper sleeves like little paws, “good.”
I blink at her. “That’s it?”
“Yeah, I guess. I’m not gonna do a Brin and demand flowers every day.”
I narrow my eyes. “Is that what you want?”
She abruptly stands. “Can I use your bathroom please?”
Her question startles me. “Er, sure.”
She breezes off, and I stare after her wondering if I’ve finally lost it.
I remember that my mouth feels like cat litter and head to the kitchen to make myself a glass of water. My stomach rumbles at the sub-par sustenance, so I peek inside the fridge for something to pick at while I wait for her to come back.
I don’t know what’s happening. Sheridan seems to have accepted the fact that I’m an idiot and still wants me anyway, but now that we’ve established that I’m still obsessed with her, is behaving like a skittish feline and hiding in the bathroom.
Where do we stand?
What’s going on?
Is she talking herself out of forgiving me?
I wouldn’t blame her, because Brin is right. I was a freaking coward ghosting her.
Sheridan reappears while I’m shoving grated cheddar out of a bag into my mouth like a caveman. I didn’t hear the system flush so she can’t have used it. She stands close to me—much closer than we were on the sofa a minute ago—and watches me swallow like I’m the most fascinating thing she’s ever seen. Her body heat is delicious, the minute space between us vibrating.
“I lied earlier,” she says quietly, and my stomach sinks.
I knew it. She’s talked herself out of it.
But then she says, “I didn’t eat at home and I’m absolutely fucking starving.”
I practically choke on a shred of cheese with my relieved exhale, and white-knuckle the counter while I recover. And when I do recover, I’m laughing. I laugh so hard my ribs ache and my eyes weep. The sound of her laughter is infectious too, and a minute later I’ve got my forehead pressed against the cool kitchen work surface because I can’t stand up straight.
The small hand with delicate fingers that starts stroking through my hair doesn’t help the fact that I’m overheating, but it does subdue me enough to take a real breath. When Sheridan’s nails scratch my scalp I shiver violently, but she carries on. She’s pushed her entire front against me, her other hand smoothing along the length of my forearm.
I twist my head slightly to find her watching me with a small, innocent little smile, and my guilt eats away at me all over again for having behaved like such a prick about everything.
“I’m sorry, Birdie,” I say gently. “I’ve been such an arsehole, and I’m so sorry.”
The hand in my hair lowers to the back of my neck and rests there. “I know, Myles. I know you are.”
She doesn’t say it’s okay, or that she’s forgiven me, because it isn’t okay, and she hasn’t forgiven me yet. But we’re making progress, and I’m going to keep that progress going, keep being better, until she does forgive me. Even if it takes years.
I finally straighten up, but she doesn’t stop touching me, and eventually she’s standing with her chest flush against mine while standing on her tiptoes, her arms looped around my neck.
“Can you tell me about Sam?” She asks, gaze warm with curiosity. “He seems like such a good kid.”
“He’s a great kid. His foster parents sent him back to the care home at Christmas like heartless animals, and then I found him in the hospital with a broken wrist on New Year’s Eve. He was all by himself, and I kind of just…saw me in him. How many times had I done the exact same thing—got on a bus or the tube and ridden to the nearest hospital—because some horrible people managed to get permission to look after a child that they were only using to get money out of?”
“Is that a thing?” Sheridan is quite clearly horrified.
“Oh yeah. That’s the thing with fostering. You get financial support to raise a child. As long as you have a spare room and can put up the front of a healthy lifestyle for a child, they’ll give you one and a bunch of cash to help raise it.” I shake my head. “Some people—and way more than you’d think possible—don’t use that money towards the child. They use it towards themselves.”
“Fucking hell,” she sighs, leaning closer somehow. “What a shitty world we live in.”
“Tell me about it,” I mutter. “Anyway, I mentioned to Sam that everything had kind of gone tits up and that I was thinking of moving if the board decided to sack me. And the scrawny little fecker asked if I’d take him with me.”
“That’s because he can see you for who you really are, Bear. Not this version of yourself you’ve created in your head.”
I don’t know what to say to that, so I turn my head away from those pretty blue eyes of hers.
A second later she slips her hands to my face and coaxes my gaze back. Her thumbs stroke my cheeks as she talks. “Sam sees you the same way I do. You’re good, Myles. Prior reputation be damned, you’ve earned another as a good teacher. A great teacher, if he’s asking you to take him with you. When are you going to realise that you’re not this monster you think you are?”
I can’t help but study her face intently while she’s this close, back to praising me as if I have any right to her affection. The freckles on her nose have faded with the winter weather but are still there, lingering like water droplets on dried glass. Her little upturned nose. Her full lips. Her big blue eyes. I don’t think I’ll ever meet another woman as beautiful as this one. And for some reason she wants to be mine.
“Maybe if I hear it enough times from people who regard me as highly as you do, I’ll start believing it,” I say hoarsely, and turn my face to kiss the palm of her hand.
Then, without giving myself time to hesitate, I snatch her by the waist and lift her up onto the counter, where I settle between her legs.
“Now,” I mumble, pressing a kiss to her forehead, “I think you told me you’re absolutely fucking starving a minute ago, so can I please cook you some dinner?”
“That depends,” she pecks the underside of my chin, “will it involve an entire bag of pre-grated cheese?”
I pinch her hip and she yelps, the noise somehow delighted by its own shock. “I was going to whip up a curry that cheats the marinating system, but I think I’ve changed my mind.”
She gasps in mock horror, “You would deny me a hearty meal?”
I purse my lips, tap them twice, and study her again—the roundness of her face, her slender neck, her slim waist and wide hips, her thighs. God, her thighs. I could suffocate between them and die a happy man. It’s that thought that has me dropping my bravado. “You know what, Birdie, I don’t think I could ever deny you anything again.”
Sheridan’s gaze softens, and then sparkles with something more mischievous. “Even if I asked you to fuck me on your kitchen counter?”
Sweet baby Jesus. “That is…not where I expected this conversation to go.”
“But would you?”
“Right now?”
She hums seductively.
“Would I fuck you on my kitchen counter if you asked me to?”
“Yes, Myles.”
My eyes glaze over, and I’m harder than a fucking lead pipe in my jogging bottoms. And I think Sheridan knows it, too. “Yeah, I probably would.”
Her grin is triumphant, “Myles, baby,” she bats her lashes at me, “please put me out of my misery and fuck me, right here, right now, on your kitchen counter.”
At her pretty little beg, I am unleashed.
When I sink my way inside her, I am home.
And when we fall apart together, I am whole again.