28. Aspen
ASPEN
“Stupid piece of shit!”
I dump the crappy excuse for a chocolate cake into the Belfast sink. A couple of drops of water hit the still burning hot tin and sizzle in a cloud of steam.
I’m feeling like shit about the way I used Blake the other night while he was sleeping.
It was wrong of me, and I shouldn’t have done it.
How would I have felt if Levi had done something like that to me while I was asleep?
I’d have been horrified. Just because I’m a girl doesn’t make it any better.
When I woke the following morning, Blake had already left, and I don’t know if I’d been relieved or disappointed.
I’d played back what I’d done, trying to remember if there had been any hint of the possibility he’d known—had heard my uneven breathing, or felt the shaking of the bed, my touch on his hand, or my nipple pebbling beneath his palm—but there hadn’t been.
I’ve been avoiding him, not wanting to look him in the eye.
I’ve got the strange feeling he’s avoiding me, too, but that might just be my guilty conscience coming into play.
I can’t continue this way forever. We live in the same house…
well, kind of house. He’s going to figure out something is up with me if I don’t pull myself together.
This morning, I remembered it was his birthday tomorrow, so I decided to bake him a cake as a kind of apology, even though he doesn’t know the reason I need to apologize.
At this rate, it won’t be much of one.
The failure has just come out of the oven and is too hot for the trash—which is where it will be going as soon as it cools down enough not to melt the plastic of the trash bag. The cake is as flat as a cookie, and about as hard, too.
“What the hell is that supposed to be?”
The male voice from over my shoulder makes me jump, and I spin around to find Levi standing behind me.
What is with his guy and constantly sneaking up on me?
It’s as though he moves like a ghost around this place, just appearing when he wants.
He’s eyeing up the disaster in the sink, one dark brow raised in a quizzical expression.
“I was trying to make your dad a birthday cake for tomorrow, and it didn’t turn out so well.”
He picks up the packet of cake mix from the side and studies the back. “It’s a pre-made mix. How can you go wrong?”
“I don’t know, but I guess I did, somewhere along the line.”
“But you just follow the instructions on the back. You did follow them, right?”
My cheeks burn hot. “I tried,” I mutter. “I’m not so good at following instructions.”
He’s still not letting it go. “What are you talking about? It’s not as though they’re complicated. Two eggs, a half cup of oil, another of water, and you mix it all together. What’s so fucking hard about that?”
I immediately see where I went wrong. I’d read it as a full cup of water and oil. No wonder the cake has come out looking like a pancake. I flooded the poor thing. Someone smarter might have seen that the mix was way too thin and not even bothered to put it in the oven, but that someone wasn’t me.
“Yeah, well, maybe I’m just fucking stupid,” I snap back at him.
I don’t want to see the cake anymore. Forgetting it’s hot, I snatch up the tin to throw the whole thing in the trash.
Pain seers through my fingertips.
“Shit!” I curse, dropping the pan back into the sink with a clatter. “Shit, shit, shit.”
Tears of frustration and hurt fill my eyes. Red marks appear on the ends of my fingers.
Levi reaches past me and turns on the cold faucet. “Here. Hold them under this for a while. It’ll take some of the burn out.”
I’m still waving my hand around in the air, so he takes hold of my wrist in a firm grasp and holds my hand beneath the water.
I’m suddenly aware of his body being merely inches from my own.
He’s wearing some kind of male fragrance, or perhaps it’s just his body wash.
I glance up and back at him, taking in the sharp line of his jaw and the hint of stubble right beneath the surface.
He really is perfectly formed. It’s just a shame he’s such a complete asshole.
I quickly look away again, not liking how my heart beats so much faster with him this close. I feel the heat of breath against the top of my head, and he edges even closer, so it would only take a slight adjustment of his hips for him to be jammed up against me.
The crazy idea that he might do exactly that jumps into my head, and, as much as I hate myself for it, a familiar tingling condenses at my core.
What would it be like to fuck Levi? He’d be rough, I’m sure of it, and talk dirty words to me while he was fucking me hard.
Sure, he hates me, and he doesn’t want me here, but that doesn’t mean he wouldn’t make me come harder than I ever have in my life.
He uses his other hand to sweep away my hair at my nape, as though it had been in his way, and leans in closer to get a better look at my hand.
“There, better?” he asks.
I’ve forgotten all about my fingers. I’m sure my panties are damp at the thoughts I’ve just been having, and I’m overwhelmed with guilt. What the hell is wrong with me? I’ve masturbated over his dad, and now I’m only moments from wanting to climb Levi like a tree, and I don’t even like him!
I blink and yank my hand out of his. “Yeah, they’re fine.”
The tin hadn’t been hot enough for my fingers to blister. They might be a little tender for twenty-four hours, but that’s all. The worst damage has been to my pride.
Levi steps away from me and jams his hands into his jeans pockets.
He shows no sign that he’s aware of my filthy thoughts about him.
Somehow, he’s managed to keep this civil and hasn’t talked about wanting to fuck me, or any of the usual inappropriate shit he comes up with.
I find myself feeling a little disappointed about that and give myself a mental slap.
“Do you want me to help you make another one?”
“What?”
He motions vaguely at the sink. “Another cake. One that isn’t a disaster.”
I’m not sure I’ve heard him correctly. “You want us to bake a cake together?”
“Sure. I’ll read out the instructions, and you follow them.” He goes to the pantry and emerges a moment later holding a second box of cake mix. “There’s another box right here.”
I’d bought two at the store. Had I subconsciously realized I’d most likely fuck up the first one?
I’m unsure about Levi’s offer of help. Is this some kind of trick?
“Why are you being nice to me?”
He shrugs. “It’s not about you. Blake is my dad, after all. I should want to help bake him a cake for his birthday.”
“I guess I never thought of you as the baking kind.”
I still don’t trust Levi. There’s a big part of me that wonders if he’s the one who’s been messing with me.
I told myself it had been my paranoia that had convinced me someone had been following me that day in the maze, and it had most likely been a bird or a bat that had gotten me all in a flap when I’d gone to get milk.
But I know I’m not imagining the little stick dolls.
Someone is making those things and leaving them for me, and if it’s not Blake, then surely it has to be Levi?
I’m tempted to ask him directly, but I don’t believe for one second that he’d give a damn about telling me the truth.
I can already picture the look on his face, how he’d curl his upper lip, his nostrils flaring, and scoff at my stupid question.
Besides, he’d just say someone else had left the dolls, like one of the contractors or the mysterious groundsman who lives out in the woods—none of whom I’ve actually seen.
Levi blows out a breath. “Are we doing this or not?”
I nibble at the inside of my lower lip, tempted to tell him no.
I could use his help, but what if I read the measuring cups wrong?
I’m anxious I’m going to make another mistake.
But they’re all laid out on the counter, and I’m not so terrible that I can’t tell when something says a half or a quarter or simply one cup.
I should be able to tell from size alone.
“Okay, fine,” I agree. “Let’s do this.”
He gazes around at the disaster of a kitchen. “We should probably clear up from the last attempt first.”
The first cake attempt is now soggy and cold enough for the trash.
I scoop handfuls of it out and throw it away, while Levi washes up the bowl I’d used.
I keep sneaking glances at him, waiting for him to do something sneaky or horrible, but he seems focused on the job at hand.
Maybe he really does just want to help me bake his dad a birthday cake, and he’s not going to use it as an excuse to fuck with me.
With the sink cleared and the dishes done, we get to work. Levi calls out instructions to me and essentially supervises, while I measure out the ingredients. I pick up one of the measuring cups to measure the oil, but he shakes his head and taps the one next to it.
Shit.
My face flushes with heat again. I’m angry at myself for getting even the simplest of things screwed up.
I have both dyslexia and dyscalculia. It means I struggle with reading and writing words and numbers.
I know it’s a condition, and I can’t help it, but it doesn’t stop me feeling like I’m dumb.
Something that comes so easily to other people feels like an impossibility to me.
It makes even reading a license plate a struggle, and it’s a miracle I even passed my driver’s exam.
Having someone ‘teach’ me how to read doesn’t work either.
It’s not like plenty of teachers haven’t tried.
But how can you teach someone something that’s an impossibility?
It’s like trying to teach a blind man to see again.
When I look at a page of numbers or letters, it’s as though the figures don’t stay still long enough for me to read them.
They’re dancing around all over the place.
Letters and numbers swap places, they slide from line to line, making it impossible for me to decipher them.