Dirty Exes

by Rachel Van Dyken

  He scratched his head and licked his lips in thought. “Right.”

  “Seriously, what are you still doing here? Go get her.”

  “Happy hour,” he said sarcastically. “I wanted the happy part.”

  “You look like shit.”

  “So do you,” he fired back, while the crowd noise around us intensified. I suddenly wanted to be anywhere but there. Blaire still hadn’t texted back. And I knew Vanessa would be home, and she’d bring up the past, and then I’d feel guilty all over again.

  And the vicious cycle would start.

  “I’m gonna head out.” Maybe I’d call Blaire. What Colin didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him, and besides, my marriage was over, there was nothing left to salvage, nothing left I wanted to salvage, despite what Vanessa might say or think. She’d betrayed me, betrayed us.

  And I hadn’t even seen it coming.

  “Me too.” Colin stood.

  I dropped a fifty and walked out with him.

  He saluted me and got into his Audi, and for some reason I was tempted to follow him. I had no idea why, just a last-minute crazy thought that he was doing something he shouldn’t.

  Then again, it’s not like I was any better.

  I shrugged it off and got into my car and immediately texted Blaire.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  BLAIRE

  I was sitting home alone.

  In my ratty sweats.

  A giant T-shirt that had a unicorn on it.

  With one spoon in some Halo Top cookies and cream and another getting chocolate sauce poured onto it.

  I told myself the double spoon idea was smart, it kept me from just drowning the ice cream in chocolate.

  It would have been a good idea had I not started just drinking the chocolate from my spoon.

  “Come on, Darcy, get your shit together,” I yelled at the TV and then switched channels. Pride and Prejudice wasn’t even making me feel better. I grabbed a blanket and tried to think about the positive.

  I’d had a great morning.

  I liked Colin.

  For a few minutes, he’d liked me back. How long would that last? A few days? Weeks? Years? And then poof?

  I found out Jessie was a lying, cheating bastard.

  And I’d sent all of my info to my clients.

  Vanessa would know by tomorrow morning that Jessie was screwing around, and she’d have all the ammo she needed.

  I refused to feel guilty about it.

  And my other client would know his wife wasn’t being faithful.

  Some people were dirty.

  I was dirtier.

  I felt dirtier.

  Because I was willing to expose them.

  The sound of something hard hitting the window stilled me. My phone number, address, any contact information were unlisted. So who was throwing rocks? Kids? Gangs? I slumped down into my couch.

  I was going to die in my chocolate-stained unicorn T-shirt.

  Sounds about right.

  Another pebble hit the living room window.

  I ducked under the blanket.

  My doors were locked.

  I was fine.

  Safe.

  My phone buzzed on the table, I yelped, and then grabbed it.

  Colin: Answer your door, was trying to be romantic and throw rocks at your window but then I panicked thinking it might freak you out and force you to pull out your gun or knife, can’t take that chance.

  I scowled at my phone, tossed off the blanket, and stomped to my door, jerking it open, ready to yell at him for scaring me, ready to say a lot of things, but the words died on my lips.

  Because he was holding flowers.

  And a pack of red licorice.

  “A fellow unicorn enthusiast.” He grinned at my shirt. “Though my T-shirt’s missing the chocolate stains and what looks like a run-in with a Rottweiler.”

  I glared.

  He took a step inside.

  “I didn’t say you could come in,” I said lamely as he shut the door behind him, locked it, and moved past me into my kitchen. “But please, make yourself at home.”

  “Already am, Spy Girl.” He rummaged around my kitchen, found a vase, filled it with water and put the flowers inside, then grabbed the licorice and tossed it in my direction. “So what are we watching?”

  “We?”

  “You. Me. Us.” He grinned wide. “Though I forgot my sweats, I may have to just go naked.”

  I pressed my lips together to keep from smiling while my insides cheered. “I was going to call it a night.”

  “No, you weren’t.” He winked.

  “No, I wasn’t,” I repeated, finding my seat on the couch, careful to sit as far away from his hot body as possible.

  Why did he look so good in jeans and a vintage unknown band T-shirt, why?

  The man was wearing Converse!

  He had a Yankees hat on!

  And there I was, salivating.

  My body remembering.

  Reminding me how good it was.

  How good it felt.

  Tears stung my eyes.

  Colin was on my side of the couch in seconds, he tugged me into his lap, and then kissed my ice-cream-stained lips, licking chocolate I didn’t even know was there from the side of my mouth, all before pulling back and sighing. “What’s wrong?”

  “Everything,” I admitted.

  “Tell me one thing, then we’ll work on the next thing, and the next after that,” he whispered gently.

  “You can’t be real.” I shook my head and looked away.

  “I think I proved to you that I’m as real as they get,” he said in a gruff voice. “Okay, tell me one thing, Blaire, just one thing.”

  “Jessie. He texted me to hang out. I got it while I was following the wife of another client and it turned out she was with Jessie. I saw them together. He lied and told me he was with his lawyer.” Screw that NDA, I was already in breach of contract with Colin, so I just kept talking. “And it just felt . . .”

  “Disappointing,” he finished for me.

  “Yeah.” I swallowed the lump in my throat. “It felt like this picture of him I had for so long, the one I held on to when things got—” I caught myself but had no reason to hold back, did I? Not from a guy I wasn’t sure about. “When things got bad with Jason, when I questioned my actions, questioned his, I always thought, Well, at least there’s guys like Jessie out there, guys who have those happy endings so many of us lonely, bitter women crave.”

  “You’re not bitter,” he whispered, “and you’re not lonely.”

  “I’m lonely,” I admitted, feeling the tears threaten again. “It’s hard knowing what it’s like to be part of a team, only to realize you were the only one to show up to the game.”

  “You’re the one woman I know who uses sports analogies and actually knows what the hell she’s talking about,” Colin mused. “And you’re not alone, you have me. You have Isla, you have a brother who clearly cares about you, if what you’ve said is true. You have more than you realize.”

  “I don’t have you.”

  “Is that problem number two?”

  “Are we numbering them now?”

  “Should we?” He cracked a smile. “I don’t do relationships, Blaire.”

  I tensed. “Trust me, I know, I didn’t mean it like that, I just—”

  “Let me finish.” He tilted my chin toward his face, his lips brushing mine before he said, “I’ve never been given a reason to . . . because in my world I view women the same way you view men. I want a partner, not a cheerleader. I want someone who wants me for me, not for my money, my body, my sexual prowess—” I smacked him on the shoulder. “I think it’s time you get the full story.”

  “Oh, there’s a story?”

  “Buckle up and hold on tight, it’s a rough one.”

  “I like rough.”

  He let out a growl and nipped my neck with his teeth, causing his hat to fall off. His hair wasn’t in a bun, it was messy, chaotic. I was dy
ing to run my hands through it. “Don’t I know it, keep looking at me like that and you won’t get a story.”

  “Sorry.”

  “Don’t ever apologize for eye-fucking, it’s rude.”

  I laughed while he pulled me into his arms and leaned back against the couch cushions. “I was married.”

  I froze.

  He squeezed me tighter. “I loved her, I mean I was ready for it all. She was twenty and played by the rules, and I told my dad I just knew it was this girl, only this girl. We had been high-school sweethearts. She was best friends with Vanessa at the time. Vanessa was different then. And Starr, well, she was just special, she was everything I’d ever wanted, sweet, beautiful, kind, I mean so kind, Blaire, she would do anything for anyone. You can imagine how kind since she even made my sister seem like a better person.”

  He shifted in his seat, his eyes far away. “Because Jessie was my best friend, it just made sense we’d all hang out together. When Jessie was finally drafted after college, Vanessa clung to him as if she’d been in love with him for years, like he’d always wanted. They’d always been friends, Jessie and Vanessa, but there was never this undying passion, you know?

  “One night we were all hanging out and Vanessa wanted some more white wine. Starr was the only one of us who wasn’t drinking. She didn’t want to go to the wine shop at first, but Vanessa being Vanessa wouldn’t stop complaining, and Starr was such a people pleaser that she finally went. She never came back.”

  He said it so matter-of-factly that I thought I heard it wrong. “She just left?”

  “She died in a car accident,” Colin whispered. “Over a damn bottle of wine for my sister.”

  “But—”

  “Things shifted between Vanessa and Jessie, he blamed her, she blamed herself. I spiraled out of control, and they spiraled right along with me. They were getting married in a few weeks and my wife was going to be Vanessa’s matron of honor. We all dealt with the grief in different ways. Vanessa turned inward, to herself, and Jessie focused on football. He tried to turn to Vanessa for comfort, but the more he clung, the more she dug her talons into him and turned him into this crazy OCD freak who wanted to control everything around him. And when she got pregnant . . .” He hesitated and then whispered, “She put her ambition before her marriage and had an abortion because she was afraid a pregnancy would ruin her modeling career. She blindsided us and didn’t tell us until after it was done. Jessie didn’t know how to deal with it, and neither did I. It was another loss that had us reeling.”

  “Why are you telling me this?”

  “Because I think you should know the truth,” Colin said sadly. “Because at some point I’m going to walk out that door, and I want to make sure you understand what part I play on a team.”

  Tears filled my eyes. He continued. “See, I’ve always been the coach. Even in my marriage, I was always coaching, fixing, making sure I deserved my wife, making sure she was happy, making sure everyone on my team knew the right plays, including my sister and Jessie.” He paused. “I learned something . . . I never actually played the game. I stood on the sidelines because I was so focused on others. You make me want to hang up the clipboard. I think I’d be a hell of a pitcher . . . I think if I was second base and you were shortstop we’d be unstoppable. I want to play. And I swore to myself that I wouldn’t jump back in unless I was given a reason to.”

  I blinked back moisture.

  “And then you walked into my bar and tried to pretend you were a cop.” He chuckled. “And asked for whiskey.”

  I bit down on my lip.

  “Life’s scary, Blaire. It’s not fair. Shit happens. You deal with it, you make choices, don’t sit on the bleachers because you’re afraid you’re going to strike out. Better to at least swing and miss than sit and let the game finish without you.”

  “How did you deal with that? Losing your wife?”

  “I was twenty-one, I dealt with it by sleeping with a shit ton of women and drinking, how do you think I dealt with it? I was an immature asshole with a fifty-billion-dollar trust fund.”

  I choked.

  He laughed. “Forty-nine, but I like rounding up.”

  “You just dropped at least ten bombs on me.”

  “I think”—he tucked my hair behind my head—“you’re more than capable of handling it. I mean you are a spy . . .”

  I laughed as tears welled in my eyes. “You barely know me.”

  “Because you won’t let me know more, you’re extremely good at the whole casual cool indifference thing.”

  “Really?” I deadpanned. “Did you pick up on that while you were licking me or when I screamed your name?”

  His smirk said it all. “Remember that, do you?”

  “It’s been less than twenty-four hours.”

  “Trust me, my body is fully aware of that.” He pulled me into his arms.

  Nervous energy had me wiggling in his lap. He stopped me and gave his head a slow shake. “Do that and I’m not leaving until I’ve had you at least a dozen times.”

  “A dozen, hmm?”

  He ran a free hand through his hair. “Maybe more, if you have Gatorade and some aspirin, I am getting old—”

  “Practically ancient.” I eyed his rock-hard pecs through his shirt and licked my lips.

  “Tell me that was an invitation.” He pushed his mouth against mine before I could protest, before I could say, Slow down, let me process, let’s talk this through.

  Colin was done talking.

  And my body was completely on board with it.

  “Bedroom or couch?” he growled against my mouth. I shook my head, not really able to formulate words with the way the heat from his chest pressed against me, made promises with each pulse, with each breath from his body. “Both it is.”

  I yelped when he pulled my shirt over my head.

  Then nearly passed out when his went flying.

  “Is it the eggs?” I just had to blurt midkiss.

  He pulled away, confused. “I’m lost.”

  “This.” I ran my hands down his fit stomach. “Is it because you don’t eat eggs? If I didn’t eat eggs, would I get this?”

  “I don’t want you to have this.” He moved my hands away and then gripped what I knew wasn’t the most fit stomach in the universe, but he looked at me like it was, like I was this supermodel who deserved his attention and praise, like my body was made for worship. “I love this.” He gripped my curvy hips with his hands and looked ready to take a bite. “All of this.”

  I was keeping him.

  End of story.

  Selfish ending.

  But I didn’t care.

  Our mouths crashed together in another drugging kiss as I nearly fell off the couch and Colin on top of me.

  My leg hit the coffee table.

  Melted ice cream spilled onto my face.

  Colin didn’t miss a beat, his tongue laved my neck all the way up my cheek and then I was tasting a mixture of us and ice cream as he shoved the coffee table with his foot and tugged my sweats off.

  No bra, no underwear, because no company.

  He grinned wickedly and then pressed a kiss to my stomach as I sat up, tugging him back against the wood floor with me.

  “I missed this,” he said gruffly against my mouth.

  “It’s been twelve hours.”

  “May as well be twelve years.” He said it like he meant it.

  My heart soared.

  I told it to stop.

  It didn’t listen.

  It never was good at listening to instructions, it just did.

  It just felt.

  His kiss lingered, his mouth hovered near mine, his eyes took me in before he moved onto his back and pulled me on top of him.

  “I’m waiting.” He grinned.

  “For me to strip you?”

  “Careful, I’m afraid of zippers.”

  “Aren’t all penises?”

  “Touché.” He laughed, and then stopped when I felt him throug
h his jeans and winked. “It should be illegal, the way your touch burns even with clothes separating us, the way it makes me want to buck against your hand until I’m spent—damn, you feel good, Blaire.”

  I fumbled with the button of his jeans, anxious to tug them off his body.

  He leaned back on his elbows, his eyes never leaving mine as I undid the button, then slowly moved the zipper down.

  “Very trusting of you,” I breathed.

  “You’re welcome,” he said smugly.

  I looked away and grinned. “So cocky.”

  He sprang free. “Very.”

  “Cute.”

  “Not cute . . . incredible,” he corrected.

  I gripped him. “Impressive.”

  He groaned as I released him and then gave his jeans a tug. He helped me by shrugging out of them and kicking them to the side and then I was on top of him again, kissing, lost in each other, our legs tangled, and then he was on top of me, and I wondered just why I thought I could walk away from him.

  From this.

  His fingers dug into my hips as his tongue thrust past my lips, his kiss was aggressive as I clung to his biceps, he kissed me like he was perfectly happy doing just that for the entire night.

  And when I felt him strain against me, when I reached for him and saw his control snap right before my eyes . . .

  I nearly lost my mind with want.

  And when he pinned me to the floor like he owned me . . .

  I let him, ready for him, wanting him more than I’d ever wanted anything in my life.

  My breaths came out sharp and then ragged as he paused at my entrance, a smug grin crossing his face before he pressed in, before I gasped, and then surrendered.

  On my dirty hardwood floor, with ice cream still dripping near our feet.

  I gave him everything I possessed.

  And it felt like he knew that and he wrapped me in his arms, forehead to forehead, chest to chest, and moved within me, kissing me tenderly across my lips, straining against release.

  I clenched my thighs, holding him, keeping him where I wanted him as waves of pleasure shot through me in tumultuous pulses that had my hips bucking against his.

  He nibbled my neck, his body pressed harder into me, making it difficult to breathe, to think.

  I grabbed his hair.

  I tugged.

  He growled.