by Eden Rayna
He returns to the bedroom, thick cock swinging freely between his legs, ironically completely confident in nudity.
“You’re leaving?”
“I don’t want one of your friends walking in on us, really giving us something to lie about this time.” There’s no way he could argue the difference between a lie and privacy under this circumstance. Besides, I’m sure he’s relieved that I don’t want to stick around to cuddle.
He got what he wanted—my house. I got what I wanted—a smile and a laugh from him. I was wrong—there were winners in the end.
Time to move on with our lives.
Chapter 30
Izzy
Two days later–Voicemail from Asher
Hi Izzy. It’s Ash. Call me.
Five days after sex with Owen–Voicemail from Asher
Heya Iz. Haven’t heard from you in a while. Wanted to see if you’d like to catch a movie this weekend. Call me.
Ten days post selling out–Text from Asher
I’m worried. Send up a smoke signal Iz.
Twelve days since giving up on my dreams–Email from Asher
Did you skip town? Where are you?
Thirteen days into the emotional turmoil–Voicemail from Asher
Why do I feel like I’m getting the brush off? Did I do something wrong? I stopped by your house. Or should I say Owen’s house? Want to tell me what’s going on?
I flip my phone over and place it face down on the kitchen table, attempting to ignore Asher’s latest message. I’ve betrayed him. I feel like I cheated on him although we aren’t a couple. I think of all the effort Ash put in to helping me get quotes and how I sold out, anyway. Worse is that I couldn’t tell Asher what I did in the end. I didn’t want to disappoint him. I was hoping I could get away with a Haha, guess what I did? sort of conversation. Then I fucked Owen. Now the guessing game I planned has to be a statement: I did a thing. And that thing led to me sleeping with the enemy.
There’s a pounding on the door, and I jump, knocking over my mug of tea. It’s not him, I assure myself. Asher’s too polite to show up and demand that we speak. The visitor knocks again. It’s definitely a man’s knock; a heavy and purposeful fist banging into the wood. I call out that I’m coming as I toss a kitchen towel over my mess to accomplish the work of cleaning.
I peer through the peephole before daring to twist the deadbolt.
“Oh, shit!” I cry out.
“Oh, shit is right. Open up, Princess.”
He doesn’t yell, but he doesn’t sound pleased all the same.
“No,” I say, then press myself against the wall, trying to become a chameleon, as if he can see me through the one-way glass contraption in the door. “How do you know where I live?”
He doesn’t answer, giving me a chance to come up with one of my own. Kelsey and Scott, I mumble under my breath.
“I’m not leaving.”
“You’re going to stay out there for the rest of your life?”
He growls at me the same way as when I refused to come off my roof. At that same frequency that hits me in the solar plexus and radiates throughout my body, making me tremble.
“If I have to.”
I’d expected a different answer. I thought it would be along the lines of I don’t need to waste my time on this, or I have more important things to do because I’m a super important guy.
“Suit yourself,” I say, and get no response.
After a moment of silence, which feels like an eternity, I put my eye to the peephole. He’s bracing himself on the door with both muscled and inked arms outstretched, looking at the floor in utter exasperation. Dressed in the usual black on black like the epitome of sexual satisfaction, anyone eavesdropping would judge me a fool. He’s fucking hot as sin and he’s here for me.
I am a fool for sleeping with him in the first place. For letting myself think of that afternoon over and over again. For wishing on some level that we could be a normal couple who didn’t drive each other insane.
Ten minutes later and he hasn’t moved. I might as well hear what he has to say without letting the neighbours weigh in on it. Still watching him, I flip the lock and open the door just enough that I can fill the space. He doesn’t straighten, leaving his bowed head level with mine. His eyes bore through my skull, straight inside my mind to see my thoughts.
“Owen.”
“Princess.”
I glower at him. I thought we were past that. I thought that having given him my body would at least earn the use of my proper name. I’ll stop making assumptions about him.
“Let me in.”
“How about a ‘please’?”
“How about you stop ignoring my phone calls and we’ll have a conversation about social graces.”
Oh yeah, in addition to Asher calling me repeatedly, so has Owen. I’ve been ignoring that too. Him coming here makes avoidance much harder.
He steps into me and leaves me with no choice but to remain pressed against him or let him in. I don’t back away, submitting myself to the effect of him sliding his hard body against mine as he stands his ground too. My breasts tingle and reach out for him.
Betrayed by my own body.
God, he smells good. Freshly showered and hair still damp, the evidence of having spent the day painting still speckled on his hands and forearms. He left work to come talk to me. Owen never begs off work. He never sacrifices useable time. Time is money.
The irrational side of me likes that. The other half—the more mature, wilful, and reasonable half—hates it. He’s not playing fair. He’s supposed to play by the book rather than fly by the seat of his pants.
“You got in. What do you want?”
“Isn’t it obvious?”
“In case you don’t know this about yourself, nothing is obvious.”
“I left you messages.”
That’s his way of asking if I listened to them. Of course I did. Still, I shrug my shoulders in an I had no idea fashion for the pleasure of watching him seethe. He hates it when people don’t follow his command.
I’ve actually created a fun little game of it. When I find myself thinking about him and I fear falling down the rabbit hole of wanting to live happily ever after with him, I come up with ways to contradict him so he’ll get angry and call me Princess. I hate it when he calls me that.
“There’s nothing to fight about anymore,” he says, summarising his messages into one succinct statement.
Does he assume Gran’s home isn’t an issue between us anymore? That we’ve settled our differences and can move on?
Gran’s house will always be an issue, one afternoon of hot sex or not. I got caught up in the moment and couldn’t think beyond what I craved. I didn’t consider how I would feel after the fact.
I slept with him without running the full gamut of consequences. I didn’t consider the guilt around betraying Gran’s dying wish, no matter that it was unfounded. I didn’t consider Asher—a man too wonderful to crush with my traitorous act. Now that I have revisited our escapade from all the angles—all the tantalising angles—I comprehend how foolish it was. With this knowledge, I could never manage it again. I’d be doing it with my eyes wide open and it will lead to further anguish.
We may not have to glare at each other across the fence anymore, but I still hold on to the fact that he has my house.
“You don’t get it,” I say.
“Then explain.”
His response startles me. Why does he care? For the self-professed champion of the business-only title, he’s reaching way outside the box and well inside mine. This is my space. He can’t have this too.
I exhale a lasting breath. “I don’t know what you want, but we will never be more than adversaries who looked the other way for an afternoon.”
“Why not?” Because we hate each other. “We’re good together.” Apparently, there are no reasons to be with someone other than being great in the sack.
Regardless of how short-sighted his answer is, I can
’t stop the blush from creeping across my chest and neck, settling on my cheeks. Owen smirks and drags his thumb across his bottom lip, pulling his mouth open, showing his teeth like a hungry wolf. The teeth that nipped at my thighs and tugged on my nipples a couple of weeks ago. The teeth I swear I can still feel if I try hard enough.
My unrestrained reaction is an invitation to him and steps into me. My arm flies forward, locked at the elbow.
He’s right. Once was good. But neither that nor his advances today change anything.
“You and I aren’t meant to be together.” I reassure myself that this—us—is wrong even when he makes me feel so good. At least in the parts of me that are ruled by hormones.
“Your mouth says no, but your body says yes. There’s more to us than sexual chemistry.” He refutes my earlier inner thought. “Fight it all you want, Iz, but it won’t change that we have the same goals and dreams.”
He digs his hands to the bottom of his pockets, making his upper arms flex as they push against the confines. I stare at his arms, scanning for signs of new ink. Something that shows life still moves on and time didn’t stall when I sold Gran’s home.
“You’re wrong. We don’t share those things, and I don’t need to fight any urges.” My eyes drop to the floor. I don’t owe him anything. He’s already taken everything that mattered to me. I muster my strength and stare at him. “You want an explanation? Here it is: Owen, when I look at you, all I see is my failure. I see Gran’s disappointment in me, and it breaks my heart.”
“No, Izzy.” His voice cracks, as if he experiences what I do when I think of her home. He reaches for me, but I back away again. He’s going to insist once more that the issues with the house were beyond my control.
I don’t want to hear it.
“You won’t change my mind. Nothing you say will make me feel better about selling.” He already seduced me into that—I won’t give him more.
Owen waits in case I waver. Seconds draw out, and with a final scrub of fingers across beard, his feet spin for the exit. I close my eyes, not able to look at his expression. The doorknob clicks when it turns and the air shifts as the door opens but doesn’t move again to signal that he’s left. I finally look up and find him with one foot in and one foot out of my house.
His back is to me when he speaks. “Yes, I will.”
I CALL ASHER A COUPLE days later and apologise profusely for being such a terrible person. I tell him the entire story, from how I marched into Brett’s office with sale papers already filled out to the shock I felt when I saw how much cash was in my bank account, omitting the X-rated parts, of course.
“Iz,” Asher says in his soothing tone that makes me want to crawl between his arms and snuggle.
“Yeah?”
“It was the right choice.”
“Really?” I could still use some convincing.
“Have you ever seen the movie, The Money Pit?”
I seem to be the single person who didn’t see the house’s faults. He laughs at my blind love for the place.
There’s a long pause on the phone, and I’m about to check if we got disconnected when Asher clears his throat.
“Do you like him?”
“Who?” comes out my instant response, then I quickly realise who he’s talking about. “Owen? No!” I never expected to have this conversation with Asher.
“The better question is, do you like me? And please don’t give me the ‘Of course, I like you, Asher.’ I mean, do I stand a chance with you?”
I want to throw up. I break out in a sweat and I pace around my bedroom, fanning myself. Like it’s going to help. The only thing that would help me now is a wind funnel to cool me off and blow me far, far away. To the Land of Oz where I can hang out with the Cowardly Lion.
“Ash,” I start and don’t finish because how do I say no without ruining the friendship?
“It’s okay, Iz. For a while, I thought that we’d move past being buddies, but I get it.” I don’t get it. I love Asher, just not like that. “Now that I’ve made things really awkward, I’m going to go. Bye, Iz.” He disconnects without letting me answer. Not that I had anything appeasing to say.
Goodbye, Asher, I say in my head as the first tear rolls down my cheek. Kelsey was right. I had two men and now I have zero.
Chapter 31
Owen
Tommy splashes the colour chips across the counter. I come very close to yelling at him, but I stop myself just in time. Instead, I duck under the table to grab the chips that fell on the floor and use my hidden stance to mouth a few choice words at his feet where he won’t see me.
“Izzy said houses can be as colourful as I want, and I want blue and yellow and pink like she had in her house! Okay, not pink. But green or purple, or something.”
Calming people down, especially kids, is a skill I lack. I don’t have the right voice or the soothing mannerisms. I definitely don’t have the patience.
I stack the paint chips in a neat pile. “Houses can be colourful,” I agree in the most acquiescent way possible. “My houses are neutral so the new owners can pick their own colours.”
“Well, that’s a stupid way to do it. Maybe people don’t know how good colour is until they’re shown it.”
The astute way he says that catches me by surprise. It’s true, most people can’t identify what they want until they see it. I didn’t recognise that I wanted to be wrapped tight in Izzy’s arms until I was.
“Izzy knows what I’m talking about. Call her, Owen. She’ll tell you I’m right.”
I slide my phone in his direction. “Suit yourself.” I pretend to be upset about it, when really, this is perfect. She still isn’t answering my calls. “It’s under ‘P’ for Princess.”
Tommy giggles. “She’s not a real princess.”
Yeah, she’s told me that too. Lots of times. I keep saying it because it gets her riled up enough for her to forget her objective and let me take her where I prefer she goes.
“Use your phone to call her.” Tommy scrunches his eyebrows in confusion. “That way she’ll have your number.” I offer a sly, bro look.
He dials her number and his cheeks fill with colour when she answers.
“Hi, Izzy? It’s me, Tommy,” he says with all the exuberance of a ten-year-old boy calling a cute girl.
Her muffled voice rings in my ears and I don’t notice how I’m leaning in to hear what she says until Tommy swats at me to give him space. I straighten my spine and cross my arms over my chest, attempting to gain back some authority and my manhood.
“You said I could call anytime I had questions about colours.”
There’s a pause where I imagine her telling him she’s excited that he called. I can picture her smile and the fine creases in the corners of her blue eyes.
Like most boys his age, he can’t sit still, and he paces around the kitchen while he talks. I follow the conversation without physically following him until he leaves the room to talk in private. Seems I’ve been told to stop and I’m less than happy about it.
Am I jealous of a kid?
Turns out when it comes to Izzy, I’m jealous of everything. I thought I would satisfy my consuming need by getting her house. Being handed those keys fuelled my fire more. Then, when I slept with her rather than telling her how I really felt, my burden increased. Now my calls go unanswered, and I’ve been reduced to forming a relationship with her voicemail.
Everything has changed since the day Princess became Izzy and I became a fool. It’s not enough that I got the house. I need her too. I need her energy and her emotion; I need her keen eye and her skill. I need everything about her because the lassie comes with the house.
I pace in the kitchen like a caged tiger, waiting for Tommy to end his call and drop a morsel of steak in the form of information at my feet. How is she? Has she found somewhere to live? Did she crawl into Asher’s arms for solace after she kicked me out of her place?
Tommy bounces back into the kitchen. “Wanna talk to Owe
n?” She must say no, because his next words are, “It’s no problem. He’s right here.” He stretches out his hand, giving me the phone.
“Izzy,” I’m quick to say before she has the chance to drop the call.
“Owen.” Determination keeps her voice neutral.
I don’t have to be in the same room as her to make her lose her stride. I can practically feel her quivering through the phone, and it makes me hard as stone. This conversation is about to turn and needs to be had out of the earshot of a young man. I head upstairs, taking them two at a time, then shut myself in my bedroom.
“Have you been thinking about us?” I ask.
“There’s nothing to think about.”
I thought she would have caved by now and given in to my pleas for mercy and affection. She holds strong. Stronger than I gave her credit for, which is ridiculous since that’s what I like most about her.
“I think about you.” All the damn time. Every day in the shower I jack off to the memory of her moaning and begging me to let her come. And I do it again every night when I get into bed. Into the same bed she was in, naked and wanting me. Then it goes well beyond that. I think about her when our designer calls and I wish it was her I worked with. I think about her on Saturday nights and wonder where she and Kelsey go. I think about her when I visit Pops and understand what it’s like to live without my love by my side.
I might not have said it to her, but it’s true.
“Stop,” she says.
She’d hang up if she didn’t want to hear more.
“I miss having you next-door to me. I miss hearing your car pull up to the curb. I miss seeing you in the backyard.”
“When did you become so talkative?”
She’s trying to steer the conversation away from the possibility that she misses those things too.
“You make me want to do a lot of things I’ve never wanted to do.” Truth.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Her voice has a knife’s edge, burdened by the idea that I wish to change for her.
