Touch & Go

by Mira Lyn Kelly

  Their puppy.

  Sam’s arm lifted off her shoulders and he walked to the crated area where seven little smooth bodies were tumbling over each other, trying to get to the new visitors.

  Jesse stood off to the side with his little girl and nodded at the chaos. “The three boys have the dark ribbons around their necks. And the girls have pastels. I’ll be in the kitchen, but go ahead and pick them up. Play with them. But watch out. Those needle teeth are brutal.”

  Ava nodded as he left, then turned back to where Sam was already reaching into the mix, his big hands gentle as he picked up one wiggling baby.

  “I know I said I wanted a boy, but check out the eyes on little Miss Pink here.”

  “Sam?” And again, she couldn’t quite find the air to fill her voice. Not that he was paying attention, anyway.

  Miss Pink’s tiny paws were dangling from between Sam’s fingers, her little chest resting in his palm. “Here, you hold her. Mr. Green is giving me the big eyes down here.”

  And then Ava was holding the small, warm body of a female puppy who was whimpering her protest at being set aside by Sam. Ava held her closer, offering what comfort she could.

  “There, there, Pinkie.” She snuggled her closer, her heart aching with want for this little girl. For so many things.

  “Check out this guy,” he said with a laugh, holding Mr. Green up so his round belly was on display. “Somebody’s just had a good lunch.”

  And then Sam had him resting in the crook of his arm, tiny paws going slack as Sam stroked his small chest and belly with two fingers. The big eyes that had caught Sam’s attention slowly lowering until Mr. Green was asleep in his arms.

  That ache was growing. Turning into something Ava couldn’t ignore.

  And Sam was smiling at her with this awed look on his face as if he’d just witnessed a miracle.

  “Did you see that? I got him to sleep. He trusts me.”

  She didn’t have the heart to suggest that a belly full of warm milk coupled with the excitement of visitors might have had something to do with it, so instead she nodded her agreement, fighting the tears suddenly pushing at her eyes. Because all she could see looking at Sam snuggling this warm sleeping puppy he wanted to be theirs was the fantasy she knew better than to let out of the box. The one with more destructive power than all the others combined.

  The one where Sam was holding a newborn infant in the cradle of his arms. Where all that awe and wonder and love was directed at the tiny gift that was the two of them combined. Denim-blue eyes and a shock of dark hair. The smallest fist wrapped around Daddy’s finger.

  “I can’t do this.”

  The words were out before Ava had even registered the thought. But they were right, real. True.

  Sam looked up, alarm in his eyes.

  Unlike the words he’d said to her a few nights back, hers didn’t leave much room for misinterpretation.

  Still, some people saw and heard only what they wanted to.

  Holding up a hand, Sam started toward her with Mr. Green sound asleep. “Ava, wait—okay, the puppy thing is too much. At least while we’re still”—his voice lowered as he checked the doorway behind them—“together. Like this at least. But these guys aren’t going to be ready to come home for another month.”

  Ava looked down at Miss Pink, whose teensy tongue was peeking past her mouth in a delicate yawn. A part of her didn’t want to give up the sweet baby, but carrying the puppy back to her cage gave Ava something to focus on other than Sam’s face. A face she wanted to grab between her hands and shake, demanding how it was possible one man could be so willfully oblivious. How anyone who cared for her the way he claimed he did could miss the truth for so many years. How he could miss it now.

  But then, she was the one who’d perfected the lie.

  Sam’s biggest crime was that he believed her.

  And the truth she couldn’t ignore was that his belief in the lies she’d been feeding him for the past two decades was the key to their continued friendship. The friendship she shouldn’t want to shake and rattle and tear down because her heart was breaking with all the things she couldn’t have. With all the lies she’d been telling herself that were now being revealed for exactly what they were.

  “Ava.” Sam’s hands were on her then, gripping her arms to turn her to face him. “Hey, talk to me.”

  As if looking him in the eye had ever ensured the truth.

  What a joke. What a horrible, cruel joke.

  “Can we get out of here?” she asked, not caring if both of them recognized the stall tactic for what it was. She needed the extra minutes and Sam really didn’t want to have this conversation on the back porch at his employee’s house.

  He let go of her arms, rubbing over the spot where he’d held her, before taking a step back and shoving his fingers through his hair.

  “Yeah, no problem. Give me a minute with Jesse and I’ll meet you at the car.”

  The five minutes she’d had before Sam’s long stride was eating up the sidewalk between them weren’t nearly enough, but she’d managed to get at least minimally prepared for the discussion to come.

  Sam climbed in the driver’s side and closed the door. “The puppy was a bad idea. And I can see where it might have been pushing over a few boundaries neither of us wants to cross. I wasn’t thinking. But believe me, Ava, I don’t want to cross them either.”

  She couldn’t help but smile. “I know.”

  And if she’d remembered it from the start, they wouldn’t have any problem at all. But she hadn’t.

  So it was damage control time.

  Shifting in her seat, she turned so she was facing Sam. “Look, what we’ve been doing together has been incredible. And I love you for it. But as much fun as you are in bed, I think we both know it can’t go on like this indefinitely. It’s going to start to feel like something it isn’t supposed to and someone’s going to get hurt. I’d rather we end it now before that happens. Just go back to being the friends we were before.”

  Sam looked out the windshield, the muscles in his jaw jumping every second or so while she waited for him to answer. “You’re right. I’ve been relaxing into this thing we’ve been doing more than I should. I get it.”

  He started the truck and pulled into traffic, casting her a quick look before returning his attention to the road. “It’s just so easy between us. Because of everything, all the years and the way we know each other. It’s not like that for me with other women. I don’t relax with them. And with you…I guess I liked being able to sink into everything. And I got too comfortable doing it. I took it too far.”

  They cruised through the neighborhood, Ava watching the houses, the families, the yards with tricycles and pint-sized batting machines. Everyone they passed had found their happily ever after.

  And Ava was sitting there watching them all pass by. A passenger in Sam’s car. Along for the ride.

  Wherever he took her.

  She couldn’t go on like this.

  And yet when she looked across the cab to the man she’d loved all her life, taking in the square cut of his jaw, the slightly roughed-up quality of his features, the pure blue of the eyes that had been looking down at her as he moved within her body—she couldn’t make herself stop from hoping one more time.

  From asking the question that would haunt her forever if she didn’t voice it now.

  “Sam, you talk about how it feels to be with me, and how it’s so different. Are you interested in—I mean, do you want to try and see if maybe—”

  “No.” One word. Firm and unyielding. In this there was no room for misinterpretation. And yet she couldn’t let it go.

  “Sam, think about it before you answer. I mean maybe if you wanted to give this thing between us a shot we could make it work. Maybe—”

  “Ava, no. You know that’s not what I want. Yeah, what we’ve been doing feels great and I was getting carried away. But I was never so far gone that I thought we could make it last forever. You kn
ow me, Ave. You know how I feel about all that relationship love stuff. About the whole marriage and commitment thing. It’s not me. Never will be.” And then as if he were trying to make her feel better or something, he caught her hand in his and gave it a squeeze. “Don’t worry.” He laughed. “Not even with you.”

  She squeezed his hand back, forcing her smile into place.

  “Okay. Great.”

  “So this is it then?” he asked, eyes on the road. Her hand still tucked in his. “Just friends?”

  Her heart was breaking. “Just like always.”

  Chapter 25

  The next few days were brutal. The last-minute pre-wedding preparations meant no chance of Ava hiding out in her apartment, feigning a Contagion “patient zero” scenario in order to lick her wounds in solitude. Though now that she thought about it, the last time she’d had the flu, Sam essentially moved into her place—cheerfully recounting the fourth quarter of the Bears’ game while he held her hair out of the toilet bowl.

  There was no escaping the man.

  Something that had never bothered her before, as it had pretty much been her life goal to get closer to him. But now, she was wishing for space where it had never existed before. The boundaries between them had always been a series of blurred lines with just a few rules keeping them out of trouble. Rules they’d completely blown to bits in recent times, and now Ava was faced with restoring.

  And all while she smiled through shoveling sand into paper candle bags, tying little satchels of birdseed, and nesting the itty-bitty melty and delicious cookies Maggie made a few hundred of into their two-inch-square boxes stuffed with crinkled white filler paper. With Sam sitting across her table doing the same.

  Looking cool and comfortable, his crooked grin as tempting and easy as ever, Sam joked with Tyler about their stint on the wedding chain-gang, flashing her a look here and there to check in, to make sure they were good, because things had changed and he cared.

  She wanted to scream.

  Tyler tossed his birdseed baggie onto the table and marked another tally on his sheet. “I need to switch. Ave, how ’bout I take those cookies off your hands for a while. I keep thinking I’m going to toss a handful of this pigeon feed back without thinking about it.”

  “Nuh-uh. Not so fast, Mister.” Ava swatted at Tyler’s hand and then for good measure stuck her foot out to block him. “Maggie said you were not to be trusted with these. So pick your poison, sand or seed, but keep your hands off the cookies.”

  Sam let out a laugh. “Sounds like the gavel has landed, my man. But tell you what. Sandbox is all yours if you want to trade.”

  Tyler grunted, picking up another disk of silver tulle and length of satin ribbon.

  Stretching back in his chair, long legs sprawled in front of him, Sam clasped his hands behind his head so his black T-shirt pulled taut across the broad terrain of his chest while teasing the fringe edge of his jeans.

  Another millimeter and she’d see skin. Bands of abdominal muscles divided by that fine line of golden hair bisecting his body in a trail she’d happily followed more than once.

  And just perfect, the fantasies were piling up at her feet as she stared. One tawdry scenario after another, each facilitating a return to the time when she’d had free license to push that black cotton out of her way and get her mouth—

  No!

  Ava fumbled the box in her hand, scattering her mini cookies across the table.

  “Sorry, and to think Maggie trusted me,” she laughed, stepping over to the sink, where she poured herself a glass of water. Taking a cool sip, she let it wash down her throat, wishing it would wash away all the things in her heart that didn’t belong there. “I need a break. Gimme a couple of minutes to check in at work and I’ll be back.”

  Tyler waved her away, snagging a cookie while she watched. “Sure. But whatever happens out here, it’s on your head.”

  Sam clucked his tongue. “I don’t know, Ty. Maggie’s going to be your wife tomorrow. Pretty sure whatever happens with those cookies, the buck stops with you.”

  Ava left the guys trading jabs and speculation, and headed deeper into her apartment. Into her bedroom, where she pulled out her computer and opened it on her bed. She remembered the last time she’d tried to use checking in at work as an excuse for escaping to her bedroom—only then she’d wanted to be alone with Sam, while now she wanted space from him.

  Just for a few minutes.

  Just long enough to reinforce her defenses.

  Crossing to the window, she pulled out the elastic from the low ponytail she’d been wearing all day and finger-combed her hair, staring out into the sliver of night she could see between the buildings.

  Maggie would be home from the gallery in a half-hour. She’d eyeball their work and help finish the last birdseed bags and cookie boxes. They’d hang out. And then tomorrow Maggie would marry Tyler, taking the next step in their life together.

  It was everything Ava had wanted for her when they’d agreed to their dating pact almost two years before, and she couldn’t be happier her friend found the love she’d been too afraid to risk her heart on until Tyler. But there was a part of Ava that wished Maggie hadn’t been the only one to find her happily ever after.

  Though even as the thought skirted through her mind, she had to acknowledge the truth. Being open to the possibilities the way she would have needed to be in order to find a love of her own would have meant letting go of the hope that someday, somehow, something fundamental would change with Sam.

  And yeah, okay, so some things had changed. But not the way she’d hoped. Not the way she needed them to. Not enough.

  They’d had sex.

  Heck, she’d even go so far as to say they’d made love. There was no other way to describe the tenderness and affection infusing so many of those late nights after they’d already tended to the sharp edge of need driving their earlier encounters. In those hours when their kisses turned slow and deep and spoke of a connection twenty years in the making.

  Still, Sam hadn’t fallen in love with her. He hadn’t realized he wanted her forever. He hadn’t figured anything out other than screwing his best friend felt every bit as good as screwing the near strangers who were his usual fare. Better, even, based on the whole trust-and-comfort thing they had going.

  But it wasn’t enough. And unless Ava found a way to get over Sam, nothing in her life ever would be. She’d spend the rest of her dateable days measuring one good guy after another against the man she couldn’t have, and she’d forever find them lacking. It had been that way in high school. In college. Law school. After.

  Every time she’d tried to move on, push her heart in a healthier direction, it was the same.

  She’d wait for that fluttery excitement that happened every time Sam entered a room, or the skip of her heart when he smiled at her—hoping one of these guys would inspire a similar reaction. But they never did.

  She’d tell herself maybe she just needed to give it time. Just give it a chance. Only then Sam would come home from his after-school job, or drop by with a twelve-pack of ramen at the dorm, or show up at the bar ready to hang out—and she wouldn’t be able to ignore the simple truth. No man could measure up to him.

  A throat cleared behind her and she turned to find Sam in her doorway, one fist squared against the frame.

  “Everything okay?” he asked, his eyes serious.

  No sign of the easy and casual he’d had going back in the kitchen. But maybe she wasn’t the only one who knew how to snow a crowd.

  “With me? Oh yeah, fine,” she answered, pushing all her best pleasant to the surface, because what else could she do? She’d been the one to end things, and she’d done it with the promise their friendship wouldn’t suffer.

  “You shot out of the kitchen pretty quick.” He walked into the room, closing the distance between them until only a few inches of space remained. “I need you to be honest with me, Ave. You don’t seem fine.”

  She half winced at hi
s call for the truth. It was so important to him, and aside from the one underlying lie that was as much a foundation of their lives as all the years, she always did her best to be honest.

  Taking a bracing breath, she stepped back and waved a hand in his direction. “I’ve got to get used to this not being my personal playground is all.”

  Sam’s brow arched and he stepped into the new distance she’d only just opened between them.

  Awareness fired to life within her, flipping all of her senses online.

  She swallowed nervously, because then he was giving her that crooked grin and the concern in his eyes had been replaced by something brighter, hotter.

  Another step in. “So what are you saying? Having a little trouble keeping the thoughts pure?”

  Another step back. “Sam,” she warned, her hands coming up in some sort of defensive stance that only made her palms itch with the need for him to close the rest of the distance and press that hot, hard body into them. “It’s only been a few days. I’ll get it together.”

  His river-washed gaze dropped to her mouth, that crooked grin going criminal. “Yeah, you will. But until then, it’s not the worst thing to know I’m not alone in this…suffering.”

  “Suffering?” she whispered, hating the breathless quality of her voice all the more when she read the satisfaction in Sam’s face. In his posture. In his very breath.

  “Seeing things I want and knowing better than to take them.”

  This was so not what she needed to hear right then. Just like the heat of Sam’s body moving into her space was about the last thing on earth she needed to feel. Not when she was trying so hard to rebuild her defenses.

  But Sam knew only half the story, and if a few physical urges had been the extent of it, then she would have been able to take this little game of boundary pushing he was playing exactly as he intended it.

  In fun.

  As teasing.

  Only the idea of Sam wanting her had her all but trembling with need. Which was so completely stupid because she knew, knew, all he really wanted was sex. A physical release that was just a step up from what his right hand had to offer. And what she wanted was everything.