Bang Theory

by Valente, Lili

  Theo and I have shared everything since we were in junior high. And I mean everything—we’re talking I taught her how to use tampons and she went with me to my first annual lady-parts exam. We have dissected every second of every love affair we’ve ever had—three for her and one for me—and I’m the one, not the guy she was dating at the time, who held her hand while she waited for the results from a pregnancy test after a broken condom last year.

  I’m sure it seems weird that I’m suddenly imitating one of the oysters she’ll have to crack open for the happy-hour buffet. But for the first time in my life I don’t want to share every detail of my personal life with Theo.

  I want to keep this between Shep and me, our own private, sexy secret.

  “I’ve found a situation I’m excited about,” I say vaguely before putting my arm around Theo and hugging her tight. “But not as excited as I am about your promotion. How does it feel to be head chef of the hottest restaurant in Hidden Kill Bay?”

  Her lips twitch, but the expected smile never appears. “Good, but stressful. I’m glad I’ll have until after the holidays to make the transition.”

  “You’re going to be great. No need to stress.” I wave a breezy hand through the air. “You practically run that kitchen already.”

  “Yes, but until now, I’ve been the enforcer, not the first-in-command.” She glances toward the kitchen, where the faint sound of banging pots and splashing water signals the dishwashers are hard at work cleaning up for the dinner service. “I’m concerned some of the staff might not respect my orders when they know they’re coming directly from me.”

  I plunk my batch of silverware into the bin between us. “Why? Because you’re a woman?”

  “Because I’m a woman and I’m younger than almost everyone on the line except Franco. And he looks like he could kill people with his pinkie finger, so he’s automatically ranking higher than I am on the respect-meter.” She tosses her silverware roll on top of mine and motions to the bin. “Like this. The lunch servers were supposed to finish this as part of their closing duties. But on the day Claudio announces that Chef Trevor the Terrible is leaving us, they just happen to forget their silverware-rolling duties, and my manager just happens to leave without submitting his front-of-house checklist, and here I am, stuck covering for my subordinates and doing work way below my pay grade.”

  I turn to her, crossing my legs on the wide window seat at the back of the restaurant, near the tiny chef’s office that will be hers one day soon. “Maybe they were just thrown off their game by the news. Change can be scary, you know. Even when it’s good change.”

  She lifts her gaze to mine, mischief flickering to life in her eyes. “Is that why you’re refusing to tell me who you’re banging?”

  “I’m not banging anyone,” I lie. Badly.

  “Liar,” she says in a scandalized voice. “You are such a dirty little liar.”

  “I am not,” I insist, but I can’t stop the grin that springs to my lips. Damnit. I might as well have a giant “guilty” banner stuck to my forehead.

  Theo rolls her eyes. “Right. You’re sitting here, glowing like a unicorn pooped on your face because you’re having such a kick-ass time rolling silverware with me.”

  I laugh. “Like a unicorn pooped on my face?”

  “Unicorn poop is made of glitter, everyone knows that.”

  “I thought it was made of rainbows.”

  “Rainbow glitter.” She huffs. “And it doesn’t matter either way. You know what I mean, and you know what you’ve done.” Her bottom lip pushes out. “And I really need to know, too, Bridget. Please? So I can have something happy to think about instead of stressing about work and the future and the really bad dating decisions I’ve been making lately?”

  I sit up straighter, my friend-dar instantly on high alert. “What bad dating decisions? What happened? Why didn’t you call me?”

  “Ah-ha! Now you know how it feels,” she says, pointing a finger at my chest. “To have your best friend start doing crazy things and keeping them a secret.” She stands, grabbing the bin of silverware. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go deliver these to the waitstaff station and figure out what I’m going to feed the dinner crew for family meal.”

  “Wait!” I jump to my feet, trailing her across the restaurant. “What crazy things did you do? And with who?”

  “Sorry, I’m super busy right now,” she tosses breezily over her shoulder.

  “Not fair, Theo. These are two totally different situations. I’m involved in an experiment that requires discretion. If not, you know I would tell you everything.”

  She bobs her shoulders. “It’s no big deal. I had a lapse in judgment, that’s all.” She sets the bin on the middle shelf of the waitstaff’s back-of-house station before turning to me, her hands propped on her hips. “It’s not going to happen again.”

  I narrow my eyes. “But you’re okay?”

  “I’m fine. I’m just…annoyed with myself. And I don’t know…” She crosses her arms and tips her chin down, studying the brightly patterned carpet. “I just don’t want boys to come between us, that’s all.”

  “They won’t,” I promise. “Not ever.”

  She glances up. “Men, either?”

  I untangle one of her hands and hold it tight between both of mine. “Men, either.”

  “Not even when you fall in love?” she asks softly.

  My mouth opens, but the assurance on the tip of my tongue refuses to come out. I want to say that I’m not in love, that I’m just engaged in a sexy experiment with a friend who happens to have a lovely penis I can’t wait to get to know even better.

  But as the words flash through my head, something hitches in my gut. It’s the same feeling I get when I tell Kirby that I love her latest salad creation even though she put so much fennel in it that my tongue went numb.

  It feels like I’m lying.

  But I’m not.

  I’m not in love with Shep.

  I just adore his company and spend every minute we’re apart wishing I was with him and dream about his hands on my body pretty much constantly, whether I’m sleeping or awake. Oh, and the thought of him leaving to go on tour has made me tear up in the shower—not once, not twice, but three times in the past week and a half.

  Shit turds.

  I might be in deep doo-doo, and not the rainbow-glitter-unicorn kind.

  I shake my head, forcing out a response before Theo pounces on my silence, “Of course not. Not even when I fall in love someday.”

  Someday.

  But not today.

  I can’t be in love with Shep, I just can’t.

  Sure, our relationship is more complicated now than it was before, but that’s because we’ve thrust ourselves into an intensely intimate situation. At heart, we’re still the same best friends we’ve always been. And yes, I’ve always looked forward to the months Shep spends in Hidden Kill Bay and to his weekly calls to catch up on the hometown news while he’s on tour, but I’ve also always been fine without him.

  And I wouldn’t have been fine if I’d been secretly carrying a torch for him all this time.

  But what was fine yesterday isn’t always fine today. People change. Feelings change, and you need to do some serious thinking about what it’s going to be like to wake up in a town without Shep in it after he gets on that tour bus and cruises out of your life for six months.

  “Well, you’re always going to be my first true love,” Theo says, making my chest squeeze even tighter. “You know that, right? I mean, not in a romantic way, obviously, but… Well, you know what I mean.”

  “I do know what you mean. And I feel the same way. We’re sister-friends. Forever.” I pull her in for a firm hug, and I’m concerned at the way her shoulder blades stab into my forearms. I pull back, pinning her with a hard look. “Are you making time to feed you, too? In addition to the staff and the customers and all the stray animals in the back alley?”

  She smiles. “Yes, Mom.”
/>
  “Are you sure? You feel skinny.”

  Theo rolls her eyes. “Stop. Please. I’m still a size six. And I’m sure that anything I’ve lost, I’ll put on this weekend eating massive amounts of buttered popcorn while slothing it up on my flamingo floatie. We’re still on for the dive-in movie double feature, right?”

  “Wouldn’t miss it,” I say, even though, up until this exact second, I’d totally forgotten about the Jaws marathon at the local indoor pool and splash-park this weekend.

  I’ve been too busy daydreaming about Shep’s kiss, another sign that I need to step back and seriously examine my feelings for this man who’s been taking up so much time and space in my head.

  Preferably before he texts me later this afternoon to say he’s ready to hang out…

  I say goodbye to Theo, refusing her generous offer to feed me an early dinner along with the rest of the Claudio’s family, and head for the pier.

  A long walk in the sea air always clears my head.

  But by the time Shep’s text pops up on my cell an hour later—Done at the house. You still up for a bike ride?—I’m no closer to clarity than I was before.

  So even though I’m dying to see him again, to kiss him again, I shoot back—I have a few fires to put out at work. Text you later?—and head for home. Maybe an afternoon spent filling out toiletry order forms and taking inventory in the stock room will lead to some answers.

  At the very least it might help keep my mind off Shep and the troubling suspicion that I’ve gone and fallen in love with my best friend.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Shep

  I move on to hanging the new shelving in the closet—the last item on my to-do list aside from a few finishing touches in the kitchen—but I can’t seem to focus. I miss the stud in the wall twice, and when I finally get the shoe rack hung, it’s obvious that my measurements were off. Which means I’m going to have to patch the holes I’ve made, paint over them, and try again.

  Instead, I grab a shower and a beer and head out to the deck.

  My parents’ house has never been much to look at on the outside—or on the inside, really, not until I ripped it apart and put it back together again—but it’s in a kick-ass location. There’s only one house between us and the ocean, and it’s a one-story to our two-story, granting us an unobstructed view from the deck to the peaceful harbor beyond.

  This is one of my favorite places in Hidden Kill Bay, but today the sound of gently churning waves and the cool sea spray on my face offer no comfort.

  All I can think about is Bridget. About how much I want her and how deeply I’m fucking myself over with this “experiment.” How I wish that I could turn back time to right before I kissed her so I could take it all back. That, or relive it in slow motion, so I won’t ever forget a single stolen moment.

  I need to talk to someone, a friend I can trust to give me the kind of tough love my muddled brain requires right now.

  But Bridget’s always been that friend. And I can’t call Kirby or Colin. Neither of them could be objective in this situation.

  I’m about to call Zack, our bassist—he’s a clown, but he’s got a good head on his shoulders when it comes to matters of the heart—when I hear a knock at the back gate.

  Thinking—hoping—it’s Bridget, I leap out of my chair and cross to the edge of the deck to stare down at the yard below.

  It isn’t Bridget, it’s Cutter, who greets me with a middle finger and a six-pack held aloft in his other hand. “Let me in, asshole.”

  “The gate’s open, shithead. Let yourself in.” I lean against the railing as he swings into the backyard and starts for the stairs leading up to the deck. “What was the middle finger for?”

  “For making Eloise change her mind about her favorite member of the band,” he says, tromping up to the landing in those heavy boots he wears no matter what the weather. “Apparently you’re the sweetest, most gentlemanly patient ever, and all the nurses at the clinic want to throw you a party and take turns petting your beard.”

  I grin. “Aw, that’s nice. I liked them, too. And Eloise is gorgeous. And funny.”

  “Yeah, whatever.” He reaches the top of the stairs, plucks a beer from the six-pack and presses the rest of it into my hands. “Maybe you can steal her away from her boyfriend, then. You’ve clearly got a better chance than I do. When she texted me to meet her for coffee this morning, I thought maybe she was interested in something on the side, but she just wanted to give me your test results. They came in earlier than expected.” He pulls a sizeable pile of envelopes from his jean’s back pocket and plunks them down on the glass deck table. “Got your parents’ mail while I was at it. You’ve been checking it, right? If not, your mother’s going to rip you a new asshole when she gets home.”

  “I’ve been checking it often enough,” I say, depositing the beer in the mini fridge by the grill before settling into a chair across from Cutter and reaching for the mail. I sift through the bills until I find a plain white envelope with my name typed on the front and rip the seal open.

  But instead of the lab paperwork I’m expecting, I pull out a typed note—

  Dear Shep,

  I know I shouldn’t write again so soon, but I can’t stop thinking about the girl you were with in the coffee shop. She’s all wrong for you, honey. I can’t reveal how I know so much about that particular young lady, but trust me, I know what I’m talking about.

  Bridget is a sweet kid, but she doesn’t have a fire burning inside her.

  She’s prey, and you need a predator, someone who can bring out that savage side of you I see every time you play.

  Someone…like me.

  There, I’ve said it, what we’ve both been thinking.

  We have too much potential not to give this a try, no matter how crazy it might seem to the rest of the world. As soon as the obstacle is out of the picture, I’ll show you what you’ve been missing.

  I promise this is going to be a relationship you’ll never forget.

  Yours in destiny,

  M

  “Shit,” Cutter says from over my shoulder, making me jump. “This woman is a piece of work.”

  “Yeah. She is.” I slam the letter down on the table, fighting the urge to tear it to pieces. I’ve kept all the notes—just in case I might need them as evidence for law enforcement—but this one is particularly important. I catch Cutter’s eye as he settles back into his seat. “Did that seem threatening to you?”

  He grunts. “It seemed batshit crazy.” He takes a swig of his beer, swallowing as his jaw works back and forth. “And yeah, a little threatening. The ‘obstacle out of the picture’ part, especially. That doesn’t sit well with me.”

  “Me, either.” My fist tightens. “I think I need to go to the police.”

  “Maybe. But first you should go check on Bridget. I’m sure you know where she is, considering the two of you have been fucking like rabbits since you got home…”

  I cut my gaze sharply his way. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Right. And I’m not going to drink three more beers after you leave and pass out in your guest room so I don’t have to sleep at my dad’s place.” He nods toward the front of the house, his gaze softening. “Go, check on your lady. But I wouldn’t let Colin in on the situation with you two just yet. Not until you figure out where it’s going. He’s even more protective of Bridget than Kirby is. You’d think she was his little sister.”

  “I would never hurt Bridget,” I say, rising to my feet. “And we’re not sleeping together.”

  He rolls his eyes. “Whatever. It’s obviously none of my business. But if it were, I’d say it was about time. You two have had it bad for each other for years.”

  I fight to keep my expression impassive, but my brows inch up in spite of myself.

  “Yeah, dude,” Cutter says, nodding with exaggerated slowness. “You might as well be wearing signs around your necks—Hi, we’re Shep and Bridget! We really want to fuck, but
we’re both too shy to make the first move.”

  “No one else seems to have noticed.” I omit the fact that I’m pretty sure Bridget only thinks of me as a friend—at least, that was the case before a rogue plant hit her on the head and put our sex-periment into motion.

  Cutter shrugs. “Well, I’ve got an eye for that shit. Years of staying far away from women who look at me the way Bridget looks at you have honed my instincts.”

  I grunt, still not ready to buy what he’s selling.

  If I did, if I really thought she might feel about me the way I feel about her…

  “And I was in love like that once,” Cutter continues in a voice I don’t recognize, an unguarded one I haven’t heard from his smart-ass mouth before. “I know what that feeling looks like on someone’s face.”

  “Who was it?”

  “It doesn’t matter. She’s gone now, and she’s never coming back.” He reaches under the stack of mail, pulling out another envelope with nothing but my name on the front. “This is what you were looking for, by the way. And sorry I gave you shit about dating a good girl when you first texted me about getting tested. I wasn’t trying to throw shade Bridget’s way. You know I like her. I was just jealous, I guess. Sometimes I think it would be nice to have something like that again.”

  I take the envelope, brows drawing together. “Then you probably need to quit fucking any woman who will hold still long enough for you to get your pants off.”

  He looks up, his I’m-just-here-to-play grin back in place. “I don’t want it that bad. Don’t want anything that bad. And you’re all clean, by the way. I took the liberty of opening the envelope and invading your privacy. Which is really Eloise’s fault. She should never have trusted me with test results in the first place.” He sniffs as his brows lift. “I’m pretty sure she broke the law by slipping that envelope into my hand. Could lose her license if she’s not careful.”