by Thorpe, Elle
“We have a head! You’re doing great, Mum, all by yourself. You don’t even need me. Just keep doing what you’re doing, and I’ll catch. One more big push, and you’ll meet your baby.”
Something welled up inside me. I’d missed all this with my Sadie. Missed her first moments. Her first years. I’d missed so damn much.
My gaze fixated on Bianca, watching the way she murmured soothing words to Elodie, despite her face being ashen. Bianca hated kids, but she loved her friends with all her heart. Well, not me. Obviously. But Elodie and Jamison for sure. Despite myself, I was impressed with her. She was normally such a diva, with her assistants and paparazzi following her and her glamour model boyfriends. But right here, right now, she was far from BB the actress. Here she looked a lot like the girl I used to tend bar with.
Like no time had passed, memories assaulted me. Her tying on her bar apron, pulling her long blonde hair up into a ponytail and exposing her neck. The times I’d cornered her in the kitchen before our shift started, stealing kisses until somebody busted us. Going home with her after shift and spending hours in bed, the way you did when you were young and couldn’t keep your hands off each other.
A cry pierced the air, startling me from my Bianca bubble and the nurse held up a squirming, gunk-covered baby. Holy hell, there was blood and white stuff all over it. It was enough to turn my stomach, but then I took in the relief, mixed with joy and instant love on Jamison’s and Elodie’s faces, and had to choke back a lump in my throat. Well, shit. It was kind of beautiful. In a disgusting sort of way.
“It’s a boy,” Jamison said, choking on a sob, his gaze full of admiration for the woman who’d just birthed his son. He leant in and kissed her so tenderly as the nurse placed the little one in Elodie’s arms.
The baby immediately quieted, and the room went silent as he stared up at them. Bianca backed away and came to stand by my side, watching the trio share their first moments.
“We really fucked that up,” I said quietly, guilt eating away at me. “She shouldn’t have had to yell at us.”
“I know.”
“What happened to us, B? We were a good team. Once upon a time.”
“That was a long time ago, Riley.” Her voice was soft as she added, “Times change.”
Didn’t I know it.
10
Riley
It was late by the time Bianca and I walked side by side through the hospital corridors on our way to retrieve her car. People bustled around us, their shoes squeaking on the scuffed linoleum floors, though I barely noticed. I was still completely overwhelmed by everything that had happened with Elodie, but Bianca’s fingers were mere inches from mine, and the need to reach out and touch her crowded my thoughts. I just wanted to take my fingers, thread them through hers, and feel the soft skin of her palm against mine. It would be so easy. She was so close, and the simple gesture would ease a part of me that always ached.
But I knew it wouldn’t be welcome. So instead I tried to focus on putting one foot in front of the other. I’d get my stuff from her car, then I’d get an Uber home, which was what I should have done this morning. Exactly what I would have done if I’d known Bianca had been with Elodie. The adrenaline had worn off and left me suddenly exhausted. I was ready to go home, have a shower, and crash out with some takeaway in front of the TV for the evening.
At the end of the corridor, the entrance to the parking lot loomed, and I quickened my pace. I needed fresh air. Being this close to Bianca was never easy for me, which was why I avoided being alone with her in the first place. It had been different on Friday night. She’d been drunk and let her guard down. It happened when we slept together, too. I got to see the real her. The Bianca who I remembered from all those years ago. But with her walls up, I never knew what to expect, so I walked on eggshells.
“I’ll just grab my wallet and stuff from your car then I’ll order an Uber,” I said to her.
She stiffened at my side, then shrugged. “If that’s what you want.”
I nodded. It was. The thought of sitting in her car, just the two of us, alone, with no Elodie as a buffer would be too awkward. We’d just end up in a screaming match. Or we’d have sex, and then we’d end up in a screaming match.
The automatic doors whooshed open, and a wall of noise hit us like a smack in the face.
“Shit,” Bianca hissed next to me, inching closer.
I blinked in the bright sunlight, bringing an arm up to shield my eyes, and tried to work out what the hell was going on. A crowd of people surrounded us, all yelling, jostling, fighting to get closer. There were so many of them crowding in that my chest immediately tightened, my heartrate picking up. Instinctively, I reached for Bianca, circling my arm around her petite shoulders, and pulled her to my side, ignoring the jolt that slammed through me as soon as my skin touched hers. I felt, more than saw her glance up at me, but there was no time to respond before a guy with a heavy-duty camera jumped in front of us, forcing us to stop.
“BB!” he yelled. “BB! Look this way.” He didn’t even bother holding his camera to his eye, but the blinding flash attached to it went off several times.
I wanted to rip it from his pudgy hands and smash it on the concrete beneath our feet.
“BB! What are you doing here? We heard there was an overdose. Was it you? Do you care to comment?”
Bianca pulled away from me, stopping, and I looked down at her in confusion. What the fuck was she doing? I needed to get us to the safety of the car before one of the thirty guys surrounding us crushed her. There was nothing of her. If these parasites pressed in on us, she could be seriously hurt. Dammit, was this what she put up with every day? My stomach churned. She needed a bodyguard, keeping these people at bay.
She tugged her hair from the messy ponytail she’d been sporting and ran her fingers through the long, golden strands. Then she plastered on a huge smile.
And just like that, the last traces of Bianca, the girl I’d once been in love with, disappeared, leaving only BB, the actress. The woman I couldn’t get close to, no matter how hard I tried.
A laugh that sounded nothing like her own fell from her lips. “Do I look like I’ve overdosed, guys? Come on now.”
“We’ve all heard the drug rumours, though, BB. You can’t blame us for assuming.”
She shrugged. “You guys know they aren’t true either. My friend had a baby. That’s it. Just regular, run-of-the-mill childbirth.”
“When are you going to have a baby, BB? Is this guy a potential baby daddy? What’s his name?”
My mouth dropped open as the attention turned on me. A microphone was thrust into my face, and flashes went off again, black dots floating in front of my eyes. The crowd surged, and Bianca held her hands up in a calming gesture.
“Come on, guys, don’t push. I’ll answer any questions you have, the jostling isn’t necessary…”
But her words fell on deaf ears. The photographers and reporters all continued trying to get closer to her, shoulder barging each other, not caring if they stepped on feet or knocked people over. With every second that passed, I had less and less breathing room, and my anger spiked. How many up-skirt shots had these guys stolen from her? How many times had I asked her about a bruise on her body and fumed when she’d confessed it was thanks to an overly eager jerk with a camera?
“Bianca, come on,” I said in her ear, but she just smiled and continued answering a question about her TV show until a burly-looking guy, solid and well over six feet, grabbed her arm, thrusting a microphone into her face. She winced, covering it quickly with her fake-ass smile, but I saw it.
And I saw red.
Without thinking about it, I drew my arm back and swung a punch that smashed into the guy’s cheek bone. Pain vibrated up my arm, but I ignored it as the guy stumbled back.
“Hey!” he yelled.
I didn’t care. Let him come at me. Blood pounded in my ears, and I was riled up. I would have been happy to take him on. He had no damn right to touc
h her. He’d hurt her.
“You don’t fucking touch her.” I grabbed Bianca around the waist and got us moving towards her car again.
“Riley!”
But I wasn’t listening. I pushed and shoved people out of the way, with single-minded focus. I had to get her out of there. These people were vultures. They didn’t care if they hurt her. She was tiny. They’d mow her down, all for the sake of the gossip mags and internet headlines. I stormed my way through until eventually they moved and I could get her door open.
Once she was in, I threw myself into the back seat, hitting the lock button as I went. For a long moment, Bianca just sat there, her fingers clutching the steering wheel until her knuckles blanched white. My breath came in short, erratic bursts as I tried to calm down. The paparazzi hadn’t let up. They banged on the windows and yelled her name. Flashes from their cameras continued to blind us.
“What are you doing? Drive!” If she didn’t go now, they’d surround the car. What was she waiting for?
She shook her head, turned the car on, and put it in drive. We were out on the road before the vice on my chest loosened a little, and I felt like I could breathe. I ran my gaze over her profile, again and again, checking her for injuries, reassuring myself she was fine.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” she said coldly.
And just like that, the vice was back, threatening to cut me in half.
* * *
Bianca
My blood boiled, but I knew that wasn’t why my skin felt so heated. I could still feel the warmth from being pressed into Riley’s side as he herded me to the car. And one part of me just wanted to hold on to that sensation. Hold on to the way it felt to have his strong arm around me. Hold on to the way he always made me feel safe.
God knows, I hated the ridiculous media packs that followed me around. My stomach had dropped through the floor as soon as the hospital doors had opened and they’d rushed us. The panic I’d felt in that moment had been crushing, and that scared me. Because panic like that was crippling. I saw the proof of that every day with my mother. And I didn’t want that to be my life. So yeah, one half of me had wanted to reach out to Riley, let him wrap me in his arms and bury my face in his neck.
But the other half of me was raging mad. And that was the half that won out, now that we were away from the crush of people.
“I don’t need you to babysit me, Riley,” I snapped as I navigated the city streets. “I’m plenty capable of handling the paparazzi.” And I was. Just because I was scared on the inside, didn’t mean I hadn’t learned how to deal with them. I’d been doing this a long time. As long as I didn’t let the fear and panic overtake me, I was fine. I was fine.
In the rearview mirror, his eyes narrowed into slits. “You’ve got to be kidding? You are not seriously angry at me right now?”
“Of course I am! I’m not some damsel in distress!” Ugh. He made me so mad when he acted like my boyfriend. “You punched a guy in the face. What if he presses charges? That, back there, is my job. I’ve managed it just fine for ten years. If you suddenly want a career as my bodyguard, talk to my manager.”
I beeped the horn at the car in front of me when they took longer than necessary at a stop light, then instantly felt bad. It wasn’t the car in front of me that was pissing me off. It was the guy behind me. Did he seriously think I didn’t know how to do my job? Would I walk onto his construction site and start bossing him around?
“Unbelievable. That guy was hurting you. What did you want me to do, shake his bloody hand and congratulate him? They were out of control.”
The glimmering anger in his eyes shocked me, but I shook my head. He had no idea. That group of paps was nothing compared to some media swarms I’d been pulled out of in the past.
For the past ten years I’d been the darling of Australian television. I’d caught a lucky break at twenty-two and landed a role in a popular evening drama. The role, that was supposed to only be a three-episode arc, somehow became my full-time job. It was all I’d known for the past ten years. And I loved it. That job was my whole life. The cast and crew were my family, and there were very few places I preferred to be than on set. But that didn’t mean it hadn’t cost me plenty over the years.
I pulled my car into the parking garage of my apartment building and yanked up the handbrake. Riley and I opened our doors and got out of the car, both of us slamming them behind us. I leant back on the cool metal and folded my arms across my chest, watching him pace up and down. His body radiated tension. He was coiled so tight I knew he was going to snap at any minute. My god. The man was such a stress head. But it was also kind of amazing, the way he looked out for me. No one else in my life did that in quite the same way he did. I softened a little.
“I knew what I was doing, Riley. Nothing was going to happen.”
He whirled on me, the intensity in his gaze shocking me as he crowded into my space, planting both hands on the car, either side of my body. I didn’t flinch. I just stared him down. The part of me that had softened grew irritated again. He wanted an argument. He needed the release. Maybe I did, too. And this was what we did best, him and I. We fought.
“Nothing was going to happen? What if those guys had pushed so hard you fell and were trampled?” His eyes blazed into mine, and my breath caught. He was so close. He had a handful of freckles across his nose that I’d once given names to, one morning when we’d lain in bed, wrapped in each other’s arms. Did he remember that? Did he think back on those mornings and nights where all we’d needed was each other?
Our lips hovered inches apart, his scent engulfing me until it was all I could think about. Something in his gaze softened just the tiniest bit, and his gaze dropped to my lips. Fuck. What was his question? I racked my brain, trying to remember, but I couldn’t think.
“Uggghhhhhhh, fuck!” he bit out before his lips slammed down on mine.
I didn’t hesitate for a second. I pulled him close, wrapping my arms around his neck and digging my fingers into his hair. His body ground me into the side of my car, his erection all too evident against my belly. Fuck indeed.
His lips moved over mine, hot and demanding, his tongue circling in the practiced rhythm we’d developed over so many years of making out. But somehow, it still always felt like the first time. It never felt old with him. I still got that feeling in my chest and the butterflies in my stomach. He devoured my mouth until an ache deep within me opened up and I broke away panting. His eyes were focussed hard on me, and I knew he was checking to see if I wanted more.
He always checked. He never assumed.
It was one of the things I would have loved about him if I wasn’t so busy fighting with him and pushing him away all the time. But all he would have seen in my gaze was pure, unadulterated wanting. He yanked open the door, nudging me down on the back seat, and I struggled to get my athletic pants off while searching for his mouth again.
His lips landed on my neck, his body covering mine, and the two of us both struggled to get our clothes down far enough to get what we both wanted. My hips jerked towards him as if they had a mind of their own, and I groaned when the warm skin of his cock nudged against my opening. Trusting that he’d stop this if he wasn’t up to date on his STD tests, I spread my legs wider, my core throbbing with need.
“You good?” he murmured into my neck, “I want—”
“I’m good.” Or I would be in a minute.
He reached down and guided himself to my entrance, inching in, giving me time to adjust to his width. But I didn’t need it. Wetness pooled between my legs, and my core ached. I wanted him. And I wanted him now. I circled my legs around his ass and pulled him to me, both of us crying out as he sank all the way inside, in one long, hot stroke. My eyes rolled back in my head when he found his rhythm, his hips thrusting in and out. God, I’d missed this. It had only been a few weeks since we’d last hooked up at the wedding, but it felt like a lifetime. He shifted off me slightly so he could reach between us and find my clit
, a practised move he knew I liked.
Best thing about a ten-year fuck buddy? His ability to get me off quicker than I ever could. Down and dirty in the back seat of a car? No problem. He knew exactly how to work my body.
I groaned at the pressure building inside me. His hot gaze bounced between my face, checking my reactions then straying to the place our bodies were joined. I writhed beneath him, so turned on by him watching, at the feel of his body in and around me. At the way he made me feel like the only woman in the world, even if we were just having a quickie in the back seat of the car. When I cried out my release, he silenced me with his kisses. He followed me over the edge, body shaking, my name a shout on his lips before he collapsed down on top of me.
I pressed my lips to his neck, inhaling and memorising the moment. Burning it into my memory, because in a second, he’d climb off me. He’d do his pants up, bite his lip, and shake his head, a mess of confusion, longing, and need still written into his expression. And then he’d leave. And I’d let him go. Just like always. But there was always this moment. The one minute we had where maybe, just for a moment, we both forgot about how different we were, and why we’d never been able to make this thing between us work.
11
Riley
I didn’t want to move. I didn’t care that we were in Bianca’s garage, on the tiny back seat of her car or that I had a cramp in my calf. With Bianca’s lips pressed to my neck, my cock still throbbing inside her, her walls still clamping down on me from her orgasm, there was no place else I wanted to be. I never knew how long it would be before we’d fall back into bed together, and every time I assumed it would be the last. Because one day, it would be. It was only a matter of time before she found some guy who could give her everything she wanted, and that would be it. That would be the end of us. For good.
