by Maya Hughes
Killian shook his head. "Nope."
"And you never asked?"
"Nope."
I must be doing something wrong. Or maybe I'm the wrong guy. I hadn't wanted to admit that for a long time. It shouldn't be this hard, right? There shouldn't be so many unanswered questions. But we'd been like two ships passing in the night for over a decade. Why would one night together, one date and a not-date change anything?
"When we're together it's great. We have fun. We laugh. None of the bullshit from our past matters. She's sexy. When we're together it's like we're meant for each other. Then the minute the door closes, she's all about excuses and avoidance. "
Killian stared at me from across the table.
"What?" Sure I'm a little wasted, well a lot wasted. He doesn't know about the whiskey I had before he arrived.
"I don't hear you talk about women like this. You going soft on me? I thought I'd be living vicariously through you now that I'm a married man," he teased.
"This is Frankie, man. She's not women."
"Oh, I know. I know that, but it's not like you two don't have a past."
"A past where we had an amazing dance and then everything fell apart. It's like I'm living that every time I'm with her. I hate it. When I'm away from her it's this gnawing, aching feeling that makes me pick up my phone and text her or call her just to hear her voice. I don't like not knowing what's going on with her."
Killian laughed. "You sound like me when I was losing my mind over Rachel."
And then it hit me like a Mack truck. I was in love with Frankie. The thought flitted around just out of reach in my mind before, like it was hiding itself from me. Like I knew the minute it finally hit me, I was screwed. I was in love with a woman who hated me.
"She doesn't hate you," Killian said, and that's when I realized I'd said it out loud.
"She keeps blowing me off."
I ran my hands down my face.
"I don't know about the other times, but I'm telling you with one hundred percent certainty that she does not hate you. You need to be patient with her. She's used to her club where she gets to keep everything at arm’s length and her computer where she never needs to talk to anyone in person. She's got a lot going on in her life and stuff from her past that makes it hard for her to communicate. And I'm saying this as the most closed-off asshole out here."
"What are you talking about?" Killian opened his mouth like he wanted to say something before snapping it shut and finishing his beer.
"You need to talk to her. Soon."
26
Frankie - Now
I sat in my office staring at the screens on my wall but not really seeing them. If I caught anyone else zoned out like this when they were on monitor duty, it would be a write-up. But I couldn't exactly write myself up. Things had been going smoothly in the club. No incidents. Everyone was behaving themselves, at least within the rules of the club.
But I wasn't in the mood. I wasn't in the mood to be on the floor, and I wasn't in the mood to be up here tucked away in my office. This had been my refuge for so long, had filled such a big part of my life, and now it felt hollow and empty.
I'd been antsy and jittery since the first plus sign on those pregnancy tests. They still sat lined up along my bathroom counter. Was I supposed to keep them? Throw them away? Give them to John?
They stared at me every time I walked into the bathroom, but I couldn't bring myself to throw them away. I had an appointment with a doctor in a few weeks. The news was still too surreal to tell my family. That would be its own insane journey. My mom would be over the moon.
In the forefront of my mind, I knew there was one person I still needed to tell. It was bad enough that Killian and Sasha knew, but that I still hadn't worked up the nerve to call John. And he hadn't called me either.
I guess my window had closed. That throbbing, dull ache in my chest was there again. I should've known better than to get involved with him. I let my guard down just a little bit and bam! The surprise of a lifetime. It was my own fault.
I stared at the monitors. A giant guy walked down the steps to the front door of Ace's. We were a fairly well-hidden location, meaning there was seldom anyone who accidentally stumbled upon the club. And most of the members didn't look like they might knock down the door with a single kick.
He thumped on the door with one hand, while munching on an apple with the other. One of the guards swung the door open. The conversation seemed to be going on for a lot longer than a lost stranger or someone trying to scam their way into the club would take. The doorman shook his head, but the stranger refused to move. Instead the guy pointed his finger directly at the camera. His bright green eyes seemed to stare right through me. I stopped with my hand halfway up to my mouth, my mug of piping-hot coffee right under my nose.
The doorman cocked his head to the side and glanced up at the camera before making a call. The phone beside me rang, and I jumped. I'd been so focused on what was happening on the screen in front of me. Hot coffee seared my hand. Damnit! I licked the coffee off my hand as I answered the call. The stranger leaned against the far wall of the vestibule with his ankles crossed, finishing up his apple like he didn’t have a care in the world.
"Hey boss, there's somebody out here who says they know you. He says his name is Sasha."
I stared at his face on the monitor with my mouth hung open. Sasha? What? That didn't make any sense.
He leaned over and spoke directly into the mic there, keeping his eyes on me.
"Surprise, Frankie." I stared at the screen in stunned silence. Leaning into the screen with my eyebrows pinched so tightly I thought they might snap, I grabbed my phone off my desk and sent a quick message.
Me: Sash, where are you right now?
The stranger’s phone lit up in his hand. He laughed and held it up to the camera before tapping out a message.
Sasha: I’m standing in the entryway to your dirty little sex club, Frankie
I barked out a laugh. Sasha was a dude! This couldn’t be right. I mean a lot of people over the years thought I was a dude, but wow…Sasha was a dude!
The doorman escorted Sasha to my office. I stared at him like an alien had landed as he made himself his own cup of coffee. I still didn’t believe it.
He sat drinking his coffee like we were old friends visiting. Hell, we were old friends visiting. But, so many questions....
"You're a dude? Never in the past decade have you ever thought to clue me in on the fact that you have a penis?"
"Why did you go straight for the penis? Why not my stunning good looks?" he asked, grinning at me. His emerald eyes were even more vivid than they’d been on the security camera feed from the front of the club.
"Why did you let me think you were a girl all this time?"
"Started as an honest mistake. My English was a little rusty, and I didn't understand what exactly ‘Clam Squad’ meant as your group name in the game. I didn’t realize I'd stumbled upon the all-girl squad for a while. And then once I realized it," he shrugged and took a sip of his coffee. "It was better. No shit-talking. No grandstanding. No wisecracks about anyone's mom. So I just kept my mouth shut, stuck to typing out my messages and kept playing. And then it was like having a window into another world. I got some pretty good advice from you ladies over the years. Well, not you. You're pretty useless when it comes to relationship advice, but you're an excellent gamer, so you have that going for you." I shot him a glare. Sasha was a fucking dude. Mind blown.
"What the hell are you doing here?" My brain was still in recovery mode after this bomb dropped in my lap.
He hand waved it away.
"Work stuff. But most importantly, you. I knew you weren't going to do what you needed to do when it came to John. You're way too much of a chicken. I knew that you would sit and wallow, close yourself up in your cave, if I didn't do something."
"I am not in my cave. I'm at work, aren't I?"
"At work, shut up in your office. Work cave. Home cav
e. Same thing. Come on, grab your coat. We're going out."
"Going out where?"
"To dinner. I'm starving." And if I hadn't known it was Sasha before, that definitely confirmed it. So many things over the years made perfect sense.
A short cab ride later and we were sitting across from one another in a restaurant I'd been dying to try. Sasha did his mind trick and got us a table with no problem.
I sat across from Sasha, still a bit shocked that I was finally meeting him in person. Him! Wow.
"Are you listening to me? Or are you still getting lost in my eyes?" He batted his freakishly long eyelashes at me. Why was he so damn pretty? Not pretty really. Hot. Sasha was hot. His nose looked like it had taken a few beatings, but it gave him that rugged and dangerous look.
I shook my head, snapping myself out of the trance I'd been in. That was one way to stop thinking about John and my impending motherhood. Welp, it had been. Just like that it was back. Slamming right into me, like course-correcting after you hit a patch of black ice. You're safe, but your heart's in your throat.
The waiter came up to the table.
"Sir, I have a drink for you from those ladies at the bar." Sasha and I glanced over his shoulder to see a few women waving at the bar. How did they think that was going to work? Was he supposed to sleep with all of them? Or would there be a cage match, and the champion got to mount him? And what the hell? What if he’d been at dinner with his girlfriend instead of his friend?
He raised his glass in a toast to them and they did the same. I stared at my plate of tapas and pushed it away. He mumbled something in Russian under his breath and took a sip of his drink.
"Morning sickness stuff?" Sasha said, a hint of his Russian accent coming through.
"I'm still a bit in shock here. I mean, you're really here."
"I am really here," he said, taking a gulp of his drink, his Adam's apple bobbing up and down. I glanced around the restaurant and the heads of every woman and some of the guys were all on him. Like a tractor beam. And why wouldn't they be? He was gorgeous. I laughed out loud.
"What?" he asked, glancing up from his plate that was filled to the brim with food.
"This whole time I was talking to you."
"Yeah, yeah, yeah. We've been over it about a hundred times now. At least fifty back in your office and the taxi ride over here. We need to talk about you and John."
I glanced down at my plate, pushing the food around with my fork.
"I'll get there. I'll call him...in nine months," I mumbled under my breath.
"You need to do this now, if only so I don't have to suffer through another decade of John Grimsby talk."
"I haven't been that bad," I said, peering up at him.
"Oh really? Want to place a bet on that? Because I have the chat logs. Going back almost ten years. How many times do you think his name will come up over the years?"
"I don't know. A few...hundred," I said, hedging. I shrugged my shoulders and wished the floor would open up and swallow me.
"Try thousands. Every interaction and chance meeting was dissected by you."
I threw down my fork. It clattered onto my plate.
"Fine, I like him. I've always liked him, but he freaks me out. He makes me nervous as hell. I don't do vulnerable. I know what he wants from me, and I know what I want from him. Giving that to him..." I trailed off. "I'm not good at letting myself let go." I shake my head. "Dealing with that, plus this pregnancy thing. I can't do it."
He reached across the table and, covering my hand with his, ran his fingers along the scar on my wrist. My bracelets and cuffs were gone. That small shield against the world, stopping them from seeing all of me.
"You have to do it. If you don't do it now, when are you going to do it? Life is short. Don't run away because you're scared."
"But what if the thing I'm scared of is what I should be running away from? What if I tell him, and he accepts it and wants to be with me and things are going along great, and I find out it's only because of the baby? Or things are going along great, and then they aren't and he feels like I trapped him? Or what if this thing that's between us fizzles out or implodes?"
"And what if it doesn't? What if you tell him, and he's overjoyed? And you two try to make a real go of things, and it works out, and you get everything you want? What if that's the future you're running from?"
I nibbled on my bottom lip, willing the tears I'd been holding back to stay where they were.
"Just so we're clear, you're aware that you're in love with him, right?
The day had already taken a turn I couldn't have imagined, but as so many emotions raced through my mind, shock the foremost, I opened and closed my mouth like a fish.
"I'm not. We have a past, and things didn't work out before. He was always a bit of a man-whore back in high school after our one date. And he's always pushing my buttons.” But the more I talked the more I knew it was true. Sasha didn't even say a word to rebut a single thing I said. He just sat there with a knowing look on his face. Holy shit!
"I love him," I said, my voice cracking as I sunk my head into my hands.
The walls felt like they were closing in.
I couldn't breathe.
Sasha got up and came around to my side of the table kneeling in front of me. All the eyes in the restaurant were on us when I glanced up. He picked up a napkin off the table, handed it to me, and took my hands in his.
I snapped out of my near panic attack as phones were all trained on us from half the restaurant. All talking stopped and the clink of forks and knives was noticeably absent.
"You need to get up now," I whispered, urging him to stand. He glanced around.
"What? Why?" he asked, looking bewildered.
"Because everyone is waiting for you to pop out a ring and propose," I said, barely moving my lips.
Realization dawned on him as he looked down at his pose and our current positions. He still had his hand wrapped around mine. Dropping my hand, he stood abruptly.
"It's not what it looks like. We're not together, and she's pregnant with another man's baby.” With that announcement, even more phones were whipped out. I slapped my hand across my forehead and wanted to crawl under the table to die.
Thanks a lot, Sash.
Sasha insisted on dropping me back off at my place.
"You know, you're a lot more intimidating online. I pictured you differently. But you're actually kind of cute," he said, bumping into my shoulder as we got to the front steps of my house. I punched him in the shoulder before climbing the steps to my door.
"Shut up. Are you going to tell me why you're really in town?" I twirled my keys on my keyring. He stood at the bottom of the steps and shrugged.
"Stuff. You know. I was in the neighborhood and figured I'd stop by and give you the kick in the pants you needed."
"I'm glad you did," I said, opening my door. He'd helped me see what I'd been running from for a long time. Fear was holding me back from so many things, but I couldn't let it hold me back from John Grimsby.
"I don't have to make you call him while I'm standing here, do I?"
"No," I said, shaking my head and stepping into the house. "I'll do it."
"Good," he said, jogging up the couple of steps and wrapping his arms around me in the doorway. His thickly muscled arms nearly enveloped me, but the smell was all wrong. Like leather and cedar. He gave me a squeeze.
"If you don't call him by tomorrow, I'm downloading all those chat files and emailing them to him," he said, pulling back and staring at me, keeping me in his hold.
"You suck. Have I told you that yet?"
"Nah, not yet. Night, Frankie," he said, letting me go and backing down the steps. I waved at him as he took off down the street. He slid a beanie onto his head and shoved his hands in his pockets. I smiled and marveled at just how crazy the day had ended. I closed the door and kicked off my shoes, sliding my hand into my pocket to get my phone out.
Time to face the music. I just
hoped I hadn't blown my chance with him.
27
John - Now
After sleeping off the hangover that seemed to last a week, Killian's words whipped through my head. I loved her. We needed to talk. Needed to hash this crap out and figure out what the hell was happening.
If she needs time, I could move at a glacial pace. If she needed space, I'd figure out a way to make it work. Back off for a while, not try for these big dates to impress her. But I needed to see her and talk to her.
I turned the corner to her block, and the excitement I felt at finally seeing her morphed into blinding rage as I saw her standing on her doorstep with some huge blonde guy. He had his arms wrapped around her and there was a big smile on her face. It lanced my heart to see her so happy. Not reserved, not a veneer, but a full-out smile. They were standing there so intimately for anyone to see. Had they just been inside? Who was this guy?
The guy jogged down the steps, and Frankie was standing in her doorway looking after him like some long-lost lover before closing the door. I could barely see straight. Rage coursed through my veins, completely replacing everything else. I chased after the guy, grabbing him by the shoulder.
"What the hell were you doing at Frankie's place?"
He whipped around, his fist in the air. I planted my feet ready to block whatever he threw out. The look of surprise on his face morphed into something else. Something unexpected. He chuckled and dropped his raised fist.
"You must be John," he said, crossing his arms over his chest. His eyes traveled up and down my body as he plastered on an assessing look. I was decidedly uncomfortable, and then he tilted his head to the side, nodding approvingly. "I can see what the fuss is about. And to clear the air, no, Frankie and I aren't a thing--believe me, she wants to see you. Right now, actually. Get in there." He put his hands on my shoulders and turned me around, pushing me back toward Frankie's door. I glanced over my shoulder.
“But who the hell are you?”
“An old friend. Don’t worry about it,” he said, pushing me again. I shook my head. I’d figure that out later, right then, I needed to talk to Frankie.
