Mad About You: A Box Set

by Pamela Ann

  “Sounds great.” Why didn’t this surprise me? The moment I heard his name, I couldn’t help but imagine what sort of party they had last night. Well knowing what type of women they usually went for, I didn’t have to guess that hard. Of course the apartment will be a party den. With these two, it was a given. So how the hell will I survive if they decided to party on the daily? They’d better not. I wasn’t a snitch but I’d seriously consider telling our parents if they decided to selfishly torture me with loud music, marijuana stench, endless litter, puke galore and all that entails. I had seen how trashed their parties could get so I better set some decent ground rules when I see them both.

  The condo was located Midtown so it would be an easy cab ride to school and the rest of Manhattan. It didn’t take long until the driver delivered us right outside the glass building. With Jackson in charge of both of my luggage, he casually strolled in before introducing me to the doorman named Norman. After the introduction we then strode towards the elevator before pressing the button panel to take us to the 8th floor. This was my second time in this place and I hoped that I get to keep the same bedroom I stayed in the first time I was here, which was right after it was purchased. Although all the rooms had the floor-to-ceiling that overlooked the city below, the room I chose directly overlooked this small family run bakery that had this old man with a prominent protruding stomach sing O Mio Babbino Caro at exactly six in the morning without fail. I wasn’t sure why I used to alarm my phone at that particular time just to check if he was going to sing but it became an odd habit of mine. Maybe it was the passion I heard in his voice and the depth of sadness that sprung me to tune in to him everyday that summer, whatever it was I knew hearing it surely would bring some familiarity and that sense of comfort I would surely seek given that I was far from home and the safe comfort of the town I grew up in.

  “Here it is, home sweet home sis.” Jackson stated as he broke into my thoughts just as the elevator dinged, indicating that we had arrived at our floor.

  Stepping out on the superbly polished black marbled floor, I held my breath as I followed his lead, turning left then stopping once we reached the place before pulling out keys from his jean pocket and unlocked the door. We were greeted by brightness of the room, skyscrapers and littered red cups everywhere with a several empty bottles of vodka everywhere. And with three matching leather modern sofas strategically situated in the middle of the living room, it made me wonder what my mom was thinking by choosing white as the main theme knowing that her son will most likely thrash it anyway.

  “I’m in the masters bedroom but I’m willing to give it up if you don’t feel like sleeping in the bedroom you used before.”

  That was nice of him to offer, I thought as I gratefully smiled at my brother. “Thanks, Jacks. I’ll keep that in mind.” I didn’t want to necessarily decline his generosity just yet. Just the rest of my kind, we women tend to be fickle so it was best to play it safe given that my bedroom was conveniently right across his from the hallway while the masters was situated on the opposite end, far from the kitchen and this section.

  And just as I was about to turn towards my room to change and what not, the opposing door opened and out came Drew Cavendish…freshly showered with nothing but boxer briefs on.

  Jesus, what a holy package, batman!

  Not only was I trying not to hyperventilate, but my capacity to think when I was under prepared for such encounters, naked or otherwise, left me non-functional.

  “Chloe’s here; you can’t walk around in your jockeys, yo. What the fuck, man?”

  “I forgot she was arriving,” I heard him say in a raspy voice.

  Upon hearing him, I was immediately reminded of how much I used to love his voice and how much it used to turn me into a lovesick teen who saw him as the master of my universe. But in his eyes, I was easily forgettable. No surprise there.

  Not bothering to meet his eyes, I poised myself to glance toward my brother who had just situated my things inside my bedroom.

  “Why don’t you change and rest a bit? I have to do something really quick. I’ll be back to take you out to dinner. How does that sound?” Jackson asked before reverting his attention to the beeping sound of his phone that was pressing for his undivided attention.

  Before I had the chance to object that I wasn’t ready to be alone with a half-naked man in the apartment, he was already out the door.

  Fuck. Way to go, Jacks! Now what? I could keep ignoring him; that would be a start.

  Refraining from sighing, I strode toward the door, intending to shut it, but the insufferable man made it his mission that I memorize the ridges of his six-pack and the impressive size of his whatchamacallit.

  “That’s probably due to Yvonne; she’s a persistent one.”

  “Good to know. Thanks,” I muttered as nonchalantly as I could before I busied myself with my things. Call it immature, but I was too startled and wound up about the unspoken past to pay mind to small talk.

  My instincts told me that he was still hovering close to the door, although I kept praying he would leave me alone. He hadn’t had any qualms about doing it in the past, so why bother this time?

  “How have you been?” he casually drawled, as if we were buddy-buddies.

  He was obviously too dense to realize I wasn’t up for chitchat. Since we were going to be sharing this place for quite a long time, however, I knew better than to start something that would make the situation twice as uncomfortable as it already was.

  “Things are … as expected,” I finally said as I opened my luggage and blankly stared at the contents.

  My body was too hyped, too aware of him to fully function as normal. It was irritating to see myself in such a position after what he had done to me. I had been here not even half an hour, and I was more affected than I should be. Life wasn’t fucking fair.

  “Well, good to see you again, Chloe.”

  I hardly doubted it, but I knew better than to say it out loud.

  “It’s good to see you, too.” I held my breath as I waited for him to move out of my room, but that hope was dashed when it became apparent he wanted to prolong this encounter.

  “You sure don’t look it. Is lying part of this new package, too, Chloe?”

  His voice was so filled with unmistaken sarcasm that I spun quickly to face him and became dizzy for a second.

  “What package?” I quipped back, meeting his blue eyes for the first time in so long.

  The moment our gazes clashed, my stomach dropped before I felt butterflies break out, leaving me agitated, angry, and frustrated all at the same time.

  “This …” He used his eyes to point out my body, perusing it with such agonizing intensity that it burned my skin, making me feel exposed, unarmed, vulnerable. “You were perfect the way you were.”

  Those are just empty words. He doesn’t mean any of them.

  Not enough, apparently, or I would have heard from him, but not a single word. He had left me as though that night had meant so little to him. He wouldn’t know what his actions had done to me, though. Like him, I very much preferred to forget it happened at all.

  The art of pretention would take time to hone and perfect, but I would get there, even if it killed me.

  “This is the new me, so take it or leave it. You’d be surprised to find out I won’t care either way.” Amber meeting his blue, I challenged him in ways he hadn’t seen coming. Gone was the girl who’d worshipped at his feet. I wasn’t sure what I was yet, but I damn well knew I wasn’t going back to that pathetic sap of an idiot I once was.

  “You’ve changed.”

  “And you haven’t.”

  I didn’t realize we weren’t alone until I heard someone clear their throat, immediately getting both our attention.

  Glancing past Drew’s shoulder, I watched as a tall, svelte woman eyed us with curiosity before diverting her attention to Drew, freezing me out as if I weren’t even there.

  “I’ve got to dash. I have a shoot in an
hour, but we’re still on for tonight, right?” she asked.

  “We are,” he calmly replied, unmoving from his position.

  A cat-like smile crossed her face. “Just double-checking,” she murmured before leaning over to kiss him on the cheek. Then she strutted down the hallway and out the door.

  Right, I thought as I realized what that was. Obviously, she had spent the night here—that was why he was in his undressed state, doing God knew what before he had come out to greet me.

  It was infuriating, and I wasn’t sure why I was feeling the way I was, but somehow, I felt insulted. It was as good as a slap to the face. The fact that the woman was beyond gorgeous didn’t help much at all or the fact that she had openly dismissed me as if I weren’t worthy of her attention, which wasn’t a surprising attitude when it came to women these days. Whatever.

  Back home, he had been into cheerleaders. He now had upgraded to models, it seemed. If that didn’t state how particular he was with the kind of women he dated, well, ponder no more. There was the answer.

  “That was totes awkward,” I commented before taking tedious steps toward the door and grabbing the handle, a hella sure sign that I wasn’t up for company. Regardless, he remained still, silent, as if he were in the throes of deep thinking. “Drew?” I raised my brow, hoping he would get the blatant message that he was the last person I preferred to be around. Call me bitter, but I needed to regroup. STAT.

  “Chloe …” he murmured, gazing at me with those eyes that devoured me alive. It was one of those rare moments when he used all of their power, their intensity to capture me, leaving my mind muddled, my body in feverish excitement, and my heart in serious overdrive.

  This is a trap. Think, brain, fucking think. I wasn’t in panic mode, although I was near to it. He was just too close for comfort, too naked, too everything for me to sanely handle him without hyperventilating. I felt like a deer caught with the headlights as he zoned in on me with his eyes before his body followed suit. He was a hairsbreadth away, and when his male scent hit my nostrils, I almost groaned in protest.

  “Stop this—”

  “Only if you promise to play nice.” Those eyes exclusively focused on my lips as if he were about to kiss me.

  My body was a lost cause, but my mind hadn’t given up yet. “Don’t you fucking dare. Don’t even fucking think it!”

  “Funny how these things work .Not so long ago, you welcome it without protest.” He was relentless, rattling me further.

  I gave a mocking laugh. “Funny, isn’t it? I’m sure, with the hoard of women you’ve had daily, they all sound and feel the same to you.”

  His breathing became ragged, holding me captive as he tried to rein himself in. “You’re the only virgin I’ve had, Chloe. Trust me, you felt different than the rest.”

  “Ah, at one point, I was wondering if I had imagined all of that, because you vanished into thin air. You fucking left without saying anything. So, no, you don’t get to do any of this shit. You have no right.” The sarcasm couldn’t quell the bitterness I tried to hide away from his knowing eyes.

  “Someday, you’ll thank me for that.”

  He would never know how much his rejection had affected me. It had changed me forever.

  “Somehow, I doubt that.”

  His closeness, his warmth, and the familiar scent of him that used to drive me wild with lust and everything else… I knew I had to compromise somewhere in this, whatever this was, before it spiraled out of control. That was the last thing I needed at the moment.

  “This is going to get really uncomfortable if we carry on this way, so I’m offering to start over. Let’s forget that night and pretend none of it happened. It was nothing. It meant nothing. So let’s not make this into something it wasn’t, all right?”

  “You’re right,” he murmured as he slowly raised his eyes to meet my troubled ones.

  Words that couldn’t be spoken out loud conveyed the ghost of our past. And that was where it should belong—in the past. We were now in the present. No point in turning back the time. No sorry or any form of apologies were spoken. Silently, we understood each other.

  When he finally moved his intense, possessive eyes away from me, his body followed suit, quietly leaving me in the room as he shut the door behind him.

  It’s over. I should breathe easy now. But even though I tried to reassure myself, the last thing I felt was calm and collected. The potent connection I’d had with him seemed as though it had unintentionally drained my soul, giving me the urge to cry.

  How did one forget there was someone out there who had the power to unman one’s heart, one’s soul by merely looking at you?

  Chapter 37

  The confrontation took up all of my energy. So much so that, after I took a quick, hot shower, I barely made it out to put a large comfortable shirt on before I passed out on the bed with my hair still wrapped in a towel.

  I awoke thirty minutes past three in the morning, still feeling the remnants of the emotional upheaval. So much for those who said sleep cured everything.

  Taking a moment to wake myself fully, I twisted to my side to switch on the Swarovski crystal lamp on the side table. It took me a bit for my eyes recover from the offensive brightness. Surprisingly, there was a small note left on the table.

  Didn’t want to wake you. There’s Chinese in the fridge.

  Jackson

  He was a good brother, but something was amiss with him. He seemed more distracted than usual. Then again, he had a new life here. Time and setting did affect one’s personality. Add growing pains to the top of the list, and well, there you had it. The last thing I wanted was for him to pick up on the bad vibes between Drew and me, so it was a wise decision that we had tentatively decided on a truce.

  Thoughts about my brother aside, I took a moment to take a breath before slipping out of the bed to use the bathroom. It wasn’t much of a surprise when I saw the dire haphazard state of my hair since the towel had unraveled during my doze. My hair reminded me of that Gary Busey mugshot photo, but oh, well. It was too late to do anything with it since I would simply go back to bed after I had food in my growling tummy.

  It was Friday night, so I doubted anyone was home. They would both most likely be out at some bar with their friends, surrounded by women. Same old, same old.

  After washing my hands, I lazily moved toward the door, yawning as I yanked it open before stepping out in the dimly lit hallway. If there were any trace left of sleepiness before opening the damn door, rest assured, everything vanished the moment my eyes witnessed Drew in the midst of thrusting in between a woman’s legs with his bedroom door half open. From the looks of it, they had been at it for quite some time.

  I stood there, flabbergasted by what I was seeing. He had his lights on, so I could very well see everything from this angle. Frozen in place, I saw the woman he was having sex with was the same woman I had seen earlier today. From memory, Drew was somewhat gentle with me, the polar opposite of what he was doing with this chick. The word pummeled came to mind as I watched with disgusted awe.

  So this defined the word fucking, while what I’d had with him resembled the words vanilla sex. As bewildering as it was, what I hadn’t expected to feel was the pain that crept out of nowhere, seizing my entirety. The back of my eyes burned. My breathing became erratic. Most of all, my chest ached so much that I thought it mimicked a mini heart attack.

  It took every ounce of me to retreat into my room. And even though my closed door shielded me from him, the memory of what I had seen came alive in my mind. My eyes kept seeing him, flashing the images of his skin, the image of his muscled buttocks working each time he thrust between her legs. It was all too much to take. Traumatized didn’t cover it. No, I was beyond that.

  Resuming sleep was clearly out of the question. After an agonizing hour of flashbacks, I knew I couldn’t keep torturing myself, so I dragged myself over to unpack my belongings from hanging my clothes to placing little mementos from home and my frien
ds around the room that reminded me of happier times.

  Although the pain was overbearing, I somehow consoled myself into believing this was a good thing. If I had held a hint of expectations, I knew now that there was nothing left to resurrect. If that hadn’t been a clear enough of sign to move the fuck on, then I was the densest person to ever exist.

  This too shall pass. My mind pressed on, but my heart knew better.

  Jackson finally made it home at half past noon. After hearing his jumbled excuse that he was with Yvonne, I wondered if things were getting serious between the two. It was so unlike him to be with the same woman for four weeks. I supposed that reinstated my belief that people changed along with the circumstances. And in some ways, I was glad he had found someone to commit to. It was long overdue.

  When I pressed him to meet this woman, he made some odd excuse that it was too early for any of that. Therefore, I left the subject open for future invitations.

  Much to my surprise, when Jackson knocked at Drew’s door, wondering if he wanted to come out to lunch with us, he wasn’t there. Upon that realization, I kicked the sinking feeling I had to the curb. Bad energy be gone.

  Jackson and I spent some quality time together as he introduced me to his go-to café named Little Collins that was within walking distance from the apartment. It was a cozy spot with metal stools and a heady aroma of good food and fresh coffee grinds. From the brilliantly brewed cappuccino to their house cured salmon with mascarpone and arugula, I knew this sweet spot would be at the top of my list, as well. My brother and I were alike in a lot of ways, food tastes included.

  “You mentioned boys at the airport yesterday. Are you seeing anyone?” Jackson’s question made me pause while sipping my coffee.

  “I’m dating, but nothing serious since, you know, I knew I was moving, anyway. Getting into a relationship wouldn’t be fair for either party.” All of that and the fact that it had been difficult to connect with anyone since each guy had fallen short when compared to Drew Cavendish. It was all so idiotic now, but oh, well. At least the thin veil, if there ever were one, had truly come off.