“Look, man. Keep getting to know her. You don’t have to figure this out right away. Just keep hanging with her for now.”
I frown at him. “If you weren’t my friend, you’d be asking her out right now, wouldn’t you?”
He looks guilty.
I point my beer can at him. “And fucking Jack Massey’s already sniffing around.”
He lifts his eyebrows in concession. “I see your point. Look, I know you’ve got some personal shit going on that’s holding you back. But maybe this girl’s worth putting yourself out there for.”
I think of all the times I have lain in bed and dreamed of being a normal guy who has a real relationship with a woman…gets married and buys a house in the suburbs somewhere with a German shepherd running around like in the movies. Then I remember what happened last time I tried to have a relationship.
I shake my head. “I can’t do a relationship. I’ve got to focus on my family.”
“I get it. I know you’re putting your brother through school, and you’ve got your mom and your grandma to take care of. But it doesn’t mean you can’t like a girl or at least kiss her.”
The idea of this both gets my blood pressure going and scares the shit out of me. “Really?”
“Yeah. Otherwise you’re sailing right into the friend zone, and there’s no coming back from that. Kiss her, and that lets her know you’re interested. She still might go out with Jack Massey or some other guy who sees a new girl around here to pounce on, but at least she’ll know you’re a contender.”
A kiss. That’s not dangerous. And it’s not a relationship.
I chuckle, looking down at my beer. I set it down. “Thank you.”
He shrugs. “I didn’t do anything.”
I head toward the front door, and he follows me. “Where are you going?”
“To your house.”
16
Kylie
I’m bringing a plate in from the living room when a knock sounds at the door, and I freeze, not sure what I’m supposed to do. I creep toward it on tiptoes and glance through the peephole. It’s Brett. I breathe a sigh of relief, and my stomach starts spinning like it does when I see him.
“Hey,” I say, wishing these guys had a mirror that I could have checked myself in before answering the door.
“How’s it going?”
“About the same as Saturday.”
“I wanted to see if you could use some help.”
“Thanks, that’s really sweet, but I’ve got this.”
He scratches his chin. “Listen, can I talk to you a minute?”
“Yeah,” I say, and we walk over to the couch and sit.
“I feel really weird about last night,” he says.
I almost ask him if he means Monday morning, because I feel weirder about that oddball kiss than anything, but I just wait for him to go on.
“I should have offered you to stay longer with me if you needed to. I just wasn’t expecting your housing not to come through, and—”
“Please,” I say, cutting him off, “don’t think another thing about it. I never would have expected you to have me at your place for longer than the weekend, and I didn’t even expect that. It’s fine. I appreciate everything you’ve done—”
His lips are on mine before I can comprehend what’s happening. His fingertips brush the nape of my neck, and then they thread through my hair. My body’s reaction finally catches up with what’s happening, my chest lighting up like a million hummingbirds are flying around a sanctuary. He pulls away and meets my gaze, his eyes lazy, his lip curling up in a little smile.
He clears his throat and stands up. “I’m gonna help.” He walks into the kitchen, leaving me in a puddle on the couch. In a moment, he comes out with a trash can and picks up a bottle, tossing it in. In another life, I would tell him we should separate the plastic and aluminum for recycling, but I’m not sure my voice works at the moment. So instead, I get up and walk into the kitchen, begging the smile on my face to stop being so obnoxious.
I get a load going in the dishwasher and hand-wash the rest of the dishes. Brett squeezes by me with the trash can, and I still, wondering if he will touch me or try to kiss me again, but he just sets it down and then points to the kitchen sink cabinets, which I’m blocking. “May I?”
“Sure,” I say, shutting the dishwasher door and scooting aside. He peruses the cleaning stuff, picking up a few bottles, and then squeezes back by. I find that the desire inside me has amped up like a race-car engine, but I tell my body to chill.
Brett disappears into the back of the unit while I work in the kitchen. A while later, from the hallway, the washer buzzes and I head over to the stackable units to transfer the laundry to the dryer.
Brett comes out into the hallway. “I’m done with the bathroom.”
“Thanks,” I say, tossing underwear into the dryer.
“You’re doing their laundry?” he asks.
“Just Cohen’s. He’s paying me an extra ten bucks. He seems like a nice guy.”
“He is.”
I start the dryer and then turn around, resting on it. He holds back a grin, and I do the same. I jerk a thumb toward the living room. “I’m just gonna go get the broom.”
“I’ll wipe down the tables and stuff in the living room,” he says, but neither of us moves.
I chew on my lip, looking down at my shriveled hands. “You’re really sweet to help me with this.”
“I have an ulterior motive,” he says, sliding his hands onto my hips. We’re face-to-face, but neither of us makes a move.
“At least you’re up-front about that.”
“Mmm-hmm,” he says, inching closer.
I can’t figure out what to do with my hands, so I finally rest them on his shoulders. It’s so weird. I can’t remember feeling these kinds of butterflies with Joshua or anyone else before him.
He leans in and kisses me again, but this time he doesn’t stop. We kiss, sweet and innocent at first, but it doesn’t take long for us to get exploratory. We fall into a heavenly bliss of mouths and my hands on his chest and his hands on my waist and my back. He presses against me, our body parts grazing one another’s, then he pulls away to kiss my neck, and then I kiss his scratchy jawline.
A shout from outside rocks me back to reality, and I pull away from him, my lips swollen and my body panting. “I’m gonna put in this other load of clothes.”
“Okay,” he says, his eyes dreamy as he steps back from me and heads into the other room.
As I put another guy’s pants into the washer, it dawns on me that what Brett needed in order to start something with me was separation. Whatever this is between us is brand spanking new. How could that work if we were in the same house? But now, he has the freedom to try something with me knowing we have our own space to exit to.
I sweep the floors while Brett wipes down everything and then follows after my sweeping with a mop. I’m so impressed by the fact that he’s completely fine with cleaning another guy’s house just so he can be with me. It’s pretty dang sweet.
We finish the floors and put up the broom and mop in the kitchen closet, and he gets that kissing look again. I grin, trying not to look at him. “I saw two sets of clean sheets in the hall closet. Do you want to help me make up the beds?”
“Yep,” he says and follows me down the hall.
We strip the beds and put on the clean sheets and comforters, then Brett tosses me onto Cohen’s bed. I let out a girly giggle that I never knew I had in me. We get started again with a make-out session, but it’s all very innocent. There are kisses full of grins, even some teeth knocking, plenty of teasing, and nothing that would devastate me if it was secretly recorded and blasted on socials.
The buzzer on the dryer sounds. “I need to go get that.”
He pulls me back to him. “Cohen can do his own damn laundry.”
“Not if I want his ten dollars.” I peck him on the lips and roll off the bed and onto my feet.
I gather the la
undry and then dump the load onto Cohen’s bed. As we start folding, Brett meets my gaze. “It’s respectable, what you’re doing here.”
“Folding laundry?”
“Doing what you have to do to make it on your own and distance yourself from your old life. I imagine as a rich girl growing up on the slopes of Aspen, you probably didn’t have to take too many cleaning jobs in order to get by.”
“To be fair, I did have a very strenuous job at a high-end boutique when I was sixteen. How do you think I got to be such an excellent folder?” I display a T-shirt, draping it over my arm and motioning to it with my other hand.
Brett picks up a pair of Cohen’s boxers, realizes what he has in his hands, and then tosses them at me. “I have my limits.”
“Another man’s underwear? That’s your cleaning limit?”
“Yep.”
I fold them and start a pile when my text alert sounds. I pull my phone out of my back pocket and see that it’s Cohen.
How’s it going?
I type back.
Good. Everything’s done except your second load of laundry. It’s in the dryer. Will probably be another hour just waiting on that.
Cool.
I re-pocket my phone, and Brett eyes me, folding a resort-issued polo.
“That was just Cohen checking in.”
“Mmm,” he grunts, and we fold in silence a moment. “He got your number?”
Do I detect a hint of jealousy? “Yep,” I say, trying not to be weird.
He picks up a T-shirt and cuts his eyes at me. “Are you into him?”
I squint at him, holding back my grin. “Would you care if I was?”
He gives me a sly look without an answer, triggering a warmth to my center.
We finish folding and I find places for all the clothes in drawers. I turn around. “All done.”
He holds his hand out to me, and I take it as we stand face-to-face, staring into each other’s eyes, my whole body on alert down to my core.
“I’d care,” he says.
My pulse is sent racing. I’m not sure what to infer from those two words, but I’m okay leaving it at that.
“Good to know,” I say.
His mouth is on my neck and he’s leaving soft kisses with bits of tongue. My eyes close and my head falls back instinctually. He pulls away and I meet his mouth with mine, my hands cupping his substantial shoulders. He’s not buff like a bodybuilder or overly broad, but he’s solid.
I am barely aware of a door shutting in the distance when Brett eases away from me, pinching my hip with a cute little grin. I straighten myself, checking my body for any evidence of my wanton lust for this man.
We walk out to find Cohen and Logan in the living room inspecting the place. There are two other guys with them who I don’t recognize.
“Damn, girl,” Logan says.
“Did you know our kitchen floors were white?” Cohen asks. “I always thought they were gray.”
“Your second load of laundry is in the dryer,” I say, “and the sheets are in the washer. I can come back and fold it all tomorrow if you’re ready for me to get out of your hair tonight?”
Brett cuts his eyes at me, clearly not liking that option.
Cohen waves me off. “It’s cool. Thanks, though.”
“You did all this for forty bucks?” one of the strange guys asks, looking around. “This place was gross.”
“Your place is even grosser,” Logan says.
The one guy looks at the other guy. “We’ve got forty bucks.”
“Yeah,” the other one says. “My girlfriend won’t come to my place until I clean it.”
“It’s fifty if you want me to do your laundry.” I rethink that, not knowing how much laundry they have. “Actually, five per load. I put in the sheets before I leave. You can put those in the dryer and start them yourself. That’s if you have a spare pair for me to replace the dirty ones with.” I’m making all this up on the fly like this is my full-time business.
“Cool,” one of the guys says. “Can you come tomorrow?”
I’m so tired I’m about to collapse, but my response is, “Absolutely.”
I collect their info, and then Brett and I head out. I can’t be sure, but it’s possible Brett and Cohen exchange a look as they pass one another. I don’t think I was supposed to see it, but I happened to turn around right as they met each other’s gazes. I can’t help wondering what that was about.
When we get outside, I’m curious if Brett will ask me to come to his place, but he walks with me in the direction of Tori’s unit. This is definitely for the best. The kisses were luscious, but I don’t think I’m ready for anything else tonight. If he’d have asked, it might have been hard to turn down.
When we get to the steps of Tori’s unit, he stops and pockets his hands. Now he’s going all shy on me?
“Thanks for helping tonight. I’d be there another hour if it weren’t for you,” I say.
“No problem.”
I try to hand him a twenty, but he waves me off, so I put it away and adjust the strap of my purse. “I had fun, if that’s possible while doing dishes.”
“I had fun, too. I’m free tomorrow night,” he says, eyebrows up.
I giggle. “No way. I’m doing tomorrow night’s gig solo. But thanks for asking.”
“Understood,” he says and backs away. “Night, Kylie.”
A massive letdown takes me over, because I was really hopeful for a final kiss for the night, but I’ve still got the ones from earlier to dream about as I drift off to sleep.
17
Kylie
As I lean into the pool to grab a kickboard, a sharp pain shoots through my back and I stand up straight, pressing my hand on it like the boomers do on the arthritis management commercials. I think this is my body screaming for some yoga. I’ve abandoned my regimen since everything went to hell back home.
But the pain has come with its reward—a hundred and fifty beautiful dollars. Monday night’s job led to Tuesday night’s job, then one last night. While I’m so exhausted I have to make sure I don’t pass out into the pool, I’m able to eat something other than peanut butter crackers for dinner tonight.
Brett checked in with me on Tuesday to say hi, but that’s been pretty much it. He didn’t respond to my response, which was left sort of open-ended, but I’m not freaking out. It’s not like we slept together and things are weird or anything like that. We just kissed, he said he’d care if I was into another guy, and then we said good night. It’s normal not to be talking every day…I think. Honestly, I have no idea. I was in a years-long sham of a relationship. That’s my whole level of expertise on the subject.
I don’t have any more cleaning gigs lined up at the moment, so I’ve offered to take Tori and Brett out to dinner. It’s not just an excuse to get to see him again. It kind of is, but I also do want to thank them both properly. We’re going somewhere Tori says is excellent but cheap, which I’m extremely thankful for, because by the time I put some gas in my car and bought some food that had actual nutrition involved, I’m already down over sixty bucks.
“Hey,” I hear and whip my head around to find Jack walking toward me in his suit pants and a shirt and tie. He looks a good ten years older than he has the other times I’ve seen him. But even so, he’s seriously handsome—a bit devastatingly so, actually.
“Hey,” I say with a smile. I glance him up and down. “Did you come for a swim?”
He gazes at the pool. “I wish. I actually came to see you. How’s it going here at the pool?” he asks, glancing around like he’s on Mars.
“It’s good.”
“Did you hurt your back?” he asks.
“Oh, no. That’s just from overdoing it this week. I’ve been cleaning houses for some extra cash. I’ve had gigs three nights this week.”
He looks at me like I’ve sprouted a unicorn horn. “You’ve been doing that on top of this job?”
“Yeah. It’s just temporary, until I get on my feet.”
/>
“Do you want to leave all this behind and come to work in the business office with me?”
I shrug. “Sure. When do I start?”
“Monday. It’s a temp job—two weeks. You’d be collecting data for an outreach initiative.”
My heart rate quickens. “Wait, are you serious? This is a real thing?”
“Like I said, it’s temp work. Nothing glamorous, but it pays a little more than you’re making here.”
I glance around, dumbfounded. “Can I do that—just leave my pool job for two weeks?”
“They’ll redistribute staff. They do it all the time.”
“What about after the two weeks?”
“You can come back here or we can see what else is available around the resort.”
I grip the kickboard, the excitement shooting through my arms. “Really? It’s that easy?”
He chuckles. “Yeah. Didn’t they redistribute staff at your last company? I checked out your resume earlier. Hope you don’t mind.”
My chest constricts with guilt. I listed my dad’s company on my resume and application and gave one of the HR women who I used to chat with as a reference. Her husband had cheated on her once and she was more than willing to help. I scratch my forehead. “Uh, sure.”
“So you’re in?”
I nod vigorously. “Yes. Absolutely.”
“Come to the business office on Monday morning.”
I shake my head. “I can’t believe this.” I open up my arms. “Thank you.” I start to give him a hug, and then I pull away, quickly. “Wait, that’s inappropriate…isn’t it?”
He smiles. “I suppose it could be construed that way. Especially since you’re in a bathing suit.”
I give him a thumbs-up with a cluck of my tongue against my cheek. “Right.” I punch him in the shoulder lightly. “Thanks a bunch.”
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