by Piper Rayne
“Here.” I hold out my hand even though my keys are in my purse.
“I have to figure it out eventually.”
He doesn’t release them, and I watch the tip of the key keep hitting the lock. I think whatever pain killer they must’ve given him at the hospital is affecting him. Finally, it goes in the hole and he unlocks the deadbolt, but we still have the bottom lock. Amazingly, it only takes four tries until we’re in, but by the time we enter, Jax, Seth, and Ethan are in the hallway with us.
“Just call me if you need me. Remember, I’m his in case of emergency,” Seth says and Jax slams the door in his face.
“I’m going to make him a badge,” Jax says, moving right to the fridge. He pulls out two beers and one water bottle, untwists the caps, and hands the water to Dylan, a beer to me, and downs a huge sip of his own beer. “Well, this sucks, huh?”
Dylan says nothing and downs his water. I take off and throw the white gym socks in the trash.
“Hey now, I paid good money for those socks!” Jax laughs, and I join in.
Dylan grunts and stands. “Listen, you guys, don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine.”
“Let me help you get settled in bed. I have some extra pillows,” I say.
But Dylan is already halfway to his room. When he gets to the door, he turns to us again. “I’m good. Promise.” Then he disappears into his room.
Jax steps over to me. “He’s such a martyr, I swear.”
“He’s too proud.”
Jax rolls his eyes and puts his empty beer bottle in the recycling. “I’m going to head to bed too. It was nice going out with you tonight even if…” He leans forward and I wonder what I would do if he did try to kiss me. “It was platonic. I don’t usually welcome second place, Rian.”
I bite my lip, unsure what he wants me to say.
“But if you ever get lonely at night, my bed is open.” He winks.
I’m not sure if he’s serious or just has no idea how to handle the situation we find ourselves in.
After his door shuts, I dump my beer down the drain and add the bottle to the recycling bin, lock the apartment door, and go into my room. Once I’m completely ready for bed, I knock on Dylan’s door. He mumbles a come in and I twist the doorknob.
“Just checking on…” My words trail off as my gaze falls to his bare chest.
I’ve seen Dylan shirtless plenty of times, but never have I seen him only in his boxer briefs. They’re lime green—which seems odd to me because the majority of his wardrobe is black and gray. I would’ve placed money on them being a neutral color. Maybe navy blue. But never lime green.
“Eyes up here, Rian,” he says.
As my vision sweeps up his hard chest to his eyes, I find his attention centered on my chest. It’s then I realize I’m not wearing a bra and I’m nipping. They’re like two flashlights seeking attention.
“I could say the same.”
He laughs, licks his lips. “I’ve never seen you in that,” he says, nodding toward my silk-and-lace tank-and-short pajama set.
“I change before coming out in the morning. I wasn’t thinking.”
“Are you telling me you’re a closet lingerie wearer?” he asks, his smirk so big my stomach flip-flops nonstop.
“No, it’s just not appropriate to wear…”
His gaze descends down my body one more time and I really wish I would have grabbed my cardigan. I just thought I’d pop my head in.
“You’re right. I don’t want Owens to see you like that.”
His words warm me, and I nibble on my bottom lip. “Do you need another pillow or anything?”
“No. I’m good.”
I nod with one last look at him. “Okay then. Goodnight.”
“Goodnight, Rian,” he says, and I shut the door.
As I hustle back to my room, I’ve never felt sexier. Maybe my lingerie needs to come out a little more often.
Chapter Fifteen
Dylan
Monday. Ink Envy is closed, but the minute my alarm goes off because I should be getting ready to go to the gym, I groan. My permanent cast was put on yesterday and it’s even more awkward and uncomfortable than the temporary one was.
Sliding my ass to the edge of my bed, I stand then open my dresser drawer and pull out a pair of track pants. Sitting back down, I open the right side to step through successfully, but opening the left is somehow impossible. After sweat beads along my hairline, I get my leg in, but now I have to pull them up.
“I look like I’m doing some kind of chicken dance at a wedding,” I mumble, shimmying them up my legs.
Forget the damn T-shirt.
I walk into the living room and toward the kitchen. Rian’s just getting out of bathroom. Shit, did it really take me that long to get the pants on?
“How are you this morning?” She tightens her robe.
It’s not the first time I’ve thought about her being naked under that puffy thing. But after I tried unsuccessfully to beat off with my right hand after she came in wearing those short silk shorts and tight cami that outlined her tits last night, I have to try to ignore the thought of her naked. Going six weeks with blue balls isn’t going to help my mood.
Again, her eyes fall to my chest. It makes me want to walk around without a shirt on all the time.
“I’m good. Sore.” I’m not sure sore from the broken arm. The bruises and scrapes all demand more attention at the moment.
“Well, eat something before taking the pain pills.” She walks across the living room.
“Got it, Mom, but I need to take a shower before I do anything.”
Her feet stop and she turns around. “Your nurse told me that you have to wrap the cast up in plastic.” She comes toward me. “She said we could try one of my scrunchies.”
“Yeah, I read the instructions last night.”
She grabs a garbage bag, not listening to me, and puts it over my arm. “Like this, I think. Maybe I should YouTube it?” She leaves the bag on my arm and turns to head back to her room.
“I got it, Rian, no worries.”
“Are you sure?”
I nod.
“Okay.” Her expression reminds me of the day she couldn’t get the puppy. “Well, my scrunchies are in the drawer on the left.”
She disappears through her bedroom door and I feel like an asshole for not allowing her to help me, but somehow, I think she’s probably not surprised. I chomp down on a granola bar and take two of my painkillers before taking my garbage bag to the bathroom.
I open up the left drawer and there’s a stockpile of hair stuff. I put my arm through the garbage bag and roll the scrunchie up my arm, although it feels like my circulation is cut off.
Taking a shower without the use of your dominant hand sucks. My right hand feels as if I’m a robot and it’s short-circuiting every minute. By the time I’m finished, I still don’t feel completely clean. And drying myself off? It’s a damn joke. I can’t wrap the towel around my waist with only one hand. My track pants are my only hope of walking out of here covered.
I stick one leg through the pants, though my skin is still damp because I apparently have no muscle strength in my right arm to even dry my skin. Shimmying them up my legs like I did this morning is ten times harder with wet skin, and I end up falling on my ass with a huge bang.
“Fuck!”
A knock sounds on the door immediately.
“I’m good, Rian,” I say.
“Okay. I can cover my eyes if that makes you feel more comfortable.” There’s a long pause. “I mean, if you need help.”
I look between my legs, my dick limp and flaccid. No way in hell is she coming in here.
But the track pants aren’t an option either.
“I need you to close your eyes because I’m going out with only a towel covering my dick.”
“Oh… okay.” Then there’s nothing for a second. “My eyes are closed.”
I shrug off the track pants. Covering my dick with a towel, I open the do
or and walk out.
Rian’s at the kitchen table with her hand covering her closed eyes. “I’m not looking. Swear.”
“She might not be, but I am. Great bod, Phillips.”
Jax shuts the fridge door with a smile. He’s actually dressed in a shirt and pajama pants on for once.
“Fuck off, Owens.” I slam my bedroom door like an angry teenager.
This fucking sucks. I look at the zip-up hoodie I laid on my bed. I need to cut the left sleeve to work with my cast, but I have no scissors. Not to mention if I try to cut it with my right hand, it will never work out. Having no other choice, I open my bedroom door, looking for Jax.
What I find is Rian still at the kitchen table.
“What are you doing here?”
She glances up then down then back up. I’m still shirtless. If I’m not careful, she’ll become immune to the image soon.
“I’m working from home. Pierson doesn’t have a problem with it.”
“Why?”
“To help you.” She stands from the chair. “What do you need?”
“I was going to have Jax…”
“Jax just left. Went to do his laundry.”
He’s never up this early. And laundry? Likely excuse. Where did he really go? If it was the city… I stop my mind from assuming anything. Jax isn’t my business. He never really was, and if he wants to look up old acquaintances and get into trouble, I can’t stop him.
“I just need someone to cut off my sweatshirt sleeve.”
She turns and opens her junk drawer that’s not really a junk drawer. It’s more like an organized miscellaneous drawer. All her different types of tape are lined up according to size. Coupons stacked neatly in the corner. She turns back around with a pair of scissors. “Got it.”
Before I can blink, she’s in my room. Although this hasn’t always been my room, I’ve made mine since living here and it feels weird to have her in my space.
She eyes the sweatshirt on my bed. “Do you know where I should cut it already?”
“I never put it on, so no.”
She picks it up and unzips it. With her feather-light touch, she pulls it over my good arm. Her wet hair is twisted into a bun on top of her head and her face is bare of makeup. She’s beautiful, pure, and natural. How does she not see that? Allowing Blanca and Sierra to give her a makeover was unnecessary.
She arranges the other side of the sweatshirt to rest on my shoulder, the sleeve hanging down empty. She reaches for my casted arm and eyeballs where she’ll have to cut. Her eyes follow the track of her hands until our eyes connect.
I swallow past the dryness in my mouth. “Thanks for doing this.”
She steps closer, tearing her eyes from mine and touching the part of the sweatshirt we’ll be cutting off. “Do you have a pen?” She moves to my dresser where my sketchbook is and stops, staring at the picture. “Dylan…” A sigh falls from her lips. “It’s beautiful. Did someone request this?”
I admire the peony tattoo I’m sketching for her. “No. I just sketched it for someone who I think it would be beautiful on.”
Her ass falls to my bed and her hands run down the paper. “I love it.”
“Really?” I seek out the confirmation that I really do know her as well as I think I do.
“Yeah. I never knew if I’d have the guts for a tattoo. Seeing all the girls who go into Ink Envy and pick a generic tattoo that could be on anyone else’s body never appealed to me. This is unique. When you do something like this, do you ever resell the image?” She stares at the picture in her hand.
“No. Not if the client asked me to draw it.”
“So you could draw something for me that’s just mine and no one else would have it?”
My mind screams tell her. Tell her you drew the peony for her. Let her eyes soften and her lips part. Open yourself up and allow her to climb in. Rian is safe, she’d never destroy the friendship you’ve built.
Instead I say, “Definitely. As soon as I’m out of the cast, I can sketch something. Any ideas?”
Coward, my conscience screams.
She glances at the sketchbook. “Just something beautiful like this.”
“And you’ll really let me tattoo you?”
She nods and stands, abandoning the sketchbook on the bed and picking up the scissors and the pen. She marks a spot on the sleeve, and I suffer through her closeness while she helps me take off my sweatshirt. She cuts off the sleeve and puts the hoodie back on me.
“Thanks,” I say.
“Zipped or unzipped?” Her fingers hold the edge of the zipper dangerously close to my dick that’s at half-chub from the scent of her soap and her being so near.
I’m screwed. Why now, after all these years, is she like a drug and I’m an addict? “Zipped.”
After she’s done, we go out to the living room, her heading to the kitchen table and me to the couch.
“How’s that problem going?” I ask, clicking on the news.
“It’s okay. I think I might have part of it right, but this might be above my intelligence level. No matter what my parents believe.”
I slide on the cushion so I’m turned in her direction, resting my broken arm on the back of the couch. “You’re the smartest woman I know.” And that’s the truth.
She rolls her eyes. “Thanks.”
“Does my opinion mean nothing?”
She stands from the chair and refills her coffee cup. She pulls another cup, fills it, and comes over to me. “You get a coffee for the compliment.”
I sip the black coffee. “Is this how we’ll work it?”
She laughs. “Sure.”
“In all seriousness, you know you don’t have to stay home. I’ll manage.”
She picks up her coffee and joins me on the couch. “I get that you’re not used to having people to count on, but you have us. We all want the best for you.”
“Thanks, but—”
“No, Dylan. I can do the same work here as I can at the office. After a few weeks when you’re used to the cast, I’ll go back, but you’ll have to suck it up for now. This is the way it is.” She tucks her legs under her body and sips her coffee.
My chest gets a warm funny feeling in it. “Listen, about last night…”
I want to say what I should have told her a long time ago. It’s time she knows how I feel about her and why I’ve ignored the telltale signs that maybe she likes me more than a friend.
She glances away from the television to me. “What’s up?”
I open my mouth to tell her, but the buzzer from downstairs goes off.
She places her coffee on the table, standing to answer. “I have no idea who that would be.” She presses the intercom button near the door of the apartment. “Hello?”
“Hey, it’s Frankie.”
“Come on up.” Rian presses the button to allow her in then opens our apartment door a crack. “I’m going to bake some cookies or something. I’m sure you’ll have a lot of visitors today.”
Just like that, I lose the nerve to say lock the door, keep Frankie out, and let me be straight with you.
Chapter Sixteen
Dylan
Jolie sings as she and Frankie come through the door. Rian’s giddy to see the three-year-old and already cleared the table of her work. I’m fairly sure she can’t bake cookies when she’s at the office, but I’m not saying anything. I fear I’ll need Rian’s help, so her being around is probably a good thing.
“Uncle Dylan!” Jolie runs toward me but stops. She points at my arm. “Hurt?”
Frankie follows right behind, closing the door and saying hello to Rian with a hug. She’s thinner than she was a week ago.
“Hey, boss,” Frankie says, sitting in the chair beside the couch, Jolie’s bag between her legs. Her jeans and T-shirt hang off her. She’s always been thin, but she’s gauntly now.
“Jolie, want to help me make monster cookies?” Rian asks.
Jolie’s eyes widen and her mouth forms a small O. She stares
at me as though she’s wondering if she heard Rian ask that or if she’s hearing things.
“Whoa, did you ever come on a good day, huh?” I say.
She unzips her coat as she circles around the room to reach Rian.
Frankie sends Rian a look of appreciation before she leans back, her eyes wide on me. “Fell off your bike, huh?”
“Yeah, I’m out for six weeks.”
“I heard,” she says. “And what are we going to do about it?”
I sit up, sliding down the couch toward her so we can talk with a little more privacy, although Jolie’s excitement is so loud, I doubt they can hear us. Rian probably wouldn’t care or judge me anyway, but the alpha in me would prefer her not to know business is bad. “Are you back now?”
She nods. “He’s locked up.” Her worried eyes venture to Jolie.
I touch her knee. “How long?”
Frankie lives a complicated life and I try not to pry, allowing her to dish out information as she sees fit. I guess it’s because of how I grew up.
“Six months, I hope.”
At least she should be in good shape to take over Ink Envy for me. “I need to find a replacement for myself. I went to the city before this happened and nothin’. Lyle is progressing, but I don’t want to rush him.”
She laughs. “He told me you lost your cool the other day. I thought he was going to piss his pants when he called.”
Good to know my employees gossip about me.
“Yeah, not my finest moment. Neither was getting myself in this situation.” I lift the cast.
“And how exactly did you do that?”
I glance over my shoulder to where Rian is tying one of her aprons on Jolie.
“Rian, it’s okay if she gets dirty,” Frankie says.
“Yay!” Rian looks at Jolie and they toss the apron away. “How about I sit down and just read you the directions?” Rian sits and crosses her legs, but Jolie grabs her hand to pull her back up.
“We’ll talk about it later,” I say and try to move my left hand up to my hair. Fuck.
“Oh, I gotcha.” Frankie winks. She’s been giving me hell about Rian for a while now.
