All she knew was that he was too much, too fast. It was all too fast.
There was no way that she could be making the right decision with him. He was too perfect. Just like her ex.
And just like before, she would be left alone on a Monday morning and no way to explain what she didn’t quite understand herself.
Left with an empty his side.
Bathroom devoid of shaving implements, the ones she had come to count on encroaching on her side of the sink. Bedroom lacking the neck pillow she’d bought for his bad back and closets without his clothing. Unlike the first time, she would be empty inside while her space remained exactly the same.
The worst part was she knew the pain would be so much worse than before and that scared her the most.
“I didn’t take you for a coward.”
“I’m not.”
“Yeah, you are.”
“Dammit, I can’t fucking do this with you anymore!”
“What, Sidonie?” Den’s voice was low and deceptively calm, the moments before a storm.
“I can’t do this.”
“I deserve better than that.” She pulled away from him and he grabbed her back.
The only reason she didn’t push him away was in deference to the sling he wore. Or that was what she said to make herself feel better. His hands soothed her, even when he was angry, even when she was and wanted to stay that way.
It would make this conversation much easier to have.
“I–I… You!”
“Me what?”
“You make me feel too much. I can’t take it.”
She had made that same statement a thousand times before. But this time, he wasn’t inside of her and it didn’t matter. She couldn’t take another second of feeling like this. It was so…
Delicious.
Beautiful.
Wonderful.
Amazing.
Scary.
Hypnotizing.
Eerie.
Haunting.
It was all of those things and yet, so much more. It was the thunder and lightning in a storm. He had become the gravity that held her earthbound even as she wanted to float away. It was supposed to be simple, yet now everything was complicated by the fact that she was… falling.
That was a lie.
She already had fallen long before now. This was just the moment she realized it. What she knew for certain was she didn’t want to say it out loud.
Sidonie knew there was a chasm within her that she had lived happily without filling. Never imagined it could be filled. Her life was full, felt full, until he swept in and made her realize how empty her world truly was.
How hollow it was.
None of her friends understood. None of them had children.
None of them knew what it was like to go on an outing with other parents and be the only single one. Even worse was the last time she’d gone on an outing just like this one, about a year ago. That particular day, Katie wanted to go to the beach with her friend, so she invited the girl, Bella, and her mother, Rachelle.
The pair of course, asked another girl and her mother to go. It wasn’t a big deal, but when she arrived at the beach, it was to find the moms, kids, and spouses there, when she only expected it to be a mommy-daughter thing.
She made small talk and had a beer at a local pier bar with them afterward as the children ate, but she felt like a fifth wheel for sure. She was the only one without a spouse to share the burdens of life with. Someone to pack lunch because she had come home late from work.
Someone to help her move furniture when she wanted to redecorate.
The smallest things made the most difference and that was what she missed the most about being part of a couple. Being part of something.
“You can do better than that.”
She could, but why say what he already knew?
“Damn you, McTavish.”
“No. You want to damn us both.” He huffed a nasal spout from his nostrils.
“You don’t understand.”
“Better than you think.” He sighed and took his hand from her arm. It was even worse to admit that when his touch left her, the warmth went with it. Now the setting sun only seemed to herald a cool evening she seemed ill equipped to deal with. “You act like you’re the only one with feelings here.”
“This wasn’t what we planned for and you know it. Did you intend to have something more than one night with me? Did you plan to become a surrogate father to two teenagers and have an instant family dropped in your lap? Do you think I planned on wanting more than was offered?”
He looked at her and took a deep breath. “Sometimes life doesn’t go the way you plan.”
“Exactly. I’m giving you the chance to walk away, McTavish.” She swallowed, suddenly her tongue was too thick for her mouth to contain it. “Take it.”
“Liar.” He shook his head at her.
“How so?”
“You aren’t giving me the chance to walk. You’re taking the chance to run.” Perceptive fucker.
Sidonie gasped and then she did just that.
Ran.
But she could barely keep her footing and by the time she reached the pier, Den’s arm shot out and grabbed her elbow.
“Nope. You’re my ride, so don’t think you get to run off into the sunset and leave me here stranded.”
“I wouldn’t…”
“Well, you did a good imitation just now.”
“Sorry.”
“Sorry for what? Trying to dump me on the beach or trying to strand me there when you were done?”
Put like that, she felt like a callow fool. “Both, I guess.”
He rolled his eyes. “So you can’t take it, huh?”
“Den, you know I’m right. This was never in the cards.”
“I’m confused. What’s not in the cards?”
“Love!” Sidonie gasped and tried to step away, only to be yanked back.
She couldn’t even look at him and dropped her head to look at the sand smoothed wooden planks under their feet.
Damn, he has beautiful feet.
“You love me?” He asked like the question was nothing. Like it was unimportant when she felt like she had ripped her heart out and handed it to him while he mused over the quality of the presented organ.
She refused to speak and the silence was filled with the sounds of the surf behind them, but even then, tension hung in the salty air.
“Even if you won’t speak to me, the least you could do is look at me,” he muttered.
She tried to. Her head lifted, but when her eyes met his, she felt blinded and dropped her gaze south again.
“Just tell me.”
“No,” she mumbled mulishly, just before she walked away, shrugged his arm off, and left him to follow her. There was no way she was going to have this conversation with him right now.
Probably not even later.
When she got into the driver’s seat and cranked the car, Den looked at her.
“You know what? I don’t get your attitude.”
“You don’t have to.”
“All I want is—”
But she cut him off right there. “What, Den? To make the sex starved divorcee fall for you so that you can add another notch to your bedpost?”
He sucked in a breath and his nostrils flared. “Wait a minute. I have never given you a reason to believe that about me. I haven’t done a damn thing to you, but make love to you day and night to fill this asinine list.”
Really? “Asinine? Let me remind you, buddy, I didn’t make the list. You did.”
“Yeah. And let me tell you, was that a mistake.”
“Mistake?” Sidonie wished she could have clapped her hands over her mouth before she had said a damn thing.
“Yeah. What else the fuck would you call it? I can’t get the time of day with you and you want to treat me like I’m a damn skeleton that you can fuck in a closet when you want to pull me the hell out!” He had started calmly enough, but
by the time it was all said and done his volume rose until he practically screamed at her.
“I… what?”
“Yeah, I said it. You sit here and look at me like your heart is in your eyes. But it’s nothing more than a trap for a sucker. Oh, its little miss perfect with her perfect life, kids, and job. At the end of the day, you’re fucking alone in your expensive ivory tower where you get to look down on simple old blue collar me.”
“I’m not the only one who’s alone, now am I?” Her teeth clenched painfully around the words as she made the effort to make them crystal clear and not blurred from anger and anguish.
“You got that right and this makes me realize why I’m alone. Fucking hate bullshit. But you need to take a good look at yourself and maybe you’ll figure out why you’re alone, too.”
She couldn’t believe that he went there. Like she made her ex gay, dammit. That had nothing to do with her. “You know what? Fuck you. Fuckyou, fuckyou, fuckyou! Neanderthal asshole!”
“Oh, you forgot already? You already did and I returned the favor. Quite a few times, might I add?” His expression was that of pure satisfaction and she balled up her fists. She had never hit anyone in her life, but she was so close to lashing out that she had to force her body not to. “You wanna pop me one, huh?” He leaned over and gave her his cheek.
He practically laughed at her and she couldn’t deal with another word from him.
“Nothing, huh? Well, lemme say this. All I wanted was to get to know you better and all you wanted was to fuck. You should be bored of that by now, so I’ll let you find another toy to tease. I’m done.”
Sidonie couldn’t respond, tried to, but she knew that her mouth gaped and nothing came out.
How dare he? She didn’t start this, he had. All she tried to do was keep them in a place where no one got their feelings hurt. Namely her, but she didn’t want to put him in that position in the first place.
She gasped and blinked for a moment before she turned the car on and the music to an earsplitting level she couldn’t even take. In all honesty, Sidonie had never fought with a man before and she didn’t have a clue as how to handle it.
Even her split with Charles was amiable. They were no longer the best friends and good companions they were to begin with, but they didn’t fight and could still have a conversation when the need arose.
Despite the fact the sun had set, she slid her sunglasses over her eyes and drove.
Den only attempted to speak once. “You’re driving too fast.”
She didn’t say a word, only turned up the volume a decibel below death metal concert.
By the time she pulled in front of his house, she turned the volume down. “You can tell them to come on out.”
He didn’t reply, just got out of the SUV and slammed the door.
Asshole better not have scratched her door or she was going to punch him in the arm. The bad one.
The kids came out with a pep in their step that let her know the donuts had been delicious and the high quantities of sugar would leave them restless for half of the night.
When they arrived back at home, Sidonie knew she was supposed to iron their uniforms, but she really didn’t feel like doing anything. She climbed into bed with the sandy swim suit on and fell into a restless sleep.
Of course, she woke up in the middle of the night to shower and change her bedding before she stripped off every inch of skin she had left. As she ironed clothes at three fifty in the morning, Sidonie thought about Den. He was probably sleeping, while she had a terrible night’s rest to show for her stupidity.
Damn it. She had fucked up. Royally. It wasn’t his fault she couldn’t keep her heart out of it. He was a man, there was little expectation that sex would translate to love. It was what it was.
And now, she had alienated the one man that had truly ever understood her.
The one man that helped her to understand herself.
Even if it had to end, as all good things did, they could have been friends.
Just friends.
Chapter Eighteen:
Open Mouth? Insert Foot
The moment Den called their arrangement asinine, he knew he had made a mistake. One that she wasn’t going to give him the chance to rectify. She turned the music up to an ear-splitting level and drove at warp speed to avoid saying another word to him.
He had fucked up.
And she wasn’t likely to give him another chance.
What had he done?
He knew what she tried to do the minute she opened her mouth. And he’d let her.
That night, he paced his bedroom until the carpet had a worn path in it from his dragging feet. His parents didn’t say a thing, but they watched him get angrier and angrier, mentally in a fucked up place.
How the hell had he gone from being a heartbeat from what he wanted one moment and in another breath further away than he’d been before they met altogether?
Damn, he’d fucked up.
Damn, damn, damn!
And his pride goeth before the fall…
After a really bad night spent with the stuffed octopus she’d given him, he pushed the thing to the top of his closet in the hopes that his mother wouldn’t know he was so pathetic in love that he slept with a child’s toy.
Of course the fact that he had made him mad as hell. He was angry enough to punch something, but found the effort less than satisfactory when he busted the knuckles of the only good hand he had left.
As he hopped and tried to shake the pain in his phalangeal joints off, his mother knocked at the door. “Veera? Are you okay?”
“Uh, yeah, Ma. Just stubbed my toe.”
“You know I wasn’t born last night, Dennis. I have an ice pack. Open the door and get it for your hand.”
He sighed. It was hard having his parents under his roof for an extended period of time. He almost felt like time had gone back fifteen years in a handful of days. “I can’t get away with nothin’ when you’re around, can I?”
“I know you better than you know yourself, boy.” His mom chuckled at the other side of the door. “You know, at first I thought you were going to marry your ex… what’s her name? Anyway, do you know when I realized that relationship was going nowhere?”
“No.”
“The night she cooked dinner for us when we first met.” That was in the early stages of their relationship, maybe six months in or so.
“Really? Why?” He was truly curious.
“Because she couldn’t cook worth a damn. Who can’t boil pasta? Your dad and I had to get takeout when we left your apartment. But that Sidonie? Yeah, that was some good chili, no lie it was better than mine.” There was no way he could respond to that, anything he said was going to be a slight to one of them.
Might as well keep his mouth shut. He opened the door a bit and let his mom stick the ice pack through the small gap.
“Thanks, Mom.”
“Don’t thank me just yet. You need to talk to your dad.”
“Why?” He wondered if his dad had any further problems that they hadn’t told him about.
“Both of you have a penis and you’d probably listen to his advice before you took mine.”
His mom was right. Not that he was sexist, but his mother wouldn’t get it. Not totally, and his father might not totally either, but his dad had a better chance at understanding.
“I’m headed to the grocery store in your truck, just so you know.”
“Stop spending your retirement money on a grown man’s groceries, Mom.”
“Grown man? I know you slept with that octopus last night.” His mother scoffed. “Looked just like you did when you were a baby.” She reminisced and he felt three feet tall within an instant.
Den shook his head and sighed. “Mom, you sure know how to hit a man where it hurts.”
“Me?” she scoffed. “Your dad was the one that told me, don’t get it twisted.” Twisted? Since when did his mom use slang?
He heard her laughter all th
e way out of the door.
While he sat on the bed, he decided to watch something on TV but he had no idea what was even on. The channels at this time of day were kind of scanty as he had no desire to watch talk shows and less desire to watch soap operas.
But he settled on ESPN, even though the talk show was less than appealing. In fact, he was downright bored. The only time he watched TV was when a game was on or he wanted to catch the highlights of the game after he came back from duty.
His father tapped on the door. “Want some company?”
“I guess so.” Although he had little desire to be bothered with talking about the farce that he’d reenacted with Sidonie the night before.
“Sounds like you don’t want to talk to your dad right now.”
“It’s not that, Pa.”
“Then what’s it like?” His father looked at the busted knuckles on his left hand and the discarded ice pack.
“I messed up.”
“How?”
“She got mad at me when I said something I shouldn’t have.”
“You told her you loved her?”
Yeah, like she was receptive to even admitting she liked him, let alone more. “Nope. Didn’t even get that far, she wasn’t even willing to hear it.”
“I know what that feeling was like.”
“Do you?” His parents were like the ebb and flow of water, natural and effortless.
“Of course. Your mom didn’t fall into my lap. I had to work damn hard to get the chance to be with Jihn. She didn’t just look at me and immediately fall in love.”
“I didn’t know all of that, thought y’all were steady after the first date.”
“Of course not, boy. She was a ten when I looked at her and I was a five, so getting that date wasn’t easy. But I proved to her that no man would love her as fiercely as I could. Any woman that goes gaga without knowing ya? You wouldn’t likely want her anyway.”
True. “I really messed up, didn’t I?”
“Nah. She wouldn’t have gotten so hot under the collar if she didn’t feel somethin’. Now it might not be the same feelins you have, but any is better than none. It gives you somethin’ to work with.”
Wasn’t that the truth? But how was he supposed to get her to admit that she had feelings for him?
Strangers with Benefits (Siren Publishing Classic) Page 24
