Not Just Another Romance Novel

by Lisa Suzanne

  Austin nodded as a grin spread across his face. “His sister.”

  “His sister?” I repeated like an idiot.

  “She surprised him when he told his family he wasn’t going home for Thanksgiving. She spent Thanksgiving Day with us.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me this sooner?” My voice was annoying even to me as I screeched my question.

  His attention moved briefly to my television, where we both saw me deep-throating the “meat popsicle” banana.

  His mouth dropped open, and I blushed furiously as I grabbed the remote to turn it off.

  “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?” I repeated, hitting Austin in the arm as I tried to ignore the fact that he had just watched me give a blow job to a banana.

  He shook his head and laughed. “Because you were into Dax and I didn’t think you wanted to talk about Scott!” Austin could hardly contain his excitement, and the despair that had hung over me for the entire day suddenly faded away as I realized what this meant.

  Scott was in love with me.

  I was in love with Scott.

  And we were both single.

  We could actually, really, truly give this a try.

  I needed to see him.

  Now.

  “I have to go,” I said to Austin, standing and rushing toward my front door.

  “Wait!” He motioned to me.

  “What?”

  “Don’t you want to put on some shoes? Maybe run a brush through your hair? Eat a banana?”

  I giggled and blushed again. “Thank God you’re here.”

  He laughed, and I ran back to my bedroom to change and find some shoes.

  Austin offered to drive me, and I gladly accepted. Their apartment was close to mine, a ten minute stroll on a slow day, but I preferred the idea of riding in a car with a friend versus walking by myself in the dark late at night.

  He dropped me at the curb. “Take your time in there. I’ll go hang out with Shannon.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. It’s your apartment, too.” I got out of the car, suddenly nervous.

  Austin chuckled. “You two need this time. I’ll be back sometime after midnight. No stains on the couch.”

  I leaned my face into the car and made a face at Austin. I couldn’t help my laughter. “We’ll be sure to clean them up before you get back.”

  I slammed his car door shut as he laughed at me, and then I stood on the sidewalk for a minute, looking up at their apartment. It was a second floor unit, and the light was on in the living room. Scott was right up there, and both of our worlds were about to shift dramatically.

  And I couldn’t be more excited for what was ahead of us.

  I knocked three times on the door as the butterflies in my stomach worked overtime. I was pretty sure I was going to vomit or pass out. Maybe I was coming down with a fever. Everything felt suddenly very hot, starting at my neck and moving outward. Everywhere. My face heated. Even my hair felt hot.

  My heart pounded in my chest, reverberating everywhere throughout my body.

  I was a nervous wreck.

  And then the door opened, and Scott’s eyes met mine, and somehow I knew everything would be okay.

  “Hey,” I said, my voice hopeful as I stared up into his crystal clear blue eyes hidden behind those dark frames. I glanced down at his body before meeting his eyes again.

  He looked especially sexy in just a navy blue SDSU t-shirt and a pair of jeans. His feet were bare, and a sudden image of his feet running along my legs as we both drifted to sleep hit me. It was a sweet image, an emotional showcase of where we were and what we could be.

  “Hey,” he said softly. He didn’t move from the doorway. One of his hands held the door open, and the other rested on the doorframe. He didn’t invite me in and he didn’t smile. As I gazed up at his eyes, I saw how tired he looked. His face was a mix of emotions. I saw the love and desire I’d never noticed, and I saw the pain and the heartbreak because I was standing in front of him.

  I’d seen him from behind when I’d spotted him in the airport, blocking me from seeing the heartbreak or the pain. Or maybe his sister had distracted him from it, and suddenly I was grateful for her. I wished I’d been able to meet her.

  I wished I’d have realized the depth of my feelings sooner, because it felt like we’d wasted so much time.

  He averted his eyes to the ground, and I didn’t blame him for being scared. He’d hidden his secret feelings from me for such a long time. It had to be weird for him that I knew.

  So instead of waiting for an invitation into his place and instead of speaking, I simply walked into his arms. I wrapped my arms around his torso and laid my head on his chest.

  I closed my eyes as his familiar scent enveloped me. Everything that it took to get to this moment was forgotten as I finally knew I was in exactly the right place.

  I was where I was supposed to be.

  He froze for a moment, his one hand still locked on the open door and the other still firmly attached to the doorframe.

  I held him for one nervous moment filled with anxiety and fear.

  And then his arms wrapped around me, and a sense of relief filtered through my veins. Tears filled my eyes, but this time it wasn’t because of sadness or hurt or regret. This time it was because of the utter relief of being held in the arms of the man I loved.

  Scott only held me in his arms for a brief moment before he tried to back away, pushing my shoulders gently. My arms stayed clasped around him as I leaned back to look up at him.

  I never wanted to let him go.

  I would eventually, obviously. Sooner or later, he’d need to eat or use the restroom or whatever.

  But my heart would never let him go.

  I finally broke the silence with a pick-up line to break the tension. “Life without you is like a broken pencil. Pointless.”

  He looked down into my eyes, and all I saw as I looked up at him was unfiltered fear. My line hadn’t worked.

  “What are you doing here, Piper?” His voice was timid. He was trying to hold back his nerves.

  But he didn’t need to do that with me. He’d never needed to.

  “You told me to use my time away to think about what I really wanted.”

  The look in his eyes didn’t change. “Did you?”

  I nodded, and my lips tipped up in a smile. I finally let go of him. “Can I come in?”

  He stepped aside to allow me in. I walked over to his couch while he shut the door behind me. I looked down at the couch, secretly smiling to myself about Austin’s warning in the car. I thought about all the times we’d sat right there, studying or talking or laughing.

  And I thought about all the times we’d do that well into the future and how different things would be. How much better they’d be.

  Sure, we had things to figure out and questions to answer.

  But if I’d learned anything from reading romance novels, I had to believe everyone deserved a happy ending.

  I sat on Scott’s couch. He paused, debating taking the seat next to me or the one across the room on the loveseat. I patted the couch next to me.

  He finally sat beside me, and I turned in my seat to face him. I started wringing my hands nervously in my lap. He leaned forward, elbows on his knees and hands clasped in front of him. He stared at a spot on the coffee table in front of him, refusing to look at me.

  So I just started talking. “A few weeks ago, you started pulling back from me. From our friendship.”

  He didn’t look over at me. “Around the same time you started dating the rock star.” His voice was low and gruff.

  I watched his profile, and I noticed he didn’t say Dax’s name.

  “That was around the same time I started to notice little things. Things like how attractive I suddenly found you in a certain shirt or how disappointed I’d feel when you weren’t waiting under our tree after class. It wasn’t just about your friendship or our study sessions. It was becoming something more.”

  He
finally looked over at me, and I kept talking. I saw the fear in his eyes slowly starting to dissipate. “I couldn’t stop thinking about you. Even in moments when I should’ve been focusing on other things, you were on my mind.”

  Hope blossomed in his eyes in a beautiful transformation. It wrecked a little piece of my soul, a piece that would forever belong to Scott Redland.

  “And then you told me how you felt, and I finally understood why you had to back away. It hurt to think about losing our friendship. It hurt to think about losing you.” I took a deep breath, and then I reached over for his hand. I laced my fingers through his, and he stared down at our twined hands. “When I sat at my parents’ house waiting for the solution to hit me, it didn’t. I was confused and unsure. I had feelings for two men, and I was sure there was no right answer.”

  His eyes continued to watch our hands, and then he pulled his away from mine.

  I wasn’t getting my point across the right way. I reached for him again.

  “Scott, I broke up with Dax today.”

  His eyes shot over to mine. “You what?” he whispered.

  I nodded. “You heard right.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I’m in love with somebody else.” I said it simply, but it was a much more complicated statement than my tone conveyed.

  A small smile tipped his lips, and it was about the most damn adorable thing I’d ever seen in my life.

  “You…you are?”

  I nodded as my lips tipped up to match his. “I am. It’s a long story, but the only part of it that really matters is the end.”

  “You’re in love with somebody else?”

  I nodded again, my smile widening.

  Scott stood, pulling me up with him. He leaned down toward me, and I automatically laced my arms around his torso as he wrapped his arms around me. As much as I wondered whether it would feel weird to be with Scott in this way, in a way so different for us and our friendship, it didn’t.

  His nose nuzzled the skin of my neck, and I let out a soft sigh.

  “Who?” he asked, his breath warm near my ear.

  “You,” I whispered back. “I don’t think I have feelings for you. I’m positive I do.”

  A soft moan escaped his lips as it rumbled against my neck. He kissed the sensitive skin of my neck, and then his lips trailed across my skin to my lips.

  When his mouth met mine, the entire world melted away. His lips moved over mine with firm grace, sweet tenderness, and controlled demand.

  While our conversation had been tentative and full of the unknown, our kiss was the opposite. It was full of longing and passion. It was two people who had the kind of forever love they’d denied themselves for far too long.

  His lips parted on a soft sigh as his tongue swept around mine. My entire body grew weak at the sensation, and I wasn’t sure if I was holding him because I wanted to or if I was holding him because I’d fall if I let go.

  But even if I let go, he’d never let me fall. Scott had never let me down, and a relationship with him—a future with him—would be the same way.

  I pulled my mouth away from his, panting. I needed a moment to catch my breath, to still the dizzying sensation Scott had caused. To regain my footing. Maybe to take a sip of water and sit down for a second.

  “Jeez, Scott.” Neither one of us let go of the other. “If I’d have known you could kiss like that, this decision would’ve been a lot easier.”

  He chuckled down at me, and then he leaned back down to my ear and whispered softly. “Wait until you see what else I can do with my tongue.”

  I blushed furiously. I’d never heard him talk like that before, but if his kiss left me panting, I had no doubt he had mad skills in other extracurricular events.

  He leaned in to kiss my cheek. “I’ve seen you turn red thousands of times, but I’ve never been the one to make you blush.”

  “Mission accomplished. Can I get a glass of water?”

  He laughed, and it was a sweet and carefree laugh—one I hadn’t heard in far too long.

  He let go of me and padded over to the kitchen, grabbing a bottle of water out of the refrigerator. I sat back down on the couch, needing a quick moment to regroup my thoughts. I gulped down half the bottle in about five seconds after he handed it to me.

  “I need to apologize to you.” He stood in front of me, staring down lovingly.

  “For what?”

  “It wasn’t fair of me to tell you I was in love with you the way I did. It was never how I imagined it happening. I wanted to tell you a hundred different times, but I was too scared to lose your friendship. When you started dating all these men, I couldn’t pretend like I was okay with it. That exploded out at you, and I didn’t mean for it to.”

  I shook my head as if to dismiss his apology. He had nothing to apologize for. If anything, it was me who had caused the two of us to waste so much time. “When I saw you at the diner, I thought you were with that girl.”

  “My sister?”

  “I saw you at the airport today saying goodbye. I didn’t know she was your sister.”

  “You saw me at the airport?”

  I nodded. “I just figured out how I felt last night. I was so excited to come home and tell you, and then I saw you with some girl at the airport and you seemed so happy and I was certain you’d already moved on.”

  “But you broke it off with the rock star anyway?” His voice was incredulous.

  “It didn’t matter if you’d moved on. I couldn’t stay with him when I knew my feelings were stronger for you.”

  “What made you realize?”

  I chuckled, and I was sure I turned red again. “You’re going to make fun of me.”

  “I won’t.” He made a cross over his heart. “How could I? Whatever it was brought you to me.”

  “I was hypnotized last night. And when I was dead asleep, my subconscious admitted the man I was in love with was you.”

  “Seriously?”

  I giggled. “I bought the DVD.”

  I glanced at the clock across the room. We had an hour before Austin would be home.

  But my apartment was empty—and it would be all night.

  I stood and stalked toward the man who I loved. “Hey, you want to come to my place and we can watch it?”

  He grinned. “Are you trying to get the home court advantage?”

  “You know, Mr. Redland, I don’t have a roommate.” I smiled a wicked little smile, and he chuckled.

  “You had me at DVD.”

  I laughed, and the two of us took a nice, leisurely walk to my apartment. Hand-in-hand.

  I had to admit, part of me was worried this part would get weird. We’d been friends for so long, and now we were crossing this line we’d never be able to uncross.

  But I didn’t want to uncross it.

  Sex had always been a pretty serious act for me. But I’d never been best friends and so head over heels in love with someone the first time I’d slept with him. I hadn’t had a ton of sexual partners, but love had always seemed to come later for me. Attraction had come first. Excitement. Need and passion.

  I had all of those things with Scott, but I also had these deeply rooted feelings on top of a beautiful friendship. And so when his lips crashed down to mine as soon as I locked the door behind us, causing me to stumble on my own carpet, we both giggled. The tearing of the clothes commenced, and my shirt got stuck behind my head for a second. We both chuckled as I tossed my shirt to the floor, and then he kissed me some more.

  I loved that even though sex had this serious stigma associated with it, the two of us could laugh together. We’d always had fun together, and obviously that lightheartedness translated to every part of our relationship.

  Scott stepped back, away from my mouth. He took off his shirt, and in doing so he completely took my breath away.

  I’d never seen him without a shirt. It had been only recently I’d even thought about what he might have kept hidden under his clothes. For the majority
of our friendship, I’d never thought twice about it.

  And it was a real shame. A complete disservice to myself.

  Because he was absolutely incredible. He was perfect.

  His body was athletic and hard. I stared at the thick cuts of muscle along his abdomen. I counted the muscles. There were more than six. And then my eyes trailed down to his hips. Dear Lord, those hips. My mouth watered as I stared at the cut V-shape of muscle pointing straight down to the Promised Land.

  My eyes flicked down a few inches and then widened at the bulge I spotted.

  This was going to be one hell of a good night. One hell of an amazing future.

  “Uhhhh…” I said, my voice a hoarse grunt. I lost my capability of forming words as I gazed at the perfect body on the amazing man before me.

  I sincerely hoped I wasn’t drooling.

  I finally glanced up at his eyes, and he stood in my entryway staring at me.

  I looked down to see what, exactly, he was staring at.

  I was wearing a black lace bra, one with those really sexy strappy cutouts. My bra was paired with jeans.

  Scott readjusted the huge bulge in his pants, and then his eyes flicked up to mine. “I’ve pictured this moment ten thousand different ways.” His voice was husky.

  “And?”

  He took a step toward me, lacing his arms around my torso. I wrapped my arms around him, my fingers trailing up the warm and smooth skin of his back. I breathed him in, and he smelled like home.

  He smiled down at me, his eyes heated and full of adoration. “And you’re perfect. Even more perfect than in my imagination.”

  His words melted my heart and turned my soul to jelly. I was putty in his hands, and I knew I would be. Always.

  I tipped my head up and he leaned down to kiss me. His tongue caressed mine with devotion and passion. I could feel his love for me as the emotions we’d both bottled for far too long exploded into our embrace.

  He started backing me up on a journey down the hallway toward my bedroom. I thought about jumping on him and allowing him to carry me to my bedroom, but then I thought of my sprained ankle and realized what a horrible idea it was.