by Anthology
As our bodies relaxed again, Nick got up to throw away the condom. When he came back, he moved up to the top of the bed, pulling me with him. While my body was spent, I enjoyed the cuddling. The light stroking of my hair quickly pulled me into a state of absolute relaxation.
“Olivia?”
“Hmm,” I answered, keeping my eyes closed.
“Why did you hide from me earlier?” There was concern in his tone.
I felt the blush run up my body and into my face. “No reason. I'm just a little shy.” I hoped he didn't recognize the outright lie.
His finger landed under my chin and he tilted my face up to his. “No. The girl who flipped shit on me on the beach earlier today is in no way shy. Do you want to tell me the real reason?”
I sighed. Maybe he deserved to know what happened, especially after he all but kicked Jake out of the bar tonight. “I've been told that I'm too athletic to be sexy. I know it's not true, but when you hear something enough, a part of you starts to believe it.”
His eyes narrowed. “Who the fuck told you that?”
I giggled. “That would be Jake.”
“The douchebag from the bar?”
“Yep, that would be him.”
He rolled me over, so I was underneath him again. “Well, it's a good thing you got rid of that asshole, because I can guarantee that you are so fucking sexy you make my head spin.”
With those words, he lowered his mouth and made my head spin.
Chapter 6
Nick
THE NEXT MORNING, I woke up feeling more rested than I had in a long time. Looking down, I realized why. Something about Olivia settled me. She was fiery and passionate. My mind started spinning with ideas of being together. Nothing permanent, I couldn't be more done with that shit. Just some fun for the week I was here. We could hang out, do dinners. Anything, really. She made for great company. I brushed a small strand of hair out of her face and she cuddled in close to me.
Olivia was absolutely gorgeous and the idea the she could be told that being in shape and athletic made her unattractive, made me want to go punch that asshole in the face again. Who would want to date a stick figure? The girl had muscles everywhere, and I loved the way she used them on me. My mind wandered back to the last time, last night, before we fell asleep. She rode me like it was our last chance and maybe it was. I really hoped we could enjoy the week together.
She stirred in my arms, her eyes fluttering open.
“Morning,” I whispered.
Her eyes darted around the room. Probably her first one night stand. Waking up in an unfamiliar bed wasn't something you were likely to get used to. Although that didn't mean the night before wasn't worth it.
“Um . . . morning.”
She sat up and pulled the sheet to her chest.
“Do you have to work today?”
“Um . . . not until later.”
I sat up next to her. “That's a lot of ums this morning.”
She shrugged. “To be honest, I'm not really sure what to say to you.”
“How about you say you'll join me for breakfast. I'll run you home, so you can shower and change, and I'll meet you in an hour.” Olivia hesitated for a moment. “Please, Olivia.”
“All right,” she sighed. “I'll have breakfast with you.”
“Awesome.” I threw my legs over the side of the bed. “Let me grab a shower really quick and we'll leave.”
“Okay.”
Pushing myself up from the bed, I stood and grabbed some clothes from my bag. Right as I put my hand on the handle she spoke up.
“Nick?”
I looked over my shoulder to face her. “Yeah?”
The smile that graced her lips was breathtaking. “You can call me Liv.”
My heart stuttered in my chest and I tried not to think too much about that. “I'd like that.”
In record time, I'd showered, dressed and was ready to take her home. Both excited and nervous about what I wanted to ask her. We got in the car and started for her house.
“I'll warn you that I still live with my completely overbearing mother.”
I laughed. “That's okay. Sometimes I wonder if I live with my best friend and his wife they barge in my house so much.”
“They just stop over to visit?”
I tried to keep my eyes on the road and stop myself from laughing at the same time. “If only that was the case. The have a key to the apartment and like to invite themselves in, a lot.”
“Okay,” she giggled. “That's just a bad. At least I know when my family will be home.”
“You have no idea.”
A few minutes later we pulled up out front of a blue cape-cod rancher. It was a mid-size home for this place, a bit bigger than the one I rented. I noticed two cars in the drive.
“Shit,” Olivia said.
“What's wrong?” I turned to her to see what happened.
“Nothing. I just forgot that my brother's here and I'm supposed to be having breakfast with him and my mother.”
Lowering my head, I said, “That's okay. You go ahead, I'll grab something from one of the cafes.”
“No,” she answered quickly. “How about you come with us?”
It was hard to explain my reaction, but I felt a lightness in my chest at her request. It happened to be the meet the parents' scenario I didn't really want to think too hard about that one. “I don't want to intrude.”
“Come on. Trust me, my mother won't care.”
“I doubt your mother wants to meet the man you spent the night with that you just met.”
“We don't have to tell her that. We'll tell her we met at the bar and that I went back to Brianna's but agreed to go out with you this morning.”
“And how do you explain your missing car and same clothes?”
“Easy. I can't find my keys which is really normal for me and I forgot I didn't have a change of clothes when I agreed to go out with you.”
None of it sounded believable, but this wasn't my mom, who would see through the bullshit in a heartbeat. “She's your mom. You know her better than me.”
“Exactly. Come on, let's go.” I followed her out of the car and to the front door. “Mom,” she called through the house.
My stomach twisted in knots. How many times did one meet the mother of their one night stand? Unless you got caught in the morning, hopefully never.
“Liv,” a soft, female voice said from down the hall.
“Yeah. Can you come in the living room? There's someone I want you to meet.”
A woman that was the older version of Olivia came down the hall. Her chestnut hair was a shoulder length, but I found the same golden eyes appraising me. “Hello,” she said. “And you are?”
Olivia stepped between us. “Mom, this is Nick. Nick this is my mom Carissa James. Nick and I met last night at the bar when he got Jake to leave me the hell alone.”
“Does Nick have a last name?”
“Sorry,” I apologized. “It's Thompson. Nick Thompson.”
Ms. James smiled then and reached out her hand. “Well, it's my pleasure then. Anyone that stands up to that asshole is just fine in my book.”
“Okay, Mom, I know he's a raging dickhead. We broke up, it's over. What I wanted to know is if you and Steven would mind if Nick joined us for breakfast?”
Ms. James looked back and forth between the two of us, studying something. “Why don't you two go and enjoy yourselves?”
“But what about Steven,” Olivia asked the same time I said, “I don't want to intrude.”
“Oh, you wouldn't be intruding. Steven will be down next weekend too. We'll go out then.” Her smile was warm and genuine. For some reason, she wanted us to have time alone, which was exactly what I was hoping for when I woke up this morning. Nothing too serious, just something fun to take my mind off of what I left behind for the week.
“What will I be down next weekend for?” A rough voice said from down the hall.
“Steven, come meet Liv's frien
d.”
Steven looked at Olivia, strode forward and extended a hand. “Hi, I'm Steven.”
Taking his hand, I said, “Nick”
“Good to meet you.” He turned back to his mom. “Now what's going on?”
Olivia's brother was the same height as me with hair a few shades darker than Olivia and her mother. The differences didn't stop there, he also had light green eyes. While Olivia and her mother could have been twins if they were the same age, Steven must have looked more like their father. She'd mentioned him last night and gave me enough information to know to avoid the topic all together.
“Olivia wanted to know if it was okay for Nick to join us for breakfast. I told her to go with Nick and we'd all do breakfast next weekend when you're here.” She waved her hand dismissively.
A look passed between Steven and Ms. James before he turned to Olivia and winked. “Go. We'll hang out next weekend.”
A light blushed stained her cheeks. Olivia glanced back at me. “I'll be right back. I'm going to trust everyone is going to behave while I'm gone.”
Without another word she walked up the stairs, leaving me in the most awkward situation ever. To hell and back, what had I gotten myself into? Standing there with the family of a girl I only wanted to be friends with. So much for my relaxing week. Although the prospect of some more alone time with Olivia somehow seemed worth the trouble.
“Nick, would you like to come sit down in the living room?” Ms. James offered.
Had I landed in the Twilight Zone? It was obvious by her daughter's dress from the night before that she spent the night with me and the woman now offered me the comfort of her living room? I didn't have any siblings, but I could guarantee, my mother would not be so welcoming.
Taking a seat on the end of the sofa, Steven sat down across from me. “So, Nick, are you from around here?”
It was hard to stop the laugh from escaping. He narrowed his eyes at me. “No, I live near Ithaca, New York. Actually your sister called me a shoobie or something like that last night.”
Steven and his mother burst out laughing.
“Yeah, she doesn't seem to have a built in filter. Whatever comes to her mind comes out of her mouth,” Ms. James said.
“I'm starting to see that.”
“Are you going to school up there?” Steven asked. Now we were moving into the interview portion of the parents meet the boy, except I wasn't the supposed to be the boy.
“No, I graduated last year. I work for Dupont. They have an office building about twenty minutes from my apartment.”
“Impressive,” Ms. James smiled. “Did you graduate from Ithaca or Cornell?”
I started to wonder if they would be happier if I gave them my resume. “Ithaca. I had a scholarship to play football there.”
“Football? That's pretty awesome,” Steven said. “Both Liv and I played soccer for Cornell.”
“I didn't know she played soccer.”
“Are we done with the twenty questions yet?” Olivia snapped from the doorway.
Spinning in my seat, my breath caught in my throat. Her hair was still wet and wavy. While she looked sexy in the dress from the previous night, the pink tank and denim shorts were just as enticing. Hoping everyone in the room was focused on the very pissed off vixen in the doorway, I adjusted my growing erection.
Steven looked away from his sister's glare, while her mother stared her down. “No, but you took less time than we expected.”
So that's where Olivia got her balls of steel.
“Well, that's too bad because we're leaving.” She came over and took my hand, pulling me towards the door.
Turning back, I saw her mother's smirk and quickly said, “It was nice you meet both of you.”
“You too, Nick.”
Ms. James completely ignored her daughter's behavior like it was a common occurrence. Olivia didn't say another word until we got to the car. “I'm so sorry they practically interviewed you. My mom is so desperate for me to find the right guy that she's going to interview any guy that I introduce to her.”
“That was the only normal part of the conversation. I'm truly surprised that she was willing to ignore the fact it was obvious you spent the night with me.”
“Yeah, I expected her to do that. My mom likes to pretend she doesn't know what we're up to.” She shifted in her seat.
I pulled away from the house and followed the directions Olivia gave me to the restaurant. “Funny, she seemed a lot like you to me. Type of person who tells it exactly like it is.”
“Well, she is. There's something about you she's decided she likes, so she'll ignore that until you give her a reason not to.”
“Strange, since she just met me, but okay.” I chuckled. “It's better than being thrown out of the house.”
There was no parking lot specifically for the place and I had to drive around the block a few times to find a space on the street. The whole time it was hard not to notice the curve of her cheek bone or the way her lips formed the perfect pout naturally.
The place was a quaint little cafe, the kind that only locals knew about and had the best food. It was far from most of the other restaurants in the main part of town. We were seated quickly. After a quick scan of the menu, the waitress came over and took our order. Once she walked away, I broached the subject that had been on my mind all morning.
“Why is your mom so determined to find the right guy for you?” I asked, bracing myself for her reaction.
She laughed, but there was no humor to the sound. “She's afraid that I'll make the same mistakes she did and pick the first hot guy who shows interest. It doesn't help that my last two boyfriends were total jackasses.”
“I'm guessing you mean your dad?”
“Yeah, he ran off not long after I was born. Mom's done an awesome job, but she doesn't want me to end up falling for just another pretty face.”
The waitress brought over our coffees.
“Yeah. I'll admit I'm tired of falling for the wrong girl. It's happened twice in the last few years. Dating sucks the life out of you.”
This time when she laughed it was genuine. “It absolutely sucks. I have no intention of dating again until I'm thirty.”
I joined in the laughter. “That's a long time to stay out of the dating pool.” It took us a few minutes to catch our breath. When I could finally speak with out laughing again, I asked, “Are you serious about not dating?”
The waitress was back with our food. Pancakes and bacon for me and an omelet for Olivia. She picked up a piece of toast and took a bite. Nodding, she said, “I think I am. At least for a while. Every relationship I've had lately has turned to shit. Maybe it's a sign that I need to stop looking. I just might get lucky and Mr. Right will fall into my lap.”
“Wouldn't that be perfect?” I took a bite of pancake and could have sworn it melted in my mouth. “Holy crap, these are amazing.”
“I tried to tell you that on the way here. Everything here is marvelous. What about you, are you interested in dating anytime soon?”
“Hell no. I want to have fun. It's part of why I came down this week. Don't get me wrong I love surfing and the beach, but my friend just got married.”
She narrowed her eyes at me. “And that's bad?”
I shook my head. “Oh, God no. It's pretty awesome, except I'm the last of our group that isn't married. Two of my friends already have kids, or at least one on the way. I'm tired of being the third wheel, not to mention they all love trying to set me up, which always ends in disaster.”
“Oh, set ups are the worse. That's what my mom's been trying to do lately.”
“Yes they are. So I figured if I could get away for a bit, I'd have a small break before they all keep trying to find 'poor Nick' a girlfriend. I don't want a girlfriend right now.”
“I'm guessing the last one didn't end up so well.”
“Not really, we're still friends, but it's hard watching her with someone else.”
Her eyes rounded to sau
cers. “She cheated on you?”
“No, never. Morgan wouldn't do that. She just knew I wasn't the one, I'd guess you call it. I loved her, but I was never in love with her and she knew it.”
“I'm sorry things didn't work out.”
Sympathy wasn't really what I was looking for. I'd put Morgan behind me, or at least I was trying to. It was more about the sting of rejection than me actually wanting her. The table got quiet while we both finished our breakfast. I set my fork down on the plate and leaned back in the seat.
“That was delicious.”
Olivia finished hers not long after me. “I couldn't agree more.”
“Liv?” Her smile brightened when I used her nickname. “Can I ask you a question?”
“Sure?”
“Can I take you to dinner?”
Her lips pressed into a thin line. Reaching over she pulled her wallet out of her purse. “Do you consider this a date? I thought you just said you didn't want to date anyone?” Her hand trembled as she tried to pull money from her wallet.
Covering her hand with mine, I hoped to calm her down and explain. “Relax, please. This isn't a date and tonight wouldn't be either. You said yourself, dating sucks and neither one of us want anything to do with it. But I do like hanging out with you. We have a lot in common and I figured since I don't know anyone here, we could hang out with each other while I'm here, as friends. There would be no strings attached.”
“So we'd hang out, but there would be no requirements to be in a relationship?”
“Exactly. We could go to dinner or the beach, but at the end of the week we part as friends. I miss having someone to hang out with that doesn't expect something from me and I think you feel the same way.”
She was quiet for a few moments, her eyes darting all around the room, never once landing on me. “If we'd be hanging out as friends, would it be just friends or friends with benefits?”
There was a spark of passion in her eyes. I hoped she was on the same page I was. “After last night, I'd love friends with benefits, but I'll leave that decision up to you.”
It shouldn't have mattered what her decision was, but it did. If she said no, I could have followed my plan to avoid women all together for the week. For some reason, I really wanted her to say yes. So there I sat, holding my breath and waiting to see what she had to say.
