by J. H. Croix
I couldn’t have moved away if my life depended on it now. It felt too good to be there. He murmured in my hair. I rolled my head. “Hm?”
His eyes opened. There was a glimmer of light cast by a nightlight by his bed. In that tiny bit of light, his eyes caught mine. His palm stroked along my side and down again. “Go back to sleep,” he murmured.
Instead of my mind spinning its wheels, I fell asleep—too relaxed, too warm and feeling too safe to do anything else.
***
That afternoon, I settled in to clean like crazy. What better time to clean like a madwoman than after my world had been knocked on its axis—in a frighteningly good way—by one night with Alex? I scrubbed the kitchen spotless and vacuumed my entire apartment. Stanley laid down for a nap with an aggrieved sigh after dodging the vacuum a few too many times. My mind had been spinning its wheels ever since I’d closed the door behind Alex after he walked me home early this morning. He’d offered to walk with me when I took Stanley out, but I’d declined. Usually we’d be running, but the morning was, well, weird for me. I’d needed some way to create some space for myself. In part because I’d so desperately wanted to latch myself to Alex and be with him all the time.
Aside from the enormity of finally—finally!—having sex again, I felt like flotsam in the rough seas of my emotions. Elation, desire, anger, sadness, longing and, above all, confusion rolled through me in wave after wave. Last night with Alex had been so far beyond anything I’d expected, I couldn’t even compute what to do about it. All I’d wanted was to experience the deep desire I felt for him. I couldn’t have anticipated it would be so much more than simply that. I’d gotten everything I could have ever hoped for in terms of the whole sex part of it. For so long, I’d worried I’d never even manage to get through the act itself that I’d figured it would be luck if I felt desire and had sex without incidence.
Alex had blown the hinges off any doors on my expectations. Hell, I couldn’t recall sex even coming close to what we’d had…ever. On the level of the physical experience, it was out of this world. Then there was the emotional part. That’s what had me rocking in the waves inside. I wasn’t prepared to feel as if the shadow cast over my heart had dissipated into nothing under the blinding brightness of how it felt to be with him. I felt as if my heart had tripped and landed on its ass this morning, knocked down by the force of so much unexpected emotion. I was scared shitless and needed time to regroup.
I was in the midst of cleaning the bathroom when my doorbell rang. I initially ignored it. Then it rang two more times, rather insistently. I tossed the sponge in the tub and rinsed my hands before walking to answer the door. Opening it, I found Daisy and Olivia there.
Daisy held a bag of pastries aloft and swept past me. “We’re here for brunch,” she announced as she aimed straight for the kitchen.
Olivia held up two cups of coffee from Desert Isle Café, handing me one. “Hi,” she said with a soft grin. “Daisy insisted we drop in. Hope it’s okay.”
I waved her inside. “Come on in.” I knew Daisy was there to get the scoop on Alex. I could seriously use some girl-talk, but I felt odd, almost as if talking about what happened with Alex wasn’t right. It had been so intimate, I was so shaken I didn’t know what to do, or to even ask.
Daisy promptly started opening cabinets until she found the plates. I’d only moved in here a few months ago, so she wasn’t familiar with what went where. We tended to treat each other’s apartments as if we lived there. Olivia plunked down on the couch and patted the spot beside her. “Come sit. Let’s enjoy our coffee while Daisy waits on us,” she said with a wink.
“Please do,” Daisy called with a laugh.
I settled on the couch beside Olivia, tucking a foot under me and taking a welcome sip of coffee. Seconds later, Daisy walked over, balancing two plates on one arm with her coffee and another plate barely balanced in the other. I reached up and took a tipsy plate off her forearm. “You could’ve asked for help.”
“I like a challenge,” she said as she set the remaining plates on the coffee table and sat down on the other side of the sectional.
I took a bite of a flaky spinach and cheese roll. “So good,” I managed after another bite. I glanced between them. “So what’s up?”
Daisy’s round brown eyes scanned my face. “Okay, what’s wrong?”
Sometimes I hated how hard it was to hide my feelings. I wasn’t too good at acting like everything was fine when it wasn’t.
I glanced to Olivia, as if she might rescue me from Daisy’s directness. All I found in her eyes was searching concern.
“Nothing,” I finally replied, trying and failing to keep the hint of defensiveness out of my tone.
Daisy didn’t say a word and simply took a sip of coffee.
Olivia cleared her throat, and I thought for a beat she might save me from this conversation. Then she spoke. “Are you okay?”
Fighting the flush on my cheeks, I sighed. “Of course I’m okay! Why wouldn’t I be? What is it with this anyway?”
Daisy lasered me with her direct and way too perceptive gaze. “Cut the shit. As far as we could see, you were about to climb in Alex’s lap and screw his brains out last night. Which is fine with me, by the way. But you look pretty damn upset right now. That’s not fine with me.”
Emotion knotted my throat and tears pushed at the backs of my eyes. I took a breath and a gulp of coffee. “Do I look that bad?” I asked, glancing between them.
Daisy nodded emphatically, while Olivia was quiet. After a moment, she shrugged. “I wouldn’t say you look bad, but you look…stressed,” she finally said.
I took another gulp of coffee, savoring its bitterness. “I guess I am. Um,” I paused and looked to Daisy. “Did you..?”
“Tell her about your crazy idea to have a sex fling with Alex? I kinda had to after last night. It was pretty damn obvious. I thought you two were going to burst into flames on sight.”
I sighed and leaned back into the cushions. Looking between them, I flushed. “I didn’t realize we were that obvious.”
“Oh, you were,” Daisy said with a sharp laugh. “It was almost funny, but now I’m worried about what happened.”
When I looked to Olivia, her eyes narrowed. “Are you okay?” she asked, circling back to Daisy’s earlier question.
Realizing they were starting to head in the worst possible direction about why I might be stressed, I figured I’d better nip that in the bud. “I might be stressed, but don’t start thinking it’s because I tried to have sex and fell apart.”
“Okaaay… Care to explain?” Daisy asked slowly.
“We had sex, and it was amazing,” I replied, almost angrily. I wasn’t angry at Daisy for being this pushy. I knew if I’d been the friend of someone in my situation, I’d probably have worried. Daisy was, of course, naturally nosy and didn’t care to hide it, but she didn’t feel nosy now. Just concerned.
Daisy cocked her head to the side. “Amazing?”
“Uh huh. And that’s the whole problem.”
Olivia eyed me. “Why is that a problem?”
“Because…because it wasn’t supposed to be like this!”
“What was it supposed to be like?” Olivia asked.
I threw a hand up, letting it fall to the couch with a thump. “I just wanted to, well, to have sex. I didn’t want any complications. Just something neat and tidy.”
Daisy, remarkably, stayed quiet. She’d warned me of this very issue when she shared her concern I wasn’t a fling type of person.
When Olivia spoke, her tone was cautious. “When did you start hunting around for sex? Last I knew, you’d sworn off relationships.” She paused for a sip of coffee, angling her head to the side. “Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t think it was the best idea to permanently put yourself on the sidelines, and Alex is awesome, but…”
Her words ran out, and I knew she was trying to avoid bumping into the topic that was always the elephant in the room when it came
to discussing me and anything to do with sex and relationships. An incredibly annoying side effect of getting raped was how everyone tiptoed around certain topics. I took a gulp of coffee and looked back at Olivia. “How many times have I said I’m sick of people tiptoeing around the obvious? I’ll say it for you. You didn’t think it was a great idea for me to avoid men for the rest of my life just because some guy raped me.”
Olivia’s breath drew in sharply, and she looked hurt. I glanced to Daisy who was quiet, but her face held a studied calm, as if she was doing her damnedest not to let anything show on her face. I suddenly felt horrible. I shook my head sharply. “I’m sorry. I know it’s weird. I just get tired of how weird it is.”
Olivia tilted sideways on the couch and hugged me hard before leaning back. “Don’t be sorry. You have nothing to be sorry for. It’s weird and awful, and I wish I could make it all go away.”
I swallowed against the emotion rising inside and nodded. “Me too.” In an endeavor to get the conversation onto lighter territory, I continued, “You, of all people, should understand the idea of not wanting to bother with relationships. Your only excuse was working too much.”
Olivia laughed softly. “True.”
“Yeah, that lasted about five minutes when she met Liam,” Daisy said with a sly grin.
“It was more than five minutes,” Olivia protested, her cheeks turning pink.
“Uh, not to be too hard on you, but didn’t you say he kissed you the first time he met you in your office?” I asked.
Olivia rolled her eyes and sighed. “Okay, fine. Maybe so. Anyway, back to you…and Alex. What’s wrong with amazing?”
My mind spun back to last night—the feel of Alex’s hard body against mine, the delicious stretch of him inside of me and then waking in the darkness in his arms. Probably not what Olivia meant with her question. It occurred to me I was looking for anything to get my mind off of how discombobulated I was inside about everything to do with last night.
I chewed on the inside of my cheek and glanced between them. “Nothing’s wrong with amazing. I couldn’t have asked for anything better. I just… I don’t know if I can do this.”
“Do what?” Daisy asked.
I sighed. “The whole emotional messiness. I didn’t think about that part.”
Daisy, being the fabulous friend she was, didn’t even point out that she’d told me so when she had. She scrunched up her nose and sighed heavily. “Right. That part. I wish I knew what to tell you, but I can’t even find a guy who makes me feel emotionally messy, so I’m not so much help.” She glanced to Olivia. “Your turn.”
Olivia didn’t miss a beat. “Okay then. Well, it’s obvious Alex is totally into you. Maybe you shouldn’t worry so much just yet. I mean, you had one night, and no matter who it was, it would have been a thing.” She paused and reached for her pastry. After a few bites, she turned back to me, her gaze considering. “I don’t know if I should tell you this, but I accidentally said something that led me into telling Alex about what happened to you.”
“It’s okay. I figured it out.”
“Huh?”
If I’d wanted to keep it quiet that I’d seen Joe, that was turning out to be impossible. I barreled ahead. “We saw Joe when we were out running. More than once actually. All I had to do was look at Alex’s face and I knew he knew who Joe was. I got a little pissed about it, but he said you told him and he looked Joe up.”
Daisy’s voice cut in. “She told me about Joe just yesterday. I’m freaking out about it,” she said, addressing Olivia.
Olivia finished chewing a bite of her pastry and glanced between us. “I can’t keep up. I don’t know whether I should be losing my mind over knowing Joe Schmidt is anywhere near you, or worried about whatever’s going on with Alex.” Her eyes coasted over me, concern radiating in her green gaze. “Promise me you’ll tell us if you run into Joe again.”
“Of course. I didn’t want you to worry, so I didn’t say anything. I’ve only seen him in the park and both times Alex was with me.”
Olivia’s mouth twisted in a sad smile. “And to think I was happy you were running with Alex.”
“That’s a good thing,” I said firmly. “It really is. Honestly, it sucks to see Joe, but I think that’s been good too. If anything, seeing him made me realize how much I was letting myself get hobbled by what happened.”
Looking between Olivia and Daisy, I saw nothing but concern in their eyes. It was awesome to have friends, especially friends who I knew would do anything for me. But I hated that their concern was all because I’d seen Joe from a distance twice. I couldn’t erase what happened, but I could try to move on.
“Could we not get stuck on the whole Joe thing? I’m trying really hard not to do that,” I said, taking another bite of my spinach roll.
Daisy nodded so emphatically, her ponytail bounced wildly. “We’re not stuck on Joe, Right, Olivia?”
“Of course not. Whatever you want to talk about,” she replied.
“Well, I’d say Alex, but I’m not so sure that’s a good idea,” Daisy said with another scrunch of her nose.
My cheeks got hot and I sighed. “Look, I’m just confused. I don’t know what to do now.”
Olivia glanced from Daisy to me. I knew she must have talked to Liam about it.
“Okay, what?” I asked
“What, what?” Olivia countered.
Daisy jumped in. “Oh God. Olivia, it’s not like she can’t figure out you might’ve talked to Liam. Spill it.”
I couldn’t help but giggle. As confused as I was, Daisy’s directness was funny. At least when it wasn’t pointing at me.
Olivia cocked her head to the side and set her now empty plate on the coffee table. “Liam thinks Alex likes you. A lot. He’s not a player and pretty much ignores all the women who hang around the team.”
My heart gave a hard kick and a funny feeling tightened my chest. My next question popped out before I had a chance to think. “Why does he think Alex likes me?”
“I knew it!” Daisy exclaimed. “You were trying so hard to act like it was just about sex, but you really like him. That’s why you’re upset.” She started to say something else, but snapped her mouth shut.
I could barely focus on Daisy’s comment. All I wanted was for Olivia to say more.
My heart gave another kick, and I felt my cheeks heat again. I wasn’t quite ready to examine how I felt about Alex, so I shrugged and looked back at Olivia, impatient for her to answer.
“I don’t know why. Liam just mentioned it after Alex was over last week. He said if Alex ever fell for anyone, he’d fall hard,” Olivia offered. “If you ask me, Alex is a total softie. He’s all tough and dark on the outside, but he’s so nice. He was like a parent with Liam when he was recovering from his surgery last year, always making sure Liam got to all his appointments. He’s a good guy.”
“Well, if the way he looked at you last night is any indication, the man is seriously into you. Just sayin.’ If he was my cup of tea, I’d have melted on sight,” Daisy said with a sigh.
I couldn’t help but laugh. I hadn’t straightened out much of anything in my own head, but somehow Daisy’s comment cast just enough sun inside I managed to find a brief respite from my worries.
Chapter 11
Alex
I strolled down the hallway at the stadium, idly tossing a soccer ball on my way to the locker room. We were done with practice for the day and I was the good kind of tired, physically worn, but floating on the rush of adrenaline from a few hours of play. I rounded the corner in the hall to find Liam leaning against the wall. The moment he saw me, he ended whatever phone call he’d been having. The little snippet of “Bye luv” I heard told me it was Olivia. He flashed a grin. “Good play, mate. Say, are we ready for the game against LA?” he asked as he rested a foot against the wall, clearly expecting me to stop and chat.
“Aye. Think so. You?” I returned as I leaned against the wall beside him, rolling the ball between m
y hands.
“Always.” He was quiet for a beat before I felt him look my way. “So? Harper,” was all he said.
I inwardly groaned. Liam was my best mate and had been for pretty much forever. Yet, he’d always tended toward being more open about his personal life than I was. I didn’t mind it so much, but at times like this, it was annoying. I hadn’t sorted my own feelings about Harper and here he was asking questions.
I rolled my head to the side on the wall. “What about Harper?”
He rolled his eyes, cracking another sly grin. “Mate, can’t believe I’m saying this, but Olivia bossed me into talking to you. I told her you like to keep your private life private, but she’s all in a tizzy about whatever the hell is going on with you and Harper. I already swore up and down, left and right that you’d never hurt a woman, but she says I have to talk to you.”
My heart gave a hard thump, and I swallowed against the emotion knotting my chest. I rolled my head away from Liam and stared at the wall across from us, my eyes idly following the pattern of tiles on the wall. Harper. It had been a full two days since my night with her, and I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about her. It had been pure heaven to wake up with her lush body curled up against mine. Problem was, once we weren’t tangled up together, she’d gone all polite and guarded again. I hadn’t wanted to push too hard and comment on it because, hell, if there was a playbook on what to do after you have sex with someone who was raped once upon a time, I didn’t have it. So I’d let her be her quiet, reserved self and held back from yanking her back into bed.
We’d gone for our usual run the morning after I woke beside her and again the mornings to follow. I didn’t much like thinking about it, but a bit of me was hurt at her polite reserve. Meanwhile, I was wrestling against a need only she could assuage. I’d fought the urge to toss her over my shoulder and cart her upstairs after our run this morning, yet she’d been on the way to work, so I’d held back. The only time I wasn’t thinking about her was when I was playing ball. The mental escape that saved my sanity from the ugliness of my father when I was a lad still had the power to keep me focused. Thinking about Harper wasn’t something I actually wanted to escape from, yet I was scrambling for a foothold in my mind and heart and body when it came to her. I’d known she wasn’t a convenient arrangement, yet I wasn’t prepared for how it would feel to be with her.
