by LJ Evans
There was no way in hell I was letting you slip away. Not then. Just like I’m trying to not let you slip away now. “It’s Seth. Would you like to see my studio?”
I had breathed it out before I’d thought it through. I never had anyone to my place. Only Locke and Becca had ever set foot in it. And you know Becca is just there to clean and mother me. I’d never had another woman there. At the school studios, I’d had to share and deal with people invading my thoughts and space. At my home, I didn’t want any of those fucking complications. But, I’d made the offer to you and meant it with every fiber in my being. When you hesitated, I knew I had a chance.
“I’m not changing my story,” you said, as if to prove you had the upper hand.
“Okay.”
“I’m not writing anything else about you.”
“Okay.”
“I can’t do it now.”
“Okay.”
You squinted your eyes at me again like you were just dying to berate me once more.
“You’re very frustrating,” you said for not the first time.
“I’ve heard that before,” I teased down at you.
“I am interested in your studio. How you do what you do. That’s it.”
It was more than that, we both knew it, but I let it slide. “Give me your phone, I’ll put in my details and you can show up when you want,” I said trying to sound nonchalant. Trying not to pick you up and carry you over to my motorcycle and take you home.
You handed me your phone, and I typed in my address and my personal cell number which, again, I never did. I know you thought different. You believed I had a long line of women, but that wasn’t me. It hadn’t been me since Tennessee.
“What if I show up while you’re… busy?” And you couldn’t meet my eyes. This made me realize you were thinking about all they ways I might be busy and that made me hopeful again. I gave you my best unused grin.
“Contrary to popular belief, I rarely entertain at home.” But my words that were meant to reassure, backfired and made you more uncomfortable instead.
“Your studio is at your house?” you gulped.
I nodded. But it made me think that maybe, just maybe, I was having as much of an impact on you as you were on me.
Our hands brushed accidentally as I gave you back your phone. Your skin was smooth and soft against mine that was calloused from working with metal and glass and wood for so many years. That smooth feel along with your sweet scent and your strength and your tininess hit me all at once. The urge to capture all of it in textures of silk and steel overtook me. My mind twirling with more imagery. I’d been on imagery overload since I’d seen you last night.
You stared down at where my hand touched yours as if the touch had jarred you too. You started to walk away. I was still panicking.
“I have to warn you,” I called out and gave you another smile when you looked back over your shoulder. “If you don’t call, I will be hunting you down.”
You raised an eyebrow at me but just walked away. I don’t think you realized just how serious I was. I wasn’t letting you walk away for long.
Maybe you liked that about me at first. My all-consuming focus. But I don’t know when to back off, and so it forced a wedge between us that I couldn’t remove even with love. Even now, I can’t remove the wedge, but I can’t let go either.
All I can say is that I’m learning. A big cat changing its stripes. After all, you’re getting a letter instead of me on your doorstep. I know now, just as I could tell then, that you weren’t one to be claimed. You were too goddamn independent. But you also need to understand, Bella, that possession, it’s a mutual thing. Because you own me as well. Every fucking piece of me and I won’t ever be the same until you're back home.
Learn To Love
PJ After Letter Two
“I’ve lost love, lived with shame.
I was humbled by my fall from grace.”
-Bon Jovi, Sambora, & Martin
PJ PUTS THE NEWEST letter down and tries to breathe normally. He was right that she fought being claimed, but she’d never considered that she owned him too. That it was a mutual possession. Even though they had always been drawn to each other like positive and negative ions.
What amazes her, is how he saw her as independent because she hadn’t felt that way about herself when they met. Instead, she’d felt like she was dependent on everyone. On her best friend, Claire. On her family. She’d been having trouble standing on her own two feet when that was what she wanted most.
It wasn’t that she ever let anyone walk on her. Not after high school. And she could pack a punch when it was required like it had been that summer. But she also hadn’t been in a place where she could say she was an adult with an adult life and adult responsibilities and adult ways of paying for it all.
When she’d met him, she’d been stuck in college mode. With part-time jobs and no career and a blog that was semi-successful but not anything she could live off.
And she knows that those feelings, that desire to be grown-up and independent, is why she’d drawn such a hard line with Seth. She’d been adamant about not sailing through life on his coat strings. On his money. She hadn’t wanted to take anything from him that she couldn’t somehow reciprocate.
But she also knows part of it had nothing to do with Seth and everything to do with her unresolved issues from her past. The regret. The shame. But she hadn’t been ready to acknowledge any of that when they’d first met.
* * *
When he walked into her life with his pretend drawl, icy eyes, and kiss that made her knees buckle, she’d been a month and a half away from graduating with a bachelor’s degree in art history, and she’d also been wait-listed for Pratt’s art and cultural management program. That rejection, coupled with the lack of any other plan, made her feel a little lost, unsure. She hadn’t been at her worst. That had been in high school, but she definitely wasn’t at her best either.
She’d been planning on moving to New York with Claire, and their roommates, Haley and Mina. But with Pratt’s rejection, it was all messed up, and she was being left behind. They begged her to come anyway, but she didn’t really see the point of spending all that money if she couldn’t attend the master’s program she really wanted.
After that intense and frustrating second meeting with Seth at The Green Room, she went back to the apartment she shared with the girls with him still hanging on her brain. She sat down at the kitchen table with his publicity pamphlet that Locke had given her and her computer.
Claire came out of the bathroom. Her tawny brown skin and long legs were showcased in a pair of tiny jean shorts. Claire was beautiful, model beautiful. She’d actually been offered cover spots for a couple of magazines striving to be more diverse, but she’d rejected them. Claire didn’t want to be known for just her looks. She wanted to be known for changing the way the world looked at ethnic issues.
Claire joined PJ at the table. She saw the brochure with Seth on the cover and grabbed it. “Oh. My. God. He’s gorgeous. I might just need to take this picture into the bedroom with me for some alone time.”
PJ grimaced, “We share that bedroom, thank you very much.” She felt a tinge of something that wasn’t quite jealousy but something close that caused her insides to tighten.
Claire continued staring wide eyed at the picture of Seth as she shoved blueberry muffin into her open mouth. “Did the earth tremble and angels weep when you kissed him?”
Color swarmed PJ’s cheeks. How she wished she could control the schoolgirl like blush. But the more she tried to control it, the deeper it usually got. “He kissed me.”
“Girl! And you came home?”
Claire’s umber eyes looked up at PJ like she was crazy. She shook her head in disbelief, making her tight, midnight curls bounce almost as much as PJ’s usually did.
“I was writing a piece on him,” PJ protested.
“A piece…” And her best friend burst out laughing, spraying blueberry muffi
n crumbs all over PJ and her laptop.
“Geez, what are you, twelve?” she growled shaking the laptop off onto Claire.
“Holy smokes, I’d love to grab that piece.”
PJ stole the pamphlet back and looked at the handsome face staring up at her. No question. Seth Carmen was absolutely stunning. No one could deny that. His dark hair and bronze skin were at striking odds to those ocean blue eyes.
Truth be told, Claire would fit right next to him like an exquisite cover on a romance novel that no one could resist buying. She was PJ’s complete opposite and not just in looks.
When the matching tool had made them roommates their freshman year, PJ had been certain Claire was going to ask to change rooms, but somehow their differences had tied them together.
Claire had a big, boisterous family while PJ just had her brother, Justice. Claire was involved in everything she could get her hands into, especially BSU and politics, while PJ just went to class and the school newspaper. Claire was all notice-the-hell-out-of-me to PJ’s mind-your-own-frickin’-business. But once they’d bonded, they’d become inseparable.
Claire grabbed the bio back a second time in their ping pong match and waved it in front of PJ’s face, grabbing her from her memories. “You’re honestly saying that you can look at this hot Cuban love child and not think about getting naked and sweaty.”
It was impossible for her to look at Seth Carmen and not think that way, but PJ would never admit that to Claire. And, she wouldn’t let thoughts and a gorgeous smile break her resolve. After all, four years of parties with sexy college guys hadn’t broken her resolve.
“I can,” she lied, grabbing her laptop and heading towards their dinky patio. If she’d thought she’d get rid of Claire, she’d been wrong. Claire tagged along behind her.
“You are too. Maybe you should drop everything and run over to this Latino-lover’s place right now just so you can kiss him again and forget about your self-imposed celibacy,” Claire said, flopping into the chaise next to PJ.
That kiss. It had been her first real kiss in a long time. There’d been that one make-out session with the British exchange student her sophomore year and that was it. Not because guys didn’t try, but because she’d promised herself that she wouldn’t be that girl again. Not after the humiliation she’d experienced as a teen.
PJ tried to put the memories aside in order to focus on her blog. She was writing a two-pronged piece on The Green Room. The food had been excellent, but the service was… annoying. She felt her anger flash again at the waitress who’d had the gall to write that note on Seth’s receipt while PJ was sitting with him. Who would write a note like that when a guy was with a girl? Was it that obvious they weren’t together?
That was the thing about PJ that no one expected. Everyone underestimated her because of her size. She knew her measly five-foot height was small and her frame slight. But her brother called her small and mighty, S&M, for a reason. She was all muscle. Muscle she worked hard to obtain. Plus, she had a temper that could put Godzilla to shame, even if it was more silent and deadly than crashing through buildings.
She’d gotten her muscle working out at Justice’s gym. He was proud of his Ninja Warrior training grounds, and she was too. He’d grown it over the last four years into one of the best in SoCal. People used it to train for the actual show and the kids swarmed to it.
Not only had the gym allowed her to challenge her muscles, it had also allowed her to supplement her meager income from her blog. Her coaching fees were helping to pay for her last year of school and helping her put a few dollars aside for the graduate program that had wait-listed her.
Claire placed the bio of Seth back on her laptop.
“So. Call him.” Claire tormented her as PJ shoved the picture aside in order to type. “Better yet,” Claire continued, “Just show up.”
That got her attention. “I can’t just show up. People don’t do that.”
“He told you to.”
“Yeah. And what do you think I’d find? Him engaged in something extracurricular with some leggy blonde.” The thought of Seth Carmen’s smoldering blue eyes, rock hard muscles, and intense attitude engaged in anything like that made PJ’s body flash a response all the way down to her nether regions.
Claire wiped at her mouth. “God, just the thought of that man engaged in anything makes my vagina ache.”
PJ stopped typing and looked at her best friend. “You are so crass.” Even though it was what PJ herself had thought, there was no way she would have said it out loud.
Claire shrugged. “Just speaking the truth, Butterfly.”
“The truth doesn’t have to be crass.”
“It’s better than being insanely proper. Or frigid and cold.”
That raised PJ’s hackles, and her eyes flashed as she snapped out. “You know I’m anything but frigid and cold.”
Claire narrowed her eyes in a way that was never a good sign. “Once upon a time, maybe. Now. Frigid and cold.”
“You’re ridiculous.”
“So, prove me wrong,” Claire dared.
PJ caught on to what her friend was trying to do, and her temper slowly fizzled. “No way. I’m not going over there to have sex with him just so you can feel better.”
“See now. You automatically went there. I didn’t even mention sex,” Claire teased her mercilessly.
PJ’s stomach flopped over at the thought of her muscular legs wrapped around his chiseled middle. It was his fault. Her brain hadn’t gone there at all when Locke had first given her the brochure and asked her to write a post about him. It hadn’t been until he’d looked down at her with his crystal blue eyes and surprised the hell out of her with his heart-stopping kiss that her thoughts had gone in that direction. Her reaction to him had been like ice in the sun. She’d melted instantly. She’d reacted without even thinking about all the things she’d promised herself and had plunged her tongue into his mouth before she’d even realized it.
She sighed because maybe Claire was right. Maybe she was becoming frigid and cold if even she was thinking she’d melted into Seth Carmen. But she really wasn’t ready to cross that invisible line she’d drawn in the sand, was she?
“Don’t you have to go to class or something?” PJ said, tired of having her friend stir the pot.
Claire laughed and grabbed the bio as she went back into the apartment. “Yep, and I’m taking this hottie with me.”
“That’s mine!” PJ shouted before she could stop herself and was rewarded with Claire chuckling all the way to the bedroom, but she didn’t give it back. Which, PJ sadly admitted, was probably for the best.
***
After Claire left and PJ finished her blog post, she felt restless. She didn’t have classes on Fridays and wasn’t supposed to teach at the gym until later that evening. But, she wasn’t able to just sit there staring at the fairy in the dew drop that Seth had given her. It made organs ache with a need to be touched that she hadn’t felt in a long time.
Instead of sitting there berating herself, she chose to drive in the nasty L.A. traffic for thirty minutes to Justice’s gym. That was punishment enough. Her lime green and naturally rust colored Volkswagen Bug, that had earned the ridiculous nickname the Caterpillar for its color, almost overheated on the way there, but that wasn’t anything new.
It was only three o’clock when she got there, and she stopped to read the text she had gotten.
UNKNOWN: You looked beautiful yesterday in your purple dress. That slime bag of an artist needs to be put out to pasture for attacking you. Hope your blog post makes his prospects burn up.
It was the fifth text she’d gotten in as many weeks from unknown numbers. The first couple had been kind of uplifting. Stuff like, I hope you have an amazing day. Or, keep smiling that beautiful smile. She honestly had thought it was one of her friends or family trying to cheer her up after the whole Pratt disaster. This one was a little creepy. As if the person had been following her. She blocked the number and then went
into the gym.
She forced her body along some of the toughest courses in order to banish images of Seth and the creepiness of the text from her brain. Almost an hour and a half later, she was deep in the rope circuit hanging from the rafters when Justice hollered out to her.
“S&M, Locke’s looking for you.”
She ignored him and concentrated on getting through the course. When she jumped down, doing a forward roll into her final landing, Justice was waiting for her. He offered her a hand, and she took it, happy, sweaty and exhausted.
Justice was twelve years older than her. He’d been twenty-five to her thirteen the year their parents were killed in a small plane crash just outside Vancouver. Justice had been their parent’s high school mistake, and it had taken them a long time before they were ready to have another child. Once they’d started trying, they’d been unsuccessful for many years until she’d come along as a late blooming surprise.
The courts had no issue handing guardianship of her to Justice as long as he had a way to support them. Justice was in SoCal and had just entered into UCLA’s sports medicine program, but he’d taken her in without a drop of hesitation even though it had changed his life. Med school had gone by the wayside as he’d done his best to put food on the table for both of them.
Justice was lean like PJ, but he had their dad’s height, at an easy six feet. He had her same brown hair that tended towards red if they were in the sun too much, and her same hazel eyes that stayed more green-blue than brown. People often commented how much they looked alike. It always made her happy because it was as if she at least belonged somewhere to someone.
Justice hugged her and then pushed her away, eyeing her up and down. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Why?” But she couldn’t meet his eyes because he knew her too well. That’s the thing about older brothers who basically raise you through your teen years. They tend to know too much about you.
“Don’t give me that bull. You’re never here putting yourself through the rope course this early unless you’re upset.”
