Love…
Love.
Was that what it’d been? Truly? Sometimes I didn’t know. I expected things of my ex, Christine. I expected the same result my brother had. He became a new person when he met his wife, fulfilled and open every time I saw him. Perhaps, in a sense, I expected too much from my ex because of my brother.
Perhaps, she never had a chance from the jump.
I’d never know that, though. She made sure of that.
She killed it to hell.
“She cheated on me, too,” I admitted, facing Noni. I touched her jaw. “A while back, but I guess that’s why I came to Aspen, too. Ultimately because of her. She’s marrying the guy she cheated on me with. She announced it at my brother’s wedding a few days ago.”
I’d gotten wasted that weekend, fucked up and a mess. So bad, I almost wasn’t there for my brother, his best man on one of the most important days of his life. I’d come through in the end, but it had been close—too close.
Breathing, I tried to forget, bury away that whole weekend when I let myself get weak. I tried to force away Christine and any evidence of her from my mind, but for some reason, I couldn’t. For some reason what she did… what she put me through... it still affected me. It still hurt. It still crushed.
“Are we just creeps?” I asked Noni, my smile forced, shaky. “Do we not deserve better?”
Filled with something… emotion, I had to look away from her eyes. I couldn’t keep the contact and almost moved away from her, pushed her away.
But she moved first.
She slid the blankets off herself, leaving me, and I was certain I had offended her by what I said.
What I didn’t expect was her mouth.
Kissing my lips, she forced me to slow down this time, got me out of my head and replaced all negative thoughts. I was left with Noni in the end.
I wanted Noni in the end.
“I’m not a creep,” she said humming the words against my lips. She smiled. “And I have a feeling you aren’t either.”
But maybe I was. I had to be if Christine did what she had.
Perhaps, I was paying for my past, all the women I had been with over the years and ultimately… tossed away.
I should have stopped Noni when she kissed my lips again, easing her legs over my waist. I didn’t want Noni to be one of those women. She deserved better. She deserved someone other than me.
The pair of us were different. We were different. She wasn’t like me. She didn’t have my past and couldn’t deserve what had happened to her because she was sweet, innocent and perfect.
But her mouth on me I didn’t resist, nor when she eased her legs apart. She guided me inside her again and I did nothing but lie back, letting her. I wanted something innocent.
I wanted something perfect just one more time.
“Oh my God, you hussy!”
Willa squealed, kicking her feet up in the crowded lodge and I forced a hand over her mouth, sliding over to her side of the couch.
We sat near the piano player in the lodge’s sitting area, but that hadn’t been enough to quiet Willa-Jean Murphy’s sound. We attracted the gaze of everyone else casually sipping hot cocoa and drinking eggnog near the resort’s large fireplace.
Though, somehow not as warm as another.
I fought my grin when I lifted my finger. I pressed it to my mouth, silently begging Willa to calm down before I removed my hand.
But to no avail.
“Hell, nah I won’t be quiet. You not just kissed but fucked a stranger and all behind my back. Where was I?”
“Taking a call,” I said, lifting my cocoa cup. I waggled my eyebrows. “At least during the kiss.”
The rest had been obviously behind the scenes, wonderfully behind the scenes.
Once the storm had blown over, Asa and I fell asleep in each other’s arms. We quite literally didn’t wake up until we heard a pounding on the door the next morning, roadside assistance finally coming to my aid. Though, at the time I hadn’t needed it. I could have spent all day in Asa’s arms, warm and sleeping. A man from the lodge had come, as well. He shoveled Asa’s walk and brought him a grocery order Asa had called in. Asa asked them both to come back after that. He wanted to make me breakfast first.
He wanted to cook for the cook.
It had actually been pretty good and I fought myself from making any revisions or helping with his French toast and eggs combo.
The whole night and this morning had been magical, something in another lifetime, and definitely not my own. Things like this didn’t happen to me. I had always been afraid to let them happen.
Eyeing me, Willa sipped her own cocoa.
“I guess you didn’t need me,” she said, grinning. “I got worried when I got up and you weren’t around. Even though I’d gotten your message.”
“I’m sorry about that.”
“Oh, girl, you were stuck and apparently with beef cake. Don’t worry about me.”
Lowering my head, I nodded. I still felt bad, but couldn’t help feeling happy despite the fact. It had been a good night, a good time.
And he helped me forget, not what happened to me with my ex and sister, but the pain became secondary and not in ways I expected. Asa gave me something memorable.
He allowed me to free myself.
“Ah, I’m so happy for you!” Willa went on, biting her lip. “Will you see him again?”
“Not sure,” I said because I really didn’t know. I shrugged. “He asked me to meet him for a drink later tonight—”
“Uh, so that means you’ll be seeing him again.”
Not necessarily. In that cabin, by the fireside, it had just been us, Asa and me and our magical time together. Now, I was back in the real world, and there, Asa had a clique.
There, Asa had other women.
Glancing away from my thoughts, I noticed Willa’s eyes on me.
My friend tilted her head, her smile warm underneath those tightly-coiled, bold curls of hers.
She grinned.
“You’re going to meet him,” she said, pulling back. “And then you’re going to fuck. All night like you did last night. I’ll be shocked if by the end of this trip you’re not pregnant.”
“Oh gosh, don’t even joke about that,” I said, knowing we’d been safe. At least… for the most part. In the moment, I hadn’t waited for the condom that last time, but Asa had pulled out. We’d be fine.
Everything had been fine, so wonderful.
Willa’s grin continued on after her teasing, but for some reason, eventually fell.
She sighed. “But unfortunately, I am going to have to cut this trip short. At least for me.”
I frowned. “What do you mean?” We were supposed to stay another day.
She shrugged. “Keenan supposedly caught a bug. He’s shitting and vomiting everywhere and my mama is freaking out.”
I shouldn’t have laughed, but the way she said it had been so crass.
I put my drink down. “Is it just something he ate?”
From the sound of the call before, her mama had been giving him anything he wanted.
“I wish. It sounds like something from school. Half the block has it apparently. I have to go back, but maybe you should stay.”
My brows lifted and she giggled.
She nudged me. “Sounds like you have something worth sticking around a little longer for. Don’t worry about me. I’ll head home and take care of my stinker. You should stay, though. You should have fun.”
Just hours before, I never would have considered such a thing. But hours ago had been before last night.
Hours ago things had been different.
I still hadn’t decided whether or not I’d stay or go by the time it rolled around to meet Asa for drinks. But I had decided to meet him, something I had been unsure about before.
He told me he’d “pick me up,” a.k.a. meet me at my room, but ready before the designated time, I decided to meet him at his. He’d given me his room number, ap
parently he’d booked that and the cabin from last night, as he’d come on the trip with friends, and I wanted to surprise him.
More excited than I should be, I took the elevator up to the top floor, to where his room was. I saw him right away when I got out of the elevator, as he’d been coming out of the other one down the hall.
And wasn’t alone.
A woman, her hair red and flowing, walked beside him. That’s about as much as I saw of her, though. Asa blocked her when she grabbed his hand, dragging him away…
Her other hand played in his hair on the walk.
Getting to a room, what I knew to be Asa’s, he let them both inside, her arms moving to go around his waist. She backed him inside, hugging him to her, and the pair disappeared from my view when they walked inside the room.
That door closed down the hall and the click actually reverberated in my ears. It charged through my head no matter how far away.
It matched the harsh beating inside my chest.
“Christine.”
I braced her shoulders, literally having to pull her off me.
When she called me earlier, called to tell me she wasn’t back home, but here, in Aspen to see me, I only thought the worse.
Despite myself, I went into my best panic, as a result. I couldn’t help it. She called me, came all the way here about something. If she went through all that labor, I felt there had to be something wrong. She wouldn’t come here unless there was. The last time I saw her she was telling the world of her engagement to another man and not long before that she was telling me she no longer loved me.
Seemed she’d forgotten both now, her hands up my chest. She’d been trying to touch me since I arrived at the front desk to meet her and I didn’t understand.
I gripped her hands. “Christine, what are you doing?”
Up until my brother’s wedding, I never would have taken Christine as one to play games. That wasn’t her M.O., the pair of us alike in that sense. We were both business people, did our work with some of the most powerful people in the world, and if we made decisions we didn’t bullshit about it. We stuck to it.
That was until my brother got married.
She’d been confusing too then, saying things to me privately… and they only messed with my head.
Much like now.
“Asa…”
The woman had a beauty that had never been tested for me, body tight and features of a starlet. Seeing her, a woman that made both men’s and women’s heads turn, had never been a problem for me and I did so without question. It had been effortless once upon a time.
“I think I’m confused,” she said, and definitely not the only one. Red strands moved against her shoulders when she shook her head. “About us.”
“There is no us.” And she made sure of that. She single-handedly annihilated us.
I pointed at her. “You’re engaged. You said you’re getting married.”
“That’s what I’m confused about,” she admitted. Her hands went to my sweater again, her fingers to my neck. “I think I need time. Everything’s happening so fast, has been happening so fast for me, and I… I just need a moment. I need to breathe and I thought if I came here, saw you…”
Saw me…
Saw me.
“Meaning you want to fuck,” I concluded, making her eyes wide. I laughed only cynically. “Because that’s what you want to do, right? Fuck me and fuck with me. More? Christine, I’m not just some dick you can ride to figure out your mess.”
“That’s not what I…”
But when she didn’t finish, bit her lip, I knew that’s exactly what I was to her. She wanted to come here, have a weekend and figure out any doubts she had in her mind. For how could she be completely sure about something, someone and a choice she’d made in infidelity. There’d always be a dark cloud over her head.
And she managed to do that all by herself.
Refusing to be a part of it, I moved out of her hands.
“Asa, please. I didn’t just come here for that. I swear, that’s not what it is. Something’s happened, Asa. Something’s happened and I think it’s a sign, a sign for us. I thought I was making the right decision before, letting you go and everything go, but I don’t think it’s up to me.”
I stood there, so confused. She wasn’t making sense, nothing about her being here did.
She put her hands on my chest. “I tried to talk to you at your brother’s wedding. I did, but I didn’t know how. Please. Just give us this weekend. Let me explain—”
My hands in the air, she didn’t continue. I wasn’t going to let her play with me, mess with me anymore.
I was done with the head fuck.
Going to the door, I faced her. “You killed any hope of us, the moment you cheated on me.”
And she had to know that. She had to.
“Asa—”
I let the door of my suite slam in her face after that, charging down the hall. If she was tortured with the ultimate decision she made, choosing that guy over me, she’d have to work that out on her own. Either way, that had nothing to do with me.
Knock, knock, knock.
“Noni? You in there?”
I stood at the door of Noni’s room moments later.
And was confused by how long I’d been out there without a response.
I knocked again.
“Noni?”
Sounds in the hall became evident, every creak of the floor and movement by others moving around in my head, but nothing stirred on the other side of that door, no sounds heard.
I shook my head.
I had the right number. She gave it to me…
I even memorized it.
Unable to help it, I lifted my hand, moving into the next round of repetitions. But once again, I was left empty, once again no response from the woman who was supposed to be inside.
I pushed my hand over my head, my mind a whirl by what was happening. I told her I’d be by her room to get her and we agreed on that, deciding that’s what we were going to do, that we were going to see each other again.
Maybe we misunderstood one another.
She could very well meet me at the bar, as I had invited her to have drinks. I could understand her confusion if that was where she went, thinking to meet me.
She has to be there.
Banking on it, I took the stairs, thinking that was faster. On the way, I silently cursed myself that I didn’t come to this conclusion sooner. I spent too much time in that hallway, knocking and hoping the door would open. Despite myself, I still had Christine and her crap in my head and lost too many moments.
Never again.
Things would be different now. I was choosing to be different. I didn’t have to let everything that happened with Christine damage me. I didn’t have to be a creep and I was choosing not to be.
I chose to be the same as someone else.
This thing with Noni… I had no idea what it was. I just knew last night had been one of more than coincidence. Last night and this morning had been fate and Noni hadn’t just been there with me, but for me.
And I’d completely stand by that.
I had to explore what this was and anything outside of that I dubbed nothing but extra. She lived in Brooklyn, okay. We had one night together, whatever. I wasn’t asking her to marry me or give some kind of commitment. I just wanted us to get to know each other and whatever that meant.
I took those thoughts to the bar, looking for her, but like upstairs my search went without result.
“I’m sorry, sir, but no one was waiting here with that description.”
Her beautiful skin tone that of a caramelized, brown sugar, her eyes dark and humming with even color just as smooth as her skin. She’d been a vision, and one I wished I would have studied more, tasted more of.
After thanking the bartender I’d spoken to, I decided to go to reception. I was certain I had the right room number, but it was possible I could have memorized it wrong. I had some pull with the people h
ere behind the scenes and thought I’d ask if they could get me the right information on her. When one spent a lot of money, they usually got some leeway when it came to things like this. I hated I had to use that, my money for pull, but I didn’t feel like I had a choice.
I just couldn’t feel guilty, not when it came to this, her.
Turning a corner, I looked up, reception in sight. I got close and that was when those thoughts of fate came back. They couldn’t be helped.
There she was, that vision standing there and waiting for service. Next in line, Noni stepped up to the concierge and I actually had to shake my head at the sight of her. She was that beautiful, that unforgettable.
“Noni?”
Her head didn’t turn at my words, too many people between us. The lodge had always been packed, a popular site in Aspen, Colorado. That’s why I came here originally, the lodge’s opulence when it came to its amenities above the rest.
I picked up the pace, calling her name again, and like before, she didn’t hear me. Whether she was busy talking to the receptionist or the room was generally too loud I didn’t know, but either way, she couldn’t hear me. I couldn’t hear her either being so far away, but I could see her. I could see her handing something over to the man she spoke to, a paper or something, and I noticed something else. She had something in her hand, a bag.
Luggage.
“Noni—?”
She rolled it away, dragging the bag with her. She kept walking with it, but not my way. She was heading in the direction of the lodge’s wide double doors, exit doors.
Everything clicked after that; her not meeting me at the bar, the bag in her hands. She couldn’t meet me. Because for some reason…
She was leaving.
“Noni!”
I sprinted now, passing that same concierge.
“Mr. Ricci, I have something for you!”
I didn’t answer him, too busy for whatever package he had. He’d given me a few since I’d gotten here, well acquainted with me. I’d gotten packages from work, various things, as my day job never stopped just because I was on vacation. I took work with me and had done something for my job every day and every night.
Baby It's Cold Out There: Aspen (Love in the City Book 2) Page 5
