“Pax,” the soft voice murmurs, intruding upon my sleep.
And for a minute, just a scant minute, it seems like it might be my mother. In the blur of sleep, the voice has the same soft timbre as hers. But it can’t be. Even in sleep, I know that. It’s only the wishful thinking that comes from that grayish, half-awake place. It isn’t my mother. I know that before I even open my eyes.
But I’m surprised, when I do, to find Mila standing in front of me.
She seems uncertain, but she’s so fucking beautiful in the morning sun. Radiant, actually. She doesn’t seem hung-over at all. Her dark hair is loose and flowing and the morning breeze carries her scent to me. I inhale it and stare at her.
“What are you doing out here?” I ask groggily. I squint into the light, then rub my forehead. As I do, I wince because my fucking hand hurts. And then I realize that I must have fallen asleep here. The night air made my throat scratchy, so I clear it, then clear it again. “Are you feeling alright?”
I glance down and find that my bottle of whiskey is beside me on the beach, its contents spilled onto the sand. I think. I certainly hope I hadn’t drunk the whole thing. If I did, I’m going to feel it later today, just like Mila.
Mila looks even more uncertain now.
“I… uh.” She shifts her weight from one foot to the other nervously. I look at her and cock an eyebrow. “I feel fine. Mostly. My mouth is dry and I have a headache. I don’t, um. I don’t remember exactly what all happened last night. But I sort of remember that you punched Jared and brought me here. And I think you might have broken his hand.”
I eye her. “Yeah, that happened. Do you make a habit of getting trashed at the Bear’s Den and going home with assholes?”
It came out a little harsher than I meant for it to and Mila flinches.
“No,” she answers quickly. “In fact, I don’t usually drink much at all, unless it is wine at dinner. Maddy has been bugging me to go out with her and blow the cogs off and after yesterday, I just felt like I needed it.”
I stare at her with interest now, my lip twitching.
“I think you mean cobwebs. And what about yesterday? When you rejected me, you mean?”
Color floods her cheeks and she stares at the sand.
“Yes.”
“If that was stressful for you, then did you ever think that maybe you made a mistake? That maybe you shouldn’t have rejected me? And that maybe you should give this thing a chance?”
I stare at her, trying to force her to meet my gaze.
“Well,” I prompt. “Have you?”
She lifts her chin, her green eyes bright.
“That’s all I’ve thought about since you left my shop yesterday,” she admits. “All I can think of is you. Even when I was with Madison and Jared last night. And then when you were there at the bar, it was all I could do to keep from running over and jumping in your lap.”
I cock my head. “Why didn’t you? I think I would have enjoyed that.”
She blushes again, her cheeks and neck flushing prettily.
“I think it might be considered socially inappropriate,” she replies wryly. “Thank you for coming to my rescue last night. I guess we’re even now. I saved you, then you saved me back.“ She pauses and looks at the ground before she looks back up at me.
“And I have been thinking about you. It’s probably not smart or good for me, but it’s all I seem to do lately. I think about you. Is your apology still on the table from yesterday? Because if it is, then I think maybe you were right. Maybe this is worth taking a risk for.”
She fidgets with her hands nervously.
I raise an eyebrow, deliberately obtuse.
“This? Can you be more specific?”
She doesn’t answer. She just bends down without hesitation and kisses me square on the mouth.
The lips that I fantasized about last night are on mine, her tongue in my mouth. I know that I taste like whiskey and smokes, but I don’t care and she doesn’t seem to either. She tastes like heaven.
Finally, she pulls away and I can see that she is a bit breathless.
“So, was that a yes?” she asks hesitantly.
I shake my head in bewilderment and smile at her. Having her here like this is fucking amazing. And surprising. My chest is swelling with the amazing feeling so much that I can’t believe my next words.
“That’s a yes,” I tell her. “My apology is still on the table. But I think I probably owe you another one.”
Chapter Nine
Mila
I stare at Pax.
Even though he’s gorgeous, he looks rough, like he had one hell of a night. He’s got two-day stubble now and he’s wearing the same clothing that he was wearing yesterday. His eyes are rimmed in red, like he didn’t sleep much. Or he had way too much to drink. Or maybe he even did too much of something else.
I narrow my eyes.
“What do you need to apologize for now?” I ask hesitantly. I’m not sure if I want to know. And he looks like he’s not sure that he wants to tell me. I back away a few steps. It can’t be worse than getting a blow job from Jill, can it?
He holds his hand up. “Wait, Mila. Just listen.”
He stares at me.
I stare back.
He sighs.
I wait.
“Yes?” I ask and even I can hear the trepidation in my tone. I swallow. He dips his head, then returns my stare.
“I think we might be onto something good here and I don’t want to fuck it up by starting it out with lies.”
I’m confused now. Lies? He’s lied to me already? As if he can hear my thoughts, Pax shakes his head.
“I haven’t lied to you yet,” he explains. “But if I don’t tell you what I did last night, then you won’t understand what kind of person that I am. And that would be the biggest lie of all.”
“What kind of person are you?” I whisper. “Did you try something with me last night?” The morning breeze blows my hair into my face and impatiently, I shove it behind my ears. I need to hear this, even if it isn’t pretty.
Pax is hesitant now, unsure. The look on his face drops a big iron weight upon my heart because I know that whatever he wants to tell me isn’t good. Maybe coming out here was a bad idea. I should have known. I want to back away, but I resist the urge and plant my feet firmly in the sand.
Pax catches my gaze and lifts his chin, sighing heavily.
“I’m the kind of person who gets pissed and then goes off and does stupid shit to try and block out my anger. Or my hurt. I don’t deal with things in a healthy way. I deal with them in shitty ways, like drugs or women. Or whiskey. Last night, I chose whiskey and a woman. Although the woman wasn’t you. I didn’t try and take advantage of you.”
He stares at me and the breath is caught in my throat. And I sort of feel like he kicked me in the stomach. I tortured myself all day yesterday and he had slept with someone else? When he didn’t even want me enough to try something with me when I had been in his bed last night?
I am stunned and so I do the only thing any self-respecting woman in this situation can do.
I walk away.
“I’m out of here,” I mutter.
One foot in front of the other, I retreat down the beach, my feet sinking into the sand. My heart feels like it is sinking too, more and more with each step, and I focus on the ground in front of me, trying to ignore the piercing pain coming from my heart. I know it’s illogical to be upset that he hadn’t tried to take advantage of me. But under the circumstances, it is a bit hurtful. And it wouldn’t have been a violation because I want him.
And that’s why the whole thing is so hurtful.
“Mila, wait!” Pax calls from behind me. I hear his steps right behind me and I stop when he grabs my arm. “Please, just wait. I need to explain something. And then, if you still want to, you can go.”
I turn slowly, staring at him in the face. His is so anxious, his mouth tightly drawn. I nod.
“I can leave
right now, if I wanted. I don’t need your permission. But I’ll hear what you have to say.”
His lip twitches, almost as if he finds my little show of independence funny. I don’t see the humor. I press my lips together, my hands on my hips as I wait.
It looks like Pax is trying not to laugh again.
“Well, obviously you can leave right now. But you’d have to walk, unless you want to wait until I drive you. Your car is still at the bar.”
I feel my face fall. So much for being feisty. I’m at his mercy right now.
He stares at me, all traces of amusement gone from his face.
“I need you to know something,” he says patiently. “Can you come back and sit?”
I glance at the beach chairs where he had apparently spent the night and nod again, curtly, following him back. I settle into one and instead of sitting in the one next to me, he sits on mine, beside my legs. I wait.
It is a moment before he begins.
“I’ve never talked about this with anyone, so it’s difficult to know where to begin,” he tells me with a wry smile. “Bear with me, okay?”
I nod yet again, silent as I wait for him to just spit it out.
“I’m fucked up,” he says bluntly and I can’t help but smile a little.
“Well, that’s one way to start,” I tell him. He smiles a little too, but it’s a sad smile, and my heart twinges a bit.
“I know. But I want to be completely honest with you. I’m seriously fucked up. I have never had a real relationship. All I’ve ever dealt with are bar whores, pardon the term, and I don’t really know how to be in a real relationship with a normal woman. Yesterday, when you said that we weren’t a good idea, it hurt. I don’t take rejection well. And then I had to drive to Chicago for some business with my father and overall, it was just a shitty day. I stopped by a little bar in the city and I ended up having sex with a woman there. Because that’s what I do. I block out any kind of hurt or anger that I feel with drugs or women.”
He pauses and I’m numb as I stare at him.
“You didn’t even know her?” I whisper.
Pax shakes his head.
“No. I didn’t even know her. But the strange part is that I couldn’t bring myself to finish. All I could see in my head was you. And all of a sudden, the dingy little bar closed in on me and I couldn’t get out of there fast enough. I thought about you the entire drive home. Then, when I saw you in the Bear’s Den, I almost couldn’t breathe. But you were there with someone else, and you had already said that you didn’t want me.
“Mila, when that guy had you against his car, I saw red. For the first time in a long time, I cared about something other than myself. It didn’t matter to me if you wanted me or not, but I couldn’t let that guy hurt you. That tells me a lot about myself. And you. It tells me that you are good for me, that trying to be with you is something that is worth my time and worth any kind of wait that it might entail, until you’re ready to be with me, too.”
He pauses now, his eyes frozen upon my face. He’s waiting…for a response, for an answer, for another possible rejection.
My heart is beating frozenly, as though the numbness of my emotions has spread to my chest. I can see the broken little boy in his eyes again, the one that screams that he has been hurt, and once again, I long to fix it. To fix him.
Even though he just had sex with someone else last night in some dirty bar.
Shit. He just had sex with someone else last night in a dirty bar.
I gulp hard at that ugly fact and stare at him. What he did might have been ugly, but he’s absolutely beautiful right now with his fragility shining in his eyes. My gut twists.
Against my deepest misgivings, I somehow believe him. I believe that it didn’t mean anything to him. I don’t know if that makes me as twisted as he is or what. The whole thing is crazy and I don’t know what to say. All I know is what I feel.
I want to take a chance.
My heart feels like it might stop beating if I don’t.
“Did you at least use protection?” I ask hesitantly. “With the girl, I mean.”
Pax nods. “Of course.”
“I’m probably crazy. We aren’t even dating and you’ve cheated on me already. But I have this insane attraction to you,” I tell him. “When I’m not with you, I’m thinking about you. I’ve never been attracted to someone like this before. It has to mean something, right? So, maybe we should see where this goes. But I need your word that you won’t be with anyone else while you’re with me. I can’t tolerate that. You’re going to have to find some other way to deal with your issues. I’m really afraid, Pax. You’ve got issues that I don’t know what to do with.”
Pax stares at me, his hazel eyes more gold than green in the morning light. He nods slowly.
“I will try very hard not to hurt you,” he says. “I’m fucked up. So I can’t promise that I won’t. But I promise that I will try.”
“Okay,” I whisper. “But try very hard.”
Pax chuckles, low and husky and my belly twinges with warmth from the sound of it. “And I did not cheat on you. We weren’t together. You rejected me, remember?”
He dips his head and kisses me again. This time, it is a kiss with promise. Of things to come, of things that might be. It fills me up with hope and I realize with a start that this is the first time I’ve felt truly hopeful in quite some time. It’s quite a feeling and for just a second, I think that I might not be crazy after all, because it feels right.
As Pax pulls away, he holds onto me, looking down at me and I see warmth in his eyes. So there really was warmth there the other day. I hadn’t been imagining it.
“I remember,” I tell him. “But it was because I was trying to listen to my head, not my heart. My head is usually the smarter of the two. For once, though, I’m going to do the crazy thing.”
Pax grins. “I’ve done the crazy thing more times than I can count, usually to my detriment. Trust me, I know crazy, and this isn’t it. This is… just nature. A man and a woman who are attracted to each other when they logically shouldn’t be because they’re opposites. But opposites always attract, you know, so it makes total sense.”
He says this knowingly, as if he’s an expert and I laugh.
“Okay, Dr. Phil. We’ll just pretend that it makes total sense and then just go from there.”
“Where exactly do we go from there, though? How do we go about a real relationship?” he asks wryly. “Because I truly don’t know.”
I can see that he doesn’t. He looks at a loss and he’s not even trying to hide it. I find that refreshing, so I don’t make fun of him.
Instead, I simply say, “Well, we start with a first date. Then a second and a third. We’ll take it slow. I’m not going to jump into your bed tonight, Pax. I meant it when I said that I’m afraid to trust you to not break my heart. I’m going to need some time for you to prove that you won’t.”
“I’m okay with that,” he tells me, amusement in his voice. “I think you’ll be worth the wait.”
I smile, then lean into his arm and we watch the lake, at how the foamy lip slides onto the beach and then sucks back away. The sun glistens on the surface like a million prisms of light and I look up at him.
“I bet this is the earliest you’ve been up in a while.”
He laughs. “Maybe. I’m not admitting to anything, though. I will tell you that I need a shower. Desperately. So I’m going to drive you to your car, then take one. When can I see you again?”
When can he see me again?
The way he words that question causes my heart to twinge a bit once again. It seems so vulnerable and tender, like him. Like somewhere, deep down, behind his tough-looking exterior, he’s fragile. But I don’t say it because I’m sure that he wouldn’t appreciate being described with that particular word.
Instead, I reply, “I have to work a shift at The Hill, my family’s restaurant. My sister runs it. I’m helping out during the slow winter months. But if you
want to come over around the end of my shift, we can have our first date. Do you like Italian food?”
Pax smiles. “I love it. And it’s a date.”
He walks me to his car and then kisses me again, leaning me against the cool metal door as he wraps his tongue with mine until I feel weak-kneed from his nearness. But I finally pull away like a rational human being and watch him walk around to his side. I can’t help but notice the way the muscles in his back flex as he moves. I sigh.
He’s gorgeous, and flawed and sexy. And I have no idea what I’m getting into.
********
I had forgotten how tiring waiting tables truly is. I’ve only been here for five hours and it feels like a million. I pause tiredly by the kitchen door to rub my ankle after banging it on a table leg.
“Tired already?” Maddy asks with a grin as she passes by. She pauses next to me, a tray of food in her hands. “Don’t worry. The night is almost over.”
I roll my eyes. “Yet the blisters will last all week. Oh, the things I do for you, big sister.”
She giggles and delivers her food while it is still steaming, balancing the loaded tray expertly. Even though she has been here every bit as long as me today, she still looks flawless. Her blonde ponytail is still perky, her makeup is still perfect. She doesn’t look for even a minute like she is hung-over. I don’t know how she does it. It’s annoying.
I sink into a nearby chair to rest my weary legs.
“Is this seat taken?”
Before I even look, my heart knows that the husky voice belongs to Pax.
I turn and find Pax behind me, freshly showered and dressed in slacks and a button-up. Holy Hell. He looks amazing. I hadn’t been expecting him to dress up and I instantly feel at a distinct disadvantage. I’m grimy and smell like garlic. Why can’t I look perfect at all times like Madison?
“Hi,” I tell him softly. “You clean up really well.”
He smiles, bright and brilliant. “Thanks. Am I early?”
“Only a bit. Why don’t you come sit at the bar and get a drink while I finish up?”
If You Stay (Beautifully Broken) Page 8
