My assistant closed his eyes and took a deep breath. I waited, recognizing the signs that he was about to say something to me that he was sure I wasn’t going to like.
“I’m going to elucidate something for you,” he said. “And I want you to understand that when I say this, I understand the implications it will have for me and my career.”
“If you’re going to tell me to go after her, save your breath,” I replied. “She’s made her intentions clear.”
Todd brandished a tight-lipped smile, though there was no amusement in it. “You’re a fucking idiot.”
My chin jerked in his direction. Had I just heard right?
“Yes, you heard me,” he responded to my unspoken question. Then, as if to make it more clear, he added “You’re a goddamn fool.”
“I thought that was what you said,” I replied bitterly. “Get out.”
“No.” Todd pulled the scotch from his back and took a gulp. I narrowed my eyes and studied him. Now he had my full attention. I’d never seen Todd touch a drop of alcohol. “This girl has been through hell and back for you, at your hands. She clearly had feelings for you from day one, and what did you do?”
“Pushed her away,” I replied. “Like I’ve always done. Like I’ve always had to do.”
“Exactly. But did that work?”
“Obviously not,” I said. “Until now.”
“And why do you think it’s working now?” he asked. “Because your love comes with conditions and you’re suddenly not worth the fight?”
“That’s a pretty good reason to stop trying.”
“Wrong!” Todd exclaimed. “How can you be so thick?”
“This is getting excessive.” I glared at him across my desk. I didn’t take kindly to insults, even when they came from someone I’d known as long as Todd.
“It’s your thick-headedness that’s excessive!”
As much as he was pissing me off, I was amazed by his gumption. This was the first time he hadn’t capped his irritation before it reached this level.
“She obviously cares a great deal about you. The reason you fell for her is the same reason you should know she hasn’t ended things because she doesn’t care about you.”
I chewed on that for a minute, but the more I did, the worse I felt. Elizabeth was good. She was gentle. She’d seen through me during those first stormy weeks enough to find something underneath that she cared enough about to keep coming back, no matter how roughly I pushed her away.
“She’s making the choice so I don’t have to,” I realized.
Todd let out a dramatic sigh. “Finally.” He took another gulp of the scotch. “Idiot.”
“Okay, I get it.”
“Asshole.”
“That’s pushing it, Todd.”
He shot me a lopsided grin and slid the scotch back over to me. “Sorry. That felt pretty good, though. I got a little carried away.”
The relief that was flooding through my chest made ignoring his insults far easier than normal. He was right. Elizabeth had ended things, which still burned, but understanding the real reason changed everything.
“So what are you going to do?” he asked.
“There’s nothing I can do.” I shrugged, taking a final sip of the scotch before securing the lid back on. “Am I ready to give all this up? Even if she loves me now, will she always?”
Todd came around the side of the desk and placed a heavy hand on my shoulder. “Only you can decide that,” he said. “But I will say one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“The last time I saw you this upset, it was because your grandfather had just passed away.”
“I remember that,” I replied, staring off into space. His death, though long expected, had been a devastating blow.
“After the funeral, I came here and found you half-drowned in a bottle of his scotch, just like today. All of his pens were still out on the desk. You were a mess, but they were still arranged perfectly. Like his desk was just waiting for him to come back.”
“I’m surprised you remember that.”
“Of course I remember it,” he smiled sadly. “It broke my heart, Oliver. I’d never seen you so shattered before.”
“Are you telling me this to remind me it can always get worse?”
He chuckled. “Do you remember what you told me that day? After I’d forced you to take a shower and eat some toast?”
I gazed up at Todd, wondering what the hell he was still doing working for me instead of solving all of the world’s problems.
“I told you I would do anything to bring him back,” I replied. “That I wished I had more time.”
Todd smiled knowingly and gave my shoulder another pat. “Let me know if you need anything else,” he said. “I’m going to go start browsing Craigslist.”
He turned and headed toward the door, his back as straight and stiff as always. So dignified. So strong. He knew urging me to follow my heart on this would very likely lead to his unemployment, and yet he did it anyway.
“Are you going to be okay, Todd?” I called out after him.
He turned to me at the doorway, smile extending almost all the way to his eyes. “I’ll always be okay, Ollie.” He chuckled. “Think of it this way—realistically, my job should have ended after your grandfather died. We only put off the inevitable.”
He turned and was out the door before I could thank him.
I needed to fix this. For Elizabeth. For Todd.
For me.
But how?
I picked up my phone and called Damien, who answered immediately. “Hey buddy,” he said. “How are you?”
I winced. “Still shitty,” I growled.
“I know. I figured that’s why I haven’t heard from you in a while.”
“Can you come over?” I asked. “I need your brain.”
“Right away, Doctor Frankenstein,” he replied. “Should I bring anything else?”
“Probably a toothbrush,” I said after a moment. “You could be here for a while.”
“And might I inquire on what basis we’re holding this impromptu sleepover?”
“With any luck,” I said, “you’ll help me figure out a way out of this mess.”
He laughed. “So we’re just solving the impossible then,” Damien said. “Right-o. I’ll be over in half an hour.”
I hung up the phone and stared at the wall of my study. Damien was right, of course. I was up against the impossible. Every choice had a downside, so there were no easy solutions to be had. I’d already spent months looking. So maybe I just needed my best friend to help figure out which downside I could live with.
I thought about going to find Todd again. I wanted to tell him how he’d inspired me. I wanted to tell him that it might be okay after all, but I really didn’t know if that was going to be true.
But at least I was back to looking for an answer instead of just wallowing in empty misery.
I still remembered that cold November day when a young college grad had showed up on our doorstep, fresh with enthusiasm and the desire to do good. I’d been a child then, but over the years, my grandfather’s care worker and I had gotten close.
I never realized he’d end up taking care of me, too.
Chapter 38
Elizabeth
Over a week and not even a quick text back to acknowledge that he’d received my break-up text. Cressida said that was normal. She said it was “just what guys do.” I still found it frustrating, especially when she left me alone to go to work and I had all day to sit in my pyjamas and think about it.
I’d done the stupid thing and turned down the job offer for Nikolai’s renovations. I couldn’t stand being so close to someone who was a friend of Oliver’s. It was pathetic, I know, but I was hurting.
Still.
If love was the most wonderful thing in the world when it was good, then it was also the worst thing in the world when it went bad. Cressida kept telling me to capitalize on all my feelings and write some poetry
or something, but I was struggling just to write cover letters for all the jobs I was applying to.
I wanted to do more interior design, I really did, but I wasn’t ready to ask Oliver for a reference yet. And I wasn’t ready to talk through my redesign of his house with future clients, either. So that left me a bit stuck. Hence the job hunt.
The apartment was so quiet without my roommate around.
The refrigerator hummed and the fan sliced through the air, but otherwise I was left to stew in my own jagged thoughts. At least I hadn’t cried in a while. That was a plus.
I drowned out my thoughts with the clicking of the keyboard. Working in an office, I had decided, would feel too confining, like I was trapped in a box after spending months in a mansion. So I was applying to landscaping jobs and minor construction work, though I wasn’t particularly skilled at either.
Maybe Rodney would hire me.
Truth be told, I didn’t need to be working just yet. I had enough money left over from Oliver’s job to sustain myself comfortably for a couple months at least. But I was going crazy spending so much time alone, so I kept clicking, typing and applying.
I was so involved in my job search that a knock at the door nearly sent me flying out of my chair. I eyed the clock. Eleven a.m. Who the hell was knocking on my door at eleven a.m.?
“Who is it?” I called.
No answer.
I cursed under my breath and stepped over to the door. We didn’t have a peephole. I’d never wished more, in this moment, that we did. I had half a mind to go put on real clothes, instead of my grey paint-stained sweatpants and ABBA t-shirt, but that would require effort—something that I only had in short supply these days.
I opened the door and nearly screamed.
“Hey, kitten.”
I could barely see his handsome face over the top of the gigantic bouquet he was holding, but I would have recognized that floppy hair and seductive voice anywhere.
“Oliver…” I blinked, worried that I had gone full on crazy and was now hallucinating.
“Are you going to let me in?” he asked. “I can come back later if you’re expecting somebody. You look like you’re about to head out on a date.”
I laughed and stood back from the door, gesturing him in. I needed a moment before I could trust my voice.
“What are you doing here? What’s—what’s all this?” I gestured to the flowers.
Oliver handed them down to me. “The lady at the store said you’d be more likely to let me in if I brought peonies,” he said. “Apparently roses are more common, but are often overdone. Peonies, on the other hand—“
I tossed the flowers off to the side and threw myself into Oliver’s arms. His lips met mine without hesitation. Then he pulled me tight to his chest and held me there, as if he never wanted to let me go. I didn’t want him to.
“I missed you,” I murmured.
“You have no idea how much I’ve missed you,” he replied.
His growing bulge pressed against my hip and I smiled. “I think I have a little bit of an idea.”
Oliver’s rumbling laugh rolled over my skin, bringing a standing ovation of goosebumps all across my body. The heat between us burned brighter and hotter the longer we kissed, and god, did we kiss. I could taste every ounce of longing on his lips, and released all my own right back into him – as if swapping my pain for his.
We tumbled down to the floor and made love right there, in the foyer. It seemed classier to call it the foyer at that moment, and not the area we kept the shoes.
He held me close as he moved above me, as if letting me slip even one inch away would be too much. I sank into the smell of him, the heat. I tasted every inch of skin my lips could reach, anxious never to forget the flavor against my tongue. And when we came together in ecstasy, I held him tight with my legs around his hips until we both ached from lying on the floor.
“You didn’t have to buy me an apology bouquet,” I said, sometime later. “I’m not actually sure why you did.”
Oliver pressed a kiss to my forehead. I was bunched up against him on the couch, where we’d eventually relocated. I was as close to him as I could get without literally lying over top of him.
“I didn’t reply to your text,” he said. “It was rude of me.”
The bark of laughter that escaped my lips was far from ladylike. “You’re apologizing for not replying to my breakup text?” I asked. “Geez, Bentley. I never used to be able to get a sorry out of you, and now you’re throwing them around like hotcakes.”
“Don’t get used to it,” he murmured, pinching my hip.
I laughed and pressed in closer. “I’ll be honest; I was upset that you didn’t reply. But I wasn’t actually mad at you. Not as much as I was mad at myself, anyway.” I sighed. “I shouldn’t have been such a coward. I should have told you to your face.” I tilted my chin back to look at him. “I’m sorry, too, Ollie.”
His breath fanned my cheek and he pressed a warm kiss to it. “Apology accepted.”
Neither of us had acknowledged the elephant in the room, and it was beginning to make me nervous.
“But why are you here?” I asked. “Not that I’m not thrilled to see you, which I’m sure you can tell I am.”
He kissed me again. “I want to be with you, Elizabeth. I want to be by your side through every moment in this life. And the next, if you’ll have me. Wherever this crazy road takes us, I just want to be there with you.”
I turned my eyes up to meet his. My heart had never beaten so fast. Even if a heart attack was imminent, it would be worth it just to have heard those beautiful words.
“Are you saying…?”
“That I’ll give up everything to be with you?” he filled in with a wry smile. “Yes. I’d do it twice if I had to. Three times, even. Perhaps not a fourth. It depends if the sex stays as good.”
I hoped he took the sound that came from me as a laugh, instead of a sob. I wasn’t sure which one it was myself, exactly. “I want to be with you, too. So goddamn badly. It killed me to send that text. I’m scared, though. I don’t want you to end up resenting me.”
“I won’t,” he promised. “And it’s not going to be all ramen noodles and monster trucks. Damien and I came up with a plan.”
“Spit it out,” I prompted. My heart was already racing. This was too good to be true. This had to be too good to be true.
“He’s going to lend me the money to get through law school and help set me up at a practice when I’m finished,” Oliver said. “If I’m any good, that is.” He chuckled. “Though after reading dozens of contracts for hours a day, I’m nearly fluent in legal-ese.”
“You can’t just give up everything, though.” As much as I wanted this, I couldn’t just accept what he was offering. His sacrifice. It was too much to ask. “Your whole life, Oliver. You’ll be giving up your whole life.”
“No.” His eyes were bright, as if lit up from behind by an eerie green glow. “I’ll be starting my life. I can’t stagnate alone in that mansion for the rest of my years, Liz. My grandfather made a mistake when he drew up that will, but I’d be making a mistake if I lived by it.”
My eyes stung. I tried to blink back the tears, but a few managed to sneak out anyway.
“Don’t cry,” he cooed. “It’ll be okay. We’ll make it work.”
I sniffed. “I’m not crying because of that.”
His eyes softened, arms tightening ever more.
“I just love you so much, you asshole.” My arms tightened around him as well.
“I love you too, kitten.” He lowered his mouth to mine, whispering against my lips. “And I’d choose you and that filthy mouth of yours every single time.”
Chapter 39
Oliver
“Oliver,” Cressida chastised. “You didn’t eat your muffin.”
I craned my neck toward Elizabeth’s bedroom. How long did it take to select an outfit to go to a lawyer’s office?
“I appreciate the gesture, Cress, but I�
�m not hungry.”
She glared at me, arms crossed over her chest. She could be quite intimidating when she tried. “You’re always hungry.”
I’ve been spending way too much time here.
“Elizabeth?” I called. “Get out here before she force-feeds me.”
“She does that!” came Liz’s muffled reply. “She’s not very fast though. You can outrun her.”
Dirty Jock Page 49
