Secrets That We Keep

by Linda Kage

  “I said move,” he commanded.

  “Right,” I said as if I was agreeing because people seemed to like it better when you agreed with them. “But the thing is…”

  I shuddered when his face darkened menacingly. Yeah, this guy had some seriously awesome intimidation skills. Except Trick was my homie. I wasn’t about to let him down.

  “I really wish I could get out of your way because I don’t want to die,” I started, trying to smile but probably cringing a little too much to make it believable. “But I’m supposed to be the lookout guy right now. At least, I think I am. I’m honestly not really sure. But just to be safe, I really can’t let you go inside.”

  “Lookout guy?” he repeated, only to glance out into the yard and swerve back to scowl harder at me. “Is someone robbing me?”

  “What? No. Of course not.” I mean, unless he figured someone stealing his girl was basically like being robbed.

  “Then someone’s inside with Connie?” he countered a little too perceptively, totally reading my facial expression.

  I had to pause a moment over the word Connie. And, huh, you know, that was probably a better nickname for her than Hot Constance. I was going to start calling her Connie from here on out.

  “Connie?” I repeated on a small cringe.

  Maverick’s face turned a bright angry red. “Is she messing around with another fucking loser? I warned her—”

  “Hey,” I broke in. “He’s not a loser. I’ll have you know, Tri—”

  “Get out of my way.”

  As he reached past me and grasped the door handle, I pressed back against the door with all my weight. “No! Please don’t hurt him. He’s one of the few friends I have. Hell, he’s like family.”

  But Maverick was bigger and stronger and managed to open the door a few inches, propelling me toward him before I could dig my feet in and shove the door closed again. Then I started knocking on it like crazy, to alert Trick to the inevitable interruption.

  Wrap it up and pull your pants back on, bud. You’ve got company.

  “He’s a really good guy, I swear. Hey, I could pay you. Do you like money?”

  Behind me, the door was shoved open from within.

  With Maverick yanking from this side and whoever was pushing from the other, I went sprawling forward, straight into his chest with an oomph.

  He lost his balance and tumbled backward, and we fell together, landing on the floorboards of the porch, with him on the bottom, me on top.

  My favorite position.

  “Sorry, sorry,” I immediately gushed.

  Lifting up to check on him before I even bothered crawling off his mountain of a body, I tried to ignore how scintillating it felt for all of me to be pressing against all of him, but pretty much failed. Because, wow. Can we say solid muscle, ladies and gentlemen? I mean, I think his muscles had muscles.

  I wanted to touch every single one of them.

  Or lick them.

  Either way.

  But maybe later. In my dreams.

  For now, however…

  “Are you okay?” I finally had the presence of mind to ask.

  All he did was wince up at the ceiling of the porch and mutter an irritated, “Ouch.”

  “What the hell?” I heard behind me. “Kid?”

  That was totally Trick’s voice. With an apologetic cringe, I glanced over my shoulder to him and some woman standing in the open doorway, gaping down at us. No doubt, this was Hot Const—er, I mean, Connie.

  “Oh, hey,” I started conversationally, and I finally began to scurry off the mountain man. Only to realize, “Thank God!” I blew out a relieved breath and grinned at my bud. “You’re dressed.”

  “Why in the world would I not be dressed?” Trick asked as he stepped out and gripped my upper arm, helping me the rest of the way up.

  “Thanks,” I murmured to him, only to turn back to Maverick and reach out to help him up.

  He slapped my hand out of his way and pushed to his feet so he could demand, “Who the hell is this Patrick Mahomes-looking motherfucker that’s trying to keep me from going into my own house?”

  Wow. He thought I looked like Patrick Mahomes? Finally! Someone had noticed who I’d been styling my hair after. That was so Mah-awesome. Though, to be fair, I was probably a shade darker and not nearly in as good of shape as the famous quarterback.

  “Interesting fact about me and Mahomes,” I said conversationally, lifting a finger. “He has a white mom with a black dad, and I’m the opposite. Black mom, white dad. Cool, huh?”

  Maverick furrowed his brow my way, then spun to the woman. “Connie?”

  “I have no idea who he is,” she cried, lifting her hands free of all culpability.

  Trick heaved out a sigh before wincing and confessing, “Sorry, Mav. He’s with me.”

  Wait. Why was Trick calling him Mav like they knew each other? Wasn’t he supposed to be sneaking around behind this guy’s back?

  “Okay,” Maverick said slowly, still eyeing me suspiciously. “So why the hell was he blocking my way into the house?”

  “Uh...” Trick squinted as he scratched the back of his head. “Yeah. Sorry, I got nothing there.” Turning, he lifted his brows my way. “Cress?”

  “I…” Blinking at all three pairs of eyes focusing on me, I began to think—you know—maybe I’d read this whole situation wrong. “Well, I…” I motioned toward the sexy god to my right, then toward Trick and addressed him. “Wasn’t I supposed to be your lookout guy for him?”

  “My lookout guy?” He shook his head. “For what?”

  “Well, I thought you and Hot Constance were—” When all three of them sent me similar stares of outrage, I paused. “Sorry. Connie. I meant, Connie. But I thought you and she were, you know, hooking up together, and you didn’t want to get caught by her boyfriend.”

  I added that final part with an apologetic cringe toward Maverick.

  “You what?” Trick cried.

  Maverick lifted his brows and shook his head before saying, “Connie is my sister.”

  “And my lab partner,” Trick added. “Neither of us is hooking up with her.”

  Oh…

  Well, that actually made me feel better. I hadn’t been too comfortable with thinking of my boy Trick as being a cheater. But now that I knew he wasn’t—Whew! Thank God.

  But just to make sure, I glanced his way. “So you weren’t trying to sneak in some sexy times with some other guy’s girl?”

  “No!” Trick cried, crinkling his nose in disgust over the very idea. “Why would I do that, and why would I have you play lookout if I were? Jesus, kid. You’re killing me here.”

  “Okay, then.” I nodded before adding, “Whoops, my bad. But wait.” I shook my head, confused. “What was the whole warning thing about, then, when you said to beware of Maverick?”

  Maverick whirled to frown at Trick. “You warned him to stay away from me?”

  “Yeah, I mean…” Trick cleared his throat uneasily. “He just got out of a relationship and is all raw and vulnerable. And you…” He waved a hand over Maverick. “You’re a bit lacking in the sensitivity department.”

  The big, rough guy only narrowed his eyes harder.

  But Trick didn’t catch on that he should tread carefully or he might get hurt because he added, “You’d break his heart faster than that dweeb Derek did. And besides, I figured he was too chipper and perky for your taste, anyway.”

  “As if that would even matter.” I snorted, hitching my thumb toward Maverick. “This guy’s as straight as an arrow.”

  “No, I’m not,” Maverick said as if I were an idiot for ever thinking otherwise.

  I whirled toward him and gulped. “You’re not?”

  In that second, I swear my entire life changed.

  Because... Derek? Had someone said the name Derek to me? Who was Derek? There was only Maverick in the world now.

  “Dude.” Trick chuckled and slapped my back. “You need to get your gaydar checke
d. Now, come on, let’s get you that ice cream I promised.”

  Ice cream? What was ice cream? I only wanted to lick Maverick.

  I was joking, of course. No man could make me forget ice cream. But still...

  I flushed and offered Maverick an apologetic cringe when he began to scowl over my intense—possibly even creepy—ogling ways.

  “It was nice to meet you,” I told him as Trick dragged me off. I kept looking at him over my shoulder as I added, “Sorry again about tackling you and stuff. Not that I didn’t enjoy it; I totally did, but you probably didn’t, so yeah…sorry.”

  Finally, I turned away, and faced forward, sighing lamely over having to leave him.

  Trick took me to get food, and it was still stale and tasteless, but at least I’d stopped grieving over the loss of Derek.

  Chapter Three

  Cress

  I honestly didn’t think I’d ever see Maverick again after that first mortifying encounter. But just looking into his amazing, chocolate brown eyes had helped jostle me from my doldrums.

  Maybe Trick was more like his dad than I figured because he’d been right. There were more fish in the sea. My life wasn’t over. And I had moved on from Derek.

  I was kind of even over the instant crush I’d formed on Maverick after meeting him. And I had stopped thinking about how immediate and necessary it felt to find love. If it came, it came, and that would be great. But if it didn’t, I’d still be totally okay.

  Back on track with focusing on school and work and myself, I whizzed through my finals, and started to pack my boxes so I could move back in with my parents for the summer when a knock came on Trick’s apartment door.

  Since he wasn’t home, I tossed the packing tape I’d had in my hand onto my bed that I would return to in the fall when the next semester started, and I went to see who was here.

  My breath caught in my lungs when I opened the door and looked up into a familiar pair of brown eyes I’d been dreaming about.

  “Oh my God, it’s you,” I blurted, feeling everything inside me come alive. Then I realized how utterly obvious I was being, so I cleared my throat and shook my head, pointing at him and attempting to be chill. Like Trick. “I mean, it’s Maverick, right?”

  He lifted his hand and showed me a set of AirPods sitting on his palm.

  “Trick left these on my coffee table last week. And Connie’s already found another place to live, so I doubt she’d ever get them back to him. They, uh, they look like the expensive kind, so…” He thrust them at me with an uncomfortable grunt. “Here.”

  “Oh! Thanks. I think they are the expensive kind.” I reached out to take them. “He’s been looking for them everywhere, anyway.”

  As the earbuds were dropped into my open palm, Maverick lifted his gaze to me and immediately retracted his hand.

  We stared at each other for an uncomfortably long moment. I smiled at him to hide the nerves roiling through my gut, then offered, “You want to come in?”

  Because what was the harm in offering? Worst-case scenario, he’d say no, turn away, and walk out of my life forever.

  But best-case scenario...

  He paused, then bobbed his head slowly. “Alright.”

  My heart skipped a beat. He still looked like he might want to kick my ass any moment, but when I opened the door wide and shifted aside to let him in, he stepped over the threshold.

  “Trick’s out right now,” I explained, holding up the earbuds as I backed toward the table that sat in the wide archway between the living room and dining area. “So I’m just going to leave these here, and I’m sure he’ll see them when he gets home.”

  Maverick nodded and skimmed his gaze over me. “I wanted to say sorry, too.”

  I lifted my brows in surprise. “Sorry? To Trick?”

  Wondering what the juicy story had to be behind that announcement, I got an even bigger shock when he said, “To you.”

  “Me?” I blinked repeatedly and pressed a finger to my chest. But why the heck would he apologize to me? I’d been the one to tackle him.

  “I work with a bunch of assholes,” he tried to explain.

  “Um…” Yeah, that didn’t clear a lot up in the understanding department. “Okay.”

  He winced, letting me know he didn’t want to explain anymore.

  But then he grunted, scowled, and turned his attention to the front room, slowly glancing around it. “They think I’d have a better disposition around the worksite if I got laid, so some of them have thought it would be funny to pay these professionals they think would entice me to come to my house and…” Not finishing the explanation, he rolled his eyes and lifted a hand, letting me use my imagination from there.

  And wow, my imagination ran wild. “So you thought I was, what, a prostitute?”

  When he sent me a miserable scowl, letting me know that’s exactly what he’d thought, I threw back my head and shouted out a laugh. “Oh my God, wow. Now I don’t feel so bad for my assumption about you! That’s actually kind of awesome, though. Maybe I should rethink my major. You think? But wait…” Amusement dying a quick death, I blinked at him before asking, “For you to think that, wouldn’t I have to be the type that actually, you know, entices you?”

  He grimaced at the question as if he hated having that little detail exposed, but then the look he sent me had my entire system ratcheting itself into hyper-drive. He did like what he saw.

  Holy…

  Wow.

  Clearing his throat to reveal his obvious discomfort, he flailed a hand lamely around the living room as he tore his gaze from me. “It doesn’t look like you.”

  I lifted my brows, not understanding, still stuck on the fact that he found me to be in any way attractive. “Hmm?”

  He motioned to the space around us again. “The room. Walls. Decoration. It’s not you.”

  “Oh.” I laughed. “Yeah. I guess not.” Especially the poster of that Sports Illustrated model that was tacked to the wall above the sofa. “But this is Trick’s place, not mine, so why would it, huh?”

  Maverick turned back to squint at me in question.

  I shrugged and stuffed my hands into my pockets, wondering what I could do to entice him just a little more. “I just stay with him during the school year. I’m actually packing to head home for the summer right now.”

  Eyes narrowing, he stepped intimidatingly close as if learning this offended him and he needed to punch someone to alleviate the anger. “You’re leaving?”

  I nodded slowly. Did this mean he didn’t want me to go? “Uh. Yeah. But I’ll be back in the fall again to enrich everyone’s life once more with my sparkling personality. Not that I’ll be going that far, anyway. My parents live just outside of town, maybe twenty minutes away. Mom wanted a garden, you see, so Dad ended up getting her a whole damn farm. He bought a place with plenty of land for her to plant as big a garden as she wanted. But then they decided we needed chickens to eat all the bugs that would bother her flowers and plants. Except the coyotes kept killing the chickens, so they had to get a llama to keep the predators away, and here we are now, damn near farmers! How crazy is that, huh?”

  Maverick blinked at me. Then said, “You talk a lot.”

  Shit. I’d just killed the enticement, hadn’t I? Way to go, idiot, I told myself. You just had to be YOU, didn’t you?

  “Yeah, I know.” I splayed out a what-you-gonna-do gesture. “I drive the entire family crazy with it sometimes, but my mama always told me that it’ll help me weed out the people who weren’t supposed to be in my life in the first place. The ones who really matter won’t mind it.”

  “I don’t mind it.” Maverick took a step closer. “I like it,” he said.

  That’s when I swallowed my tongue.

  “Y-you—You do?” I fumbled out the question.

  He nodded and hesitantly reached a hand for my hair. His gaze sought mine as if to ask for permission. When I bobbed my head yes, he sank his fingers into the tight curls and sucked in a breath befo
re gripping the locks and looking into my eyes again.

  Holy damn, he was one of those intense lover types; I could already tell.

  I could definitely handle intense.

  Yes. Bruise me, I almost begged aloud.

  “I always wished I could talk as well as some people,” he admitted, his voice going rough. “Like you do.”

  He seemed suddenly vulnerable and hesitant with his admission. I lifted my hand and set it against his chest, feeling his heartbeat under my fingers.

  “You talk just fine,” I said.

  But he shook his head. “No. Not like you. You always know what to say.”

  I snorted. “Uh, no. No, I don’t.”

  He nodded, disagreeing, before his hand left my hair to cup my cheek tenderly, where his thumb stroked my jaw and sent tingles through me. “Whenever you talk, I just want to kiss you.”

  “You do?” My lips parted in awe. But seriously…

  Had I said wow yet? Because this was just so wow.

  “Okay, I’m good with that,” I answered. But then I frowned, growing suddenly uncertain, hoping I hadn’t read what he’d said all wrong. So I pointed to the ground between us. “Like, right now, you want to—?”

  He nodded and eased closer. Licking his lips as he watched me intently.

  Shit. He really did want to kiss me.

  “Okay,” I repeated, whispering it this time. I slipped my hand across his chest to his shoulder and grinned triumphantly when he shuddered out a groan over the contact. “But if we’re going to do this...” I started.

  He paused and furrowed his brows in confusion. So I finished, “I want you to be your true, unadulterated self with me. Alright? Don’t hold you back.”

  That caused him to blow out a shaky breath and shake his head. “I’m pretty blunt and direct,” he warned. “And physical.”

  Grinning, I nodded. “Yeah, I can tell. I find that to be really hot and exciting, though.”

  His gaze brightened with hope. “You do?”

  I nodded.

  Releasing a relieved breath as if he’d actually had doubts that I would ever reject him, he slid his hand down from my cheek to the side of my neck.