by Fields, MJ
Eric shakes his head. “She needs to level up. These men aren’t worthy enough to open a door for her, let alone buy her a meal. Jesus, ladies, aim higher.”
What I need and what I know I want are two totally different things.
“He meets all her requirements—over thirty-five, doesn’t want kids, and has a career.”
“He also has a fucking toupee; that’s a hard no.”
But he’s what I need.
“He doesn’t.” I shake my head.
“Fine, date him, just don’t expect to grab a handful of hair when he’s going down. You’ll get the whole do.”
Claudia looks at him. “So, why is it that she needs a man who can take charge, but you insist on professionals for me? Nerds even?”
“Because they will respect you. You’re geeky chic, and they will do whatever you ask of them, because they want to be nerdy cool like you.”
“I’m going to take that as a compliment; otherwise, I’m going to go all Shuri on you.”
“See? My point exactly.” He laughs and holds up his hand for a high-five. She gives him one.
“And this one is yours.” I hold out a picture of a blonde who looks like a supermodel. They’d have beautiful babies.
He doesn’t even look at it. “Whatever you want, Autumn.”
* * *
Two days later, we are all at different tables in the same restaurant, waiting for our dates to arrive.
Eric looks amazing. I have to push down the tinge of jealousy I feel, knowing I want him to have the best and I’m not it.
I’m pretending to check emails while trying to ignore the warmth I feel whenever he’s around when I get a text.
Eric: Babe, run. Run as fast as you can. It’s worse than expected.
I look up. “Oh dear.”
“Hey, sweetheart, I hope I didn’t keep you waiting.” His voice booms through the quiet restaurant as he practically runs to the table like he’s at McDonalds.
I start to stand up, and he leans in for a kiss. Dodging it, I end up on my ass and hear Eric laugh.
“Let me help you.” He bends down as I stand, and we knock heads.
“Well, this is starting out all wrong.” He laughs loudly and snorts.
I hold my hand up to stop him while I right myself and stand. When I have my bearings straight, I look up and, sure enough, his hair has shifted.
“I’m sorry, but this is a sign.”
“Oh no.” He belts out another laugh. “Let me make it up to you.”
My phone vibrates on the table, and I pick it up. Eric has sent an entire screen with laughing faces. I suppress a grin.
“Everything okay?”
“No, it’s my husband. He’s wondering why I’m not home.”
“Your husband?”
I shrug. “Just need to spruce things up once in a while, but if he finds out, it would be bad.”
“Of course. We’ll do this another time.”
Gross, I think as I throw a twenty on the table and leave.
* * *
Two hours later, Claudia and Eric walk into Bombers, our meeting place, laughing hysterically.
“Laugh it up.” I smile and look at Tony the bartender. “Their usuals please.”
As we share a drink, Claudia tells me about Eric’s date, who couldn’t stop smiling.
I force myself to put my claws away.
“He has that affect, I’m sure.”
“Babe, she had Botox today and apologized as her drink spilled down her frozen face.”
Babe … He needs to stop that.
“And my guy believes aliens are landing on top of The Rock.”
We all have a good laugh, and then Claudia is the first to leave again. This time, Eric insists on her taking a cab.
“You worried about her?”
“Yeah, of course. She’s single and living in a pretty shitty area of town.”
“Is my basement apartment nicer than her place?”
He smiles and shakes his head. “I don’t know, babe, but damn.”
I don’t have to ask what damn means. I see admiration in his eyes. It’s warming and not just in the spots where lust lives, but in my heart.
I look down. “Maybe you could find out.”
* * *
The next evening, as I’m in the basement apartment, I hear the door open and grab the broom. “I have a weapon.”
“I’m aware.”
It’s Eric.
“Don’t you know how to knock?” I yank the scrunchy off the top of my head and run my fingers through my hair, trying to fix the mess I know I am right now.
“I have the code.”
I poke my head out from behind the bedroom door.
“It’s me.” He holds his hands up.
“What …?” I pause. “Is everything okay?”
“Her place is bad but rent controlled, and she won’t leave it because the city is where she fell in love. She thinks it’s good luck.”
I walk out. “Well, this place is rent controlled, in a decent neighborhood, and after last night’s date, she needs luck.”
“Pretty sure they lived there together.” He cocks his head and narrows his eyes. “She’s not going to leave, and I’m not going to sleep knowing she’s there.”
“You’re freaking adorable.”
A smile creeps up on his face as mine burns with embarrassment at my word vomiting.
He steps toward me, and I hold up the broom.
“Really?”
“It’s best you don’t.”
“It’s best you just let it happen.” He takes two steps and grabs me, hugging me tightly as he whispers, “Just go with it.”
“I’m not sleeping with you.” I wrap my arms around him and hug him back. God, how it feels so good.
“Tell me what that feels like.”
“Shh …” I whisper.
“This feels right, Autumn of Queens,” he whispers back.
What it feels like is everything I want but am afraid to take.
“Shh …” he whispers.
“I didn’t say anything,” I whisper back.
“But I know what you’re thinking, Autumn, and the worst of it is over. All the good stuff comes next.”
“What’s the worst?”
“The fall.”
I shimmy down his body and step back. “To me, that’s the best.”
He looks between my eyes. “Because you haven’t felt the what’s to come.” He steps forward again, and I don’t move. Then he grabs the back of my neck and pulls my head toward his.
“Have you?”
“I’m in it, Autumn, just waiting for you to catch up.” Then he leaves.
I pace back and forth then finally say fuck it and hurry outside just in time to watch him drive away.
When I look down, I see a bouquet of flowers. I pick them up and smell them. Then I pull the card out and read it.
He should have brought flowers. You deserve flowers.
~ Yours ~
E
* * *
After four weeks of dates, each ending with flowers on my doorstep from him, fucking with my resolve, I get a call from Angela, requesting I come back for three months.
“Yep. When do you need me? Tomorrow?”
“You okay?”
I flop back on my couch. “No. I’m in hell. A hell full of lustful thoughts and forbidden fruit. A hell where Satan took the month off and handed the throne over to Eric Cartwright.”
“Yeah?”
After I spill all the tea, we both sigh at the same time.
“I wish you wouldn’t fight it.”
I sit straight up. “What!”
“You are so in love with him, and you can’t even see it.”
“Oh, I can see it. That breakup would make my Baby Ruth days look like a Hersey Kiss.”
“Oh, Autumn, it’s bad, isn’t it?”
“It is. I need a break.”
“One week, and your break isn’t puppy sitting. It�
��s London, Paris, Joshua snuggles, rom-coms, and wine therapy.”
“Yes!” I raise a fist in the air.
Thirty
Eric
It’s pre-date night number five and leg day. Yep, after last time I saw her, I needed to make damn sure my body was shot.
Twice a week, I get to see her, and after sending Claudia back to her place in a cab, I walk her home.
I’ve hugged her, kissed her head, and held her hand. I stopped picking her up, knowing that one sentence, “Wrap them around,” and I’ve been inside the best pussy I’ve ever had the pleasure of being wrapped in. But I’m good with slowing it down.
As worried as she is about me hurting her, I’m fucking terrified of rushing it.
Holding the door open for Claudia, I immediately see Autumn at a table in the corner. It’s covered with food, and there’s a bottle of champagne on it.
Shit.
Claudia hurries toward the table, and I follow, tipping my head to the bartender who still looks at me like I’m a freak, which makes me laugh every damn time.
I help Claudia with her coat and ask, “What are we are celebrating?”
“Well, it’s more a bribe actually.” She glances at me only briefly.
Claudia sits next to Autumn. “Food is always a good place to start.”
Autumn rubs the bridge of her nose and places both palms on the table like she’s about to hold a meeting. I find it a huge turn on.
I remove my wool coat and sit, because I’m pretty sure that’s what she’s expecting me to do. It kind of reminds me of when I fucked her on her desk.
“I have to leave for a few months.”
Scratch that. It’s exactly like when I fucked her on her desk.
“Oh no, is everything okay?” Claudia asks, and I’m so glad she did because I want to tell her over my dead body and that’s not a good way to go at her.
“It’s for work.”
“Wow, I’ve never asked where you work. How rude of me.”
I finally speak. “She’s a VP at de la Porte.”
I wait for Claudia to get that face all women get when they hear the name of the company that puts out the must-haves of every season.
“Huh, never heard of it.”
Autumn and I share an aw look.
“It’s high fashion,” I tell her.
She looks down at her clothes. “Not really my thing.”
“Your thing’s working fine.” I wink.
“Geek chic, I know. However, all the statistics about opposites attracting might hold some water. My dates have been nightmares.”
We laugh, and I say, “Well, kind of proves my theory, though.”
She pulls her phone out of her coat pocket and nods. “So, you don’t think you can find love on the internet? Not someone who, as you said, has a heart the size of the sky and room enough for all the stars she holds in it to shine? You wanted to be one of them?”
I laugh uncomfortably. “You are very fucking thorough.”
“Well?” she asks.
I look at her instead of Autumn. “I think when you love someone, you love them, Claudia, and there isn’t a damn thing you can do about it but let it happen.”
“But past hurts?” She nods toward Autumn.
“Past hurts be damned. Live in the now.” Now I look at her.
“And how do you step away from the past when it is always there?” she asks softly.
Angela wraps her arm around Claudia’s shoulders. “You have different hurts. He didn’t hurt you, Claudia; he died. You loved a man who loved you, who was taken away from you too soon.”
“Yeah,” she whispers.
We allow her the moment she deserves.
Autumn looks up at me then back at Claudia and smiles. “I need to ask you a favor.”
She looks up at her.
“I have this big house, with a cozy, little two-bedroom basement apartment. It’s been vacant a while and I considered putting it up for rent but would much rather have someone I know living there.”
She looks at me. “Eric’s lease is up next month. He said he’d be moving into a hotel until the end of the semester.”
“I was thinking maybe you could—”
“Oh no, I am on a strict budget and have the rest of the semester to get through and all of next year. I know my place isn’t much, but—”
“I’m losing money on heat and electricity every day. Cover that and water my house plants while I’m gone.”
“I’m fine, but he’s—”
“I’m good, Claudia. She’s asking you.”
“But—”
“It would mean a lot to me,” Angela says, and she’s not blowing smoke. She’s taken with Claudia, and once she gets taken, she becomes the best thing that could ever happen to them.
“Can I have a day or two to consider?”
“Of course. You can come by tomorrow—”
“How about tonight?” I ask. “We can get this all to-go and absorb the place.”
“Okay.” Claudia nods then laughs. “Okay.”
* * *
I watch Autumn beaming as Claudia walks around the place, gushing about good bones and fantastic furnishings.
“It’s a furnished apartment.” Autumn smiles.
“I’d need to bring my bed. I mean, if I decided to move, I’d need to move my bed.”
“That’s perfectly fine. Whatever you don’t want can easily be moved.”
“Move,” she whispers her worry.
“I have some buddies who could help,” I offer.
“Oh, I wouldn’t want to impose.”
Autumn laughs. “This is doing me a favor.”
“You said two bedrooms? Can I see the other?”
“Um …” Autumn hesitates. “It’s kind of a mess. Could you give me some time to move everything?”
“I don’t mind the mess.” Claudia looks toward the doorway of the room she hasn’t been in.
“Autumn”—I laugh—“she isn’t judging you. Go ahead, Claudia.”
I start to stand up, and Autumn moves to block me.
“Does it house your sexy undies and kinky toys?”
She narrows her eyes. “You stay out.”
“Oh my God, it’s … Wow, there’s so much,” Claudia calls out.
“So much what?”
“I have the ROYGBIV of vibrators in there; you don’t want to see them.”
I laugh. “The fuck I don’t.”
“Where did you get all this stuff?”
“Babe, I will toss your ass like a salad to see that room, so move it or you’re up and over my shoulder in three, two—”
“It’s Shelby’s things, okay?”
“Huh?”
She palms her face.
“Shelby, as in my sister?”
She peeks between her fingers and gives one little, quick nod.
“Care to explain?”
“We have this thing going on.”
“That involves sex toys?”
She opens her mouth to answer.
“No, forget it. I don’t need to know a damn thing about Shelby and …” I lean in. “Spill it.”
“Her business … She, well … I-I sent her things from overseas. Her mom was apparently taking things from her and selling them, so I told her that she could keep things here.”
“You’ve been seeing Shelby behind my back?”
“Well, not like that,” she huffs.
“How long?”
She looks away.
I grab her chin so she has to look at me. “How long, Autumn?”
“Well, a few years?”
“I don’t know whether to be pissed or pleased that you …” I stop and smile.
“Oh, put that away, you smug bastard. This has nothing to do with you. I like her.”
Thirty-One
Autumn
When Eric walks back in from seeing Claudia off, he looks at me and smiles.
I shake my head at him and ask, “What?”
“Well, I genuinely like you, too.”
He puts his hand on the doorframe and leans in. “Then what the hell is the problem, babe?” When I hesitate, he states, “Truth.”
“I’d rather have you as a friend than lose you. And I will lose you.”
He takes a deep breath and looks up. “Fine.”
The response surprises me. “Fine what?”
“I’m good with that.”
“Why does there seem to be a but coming?” When he smirks, I throw my hands up in the air. “See?”
“I do see. I see you”—he steps forward—“and I see me”—he takes another step—“and I see all the things that are there, have always been there, will always be there, but I’m good with friends.” He reaches out and grabs my hand, pulling me toward him and hugging me until I laugh. He picks me up and spins me around, then stops.
I pull my head off his shoulder and look at him.
“I love your spirit, Autumn Raynes. I love it so fucking much. You just need to allow yourself to admit you feel the same way about me. And stop fucking comparing us to any other failed relationship, because we’re not failures. We’re passion and fire. Stars and skies. We are so fucking meant to be that I’m not even a little anxious about you leaving here and going back to Paris. I know Sam hasn’t got shit on me, and I know—”
I laugh out loud.
He cocks his head then rolls his eyes. “I’m a jealous, possessive, protective bastard when I feel it in my gut that I need to be so.”
“He’s dreamy.” I bat my eyelashes.
“You can push all the buttons you wanna push, but—”
“And furry. And very, very naughty, which was why I took him once a week to give his owner a break.”
“Sam’s a dog?”
I nod.
“Which is even better.”
I lightly grip the ends of his silky hair and rub them in soft circles between my fingers as we stare at one another.
“You better not kiss me,” I whisper.
“Is that a rule?” he asks quietly.
“Nope.”
“Good.” He presses his lips against mine, shocking me, because it wasn’t a rule. It purposely wasn’t a rule, because had it been, he would have broken it and kissed me … He did anyway.
