by Alexa Davis
“Oh, come on, I can tell that you like him. like him. You turn into a schoolgirl with a crush when we talk about him. I haven’t seen you act this way for years. What is stopping you from just having some fun? Why don’t you just enjoy yourself?”
I couldn’t tell her the truth – there was no way that I could admit I was afraid I would end up falling too hard. I couldn’t bear the shame of telling Laynee that I already liked him far too much and that I didn’t want to get my heart broken by this man. It was too embarrassing.
“I just... It’s a silly idea, and he’s a paying customer. I can’t; how unprofessional would that be?” Blaming it on the cabin was much easier than anything else.
“Yeah, yeah, you will end up cracking before he goes home, I’m sure of it.”
I didn’t like to admit how right she was. I was practically living with this guy, we were surviving in the thick sexual atmosphere, and there was only so much that I could do. I was only human – there was only so much temptation I could resist.
Luckily, at that moment, the door clicked open and our first two customers of the day came in, saving me from talking about Milo anymore. But it didn’t stop me from thinking about him. I wasn’t sure anything was that much of a distraction...
“Hello, there, you two, you look great today.” I grinned, turning on the charm. Ms. Wilson and Mrs. Lino were two of our oldest customers, and they always had the same very boring style, but I adored them because they always kept coming back. “Now what can we do for you?”
They sat in front of me and Laynee, staring at their reflections in the mirror, gossiping about the other women in the town while we worked. I couldn’t help but smile as they talked; it was amazing what you learned working on people’s hair. It was almost as if they thought we couldn’t hear or that we had some sort of hairdresser/customer confidentiality agreement. We often found out about affairs, surprise pregnancies, and arguments before anyone else did.
It put us in a position of power, really, but we didn’t care. We knew it all, but the more that time passed, the more we realized how pointless it was. Who cared what was going on in other people’s lives? And everyone moved on quickly to the next topic soon enough, anyway.
“You two are pretty,” Mrs. Lino mused, snapping the attention of the room back to us. “But I never see you with guys. Do either of you have boyfriends?”
I wasn’t sure if she was asking to be kind or just to find out dirt on us, but after the chat I’d just had with Laynee, it was the last thing either of us wanted to be talking about.
“Erm, no...” I started, but Laynee interrupted me sharply, not letting me get a word in edgeways.
“I don’t, but Eliza does,” she teased. “But you won’t know him because he isn’t from around here.”
“Ooh.” The women both grew excited by this information. “Who is he? What is he like?”
“He’s tall, dark, and very handsome,” Laynee continued. “Super-hot, and he adores Eliza—”
“He isn’t my boyfriend,” I interjected quickly, wanting to stop the flow of rumors before they started. Not that it was likely, but if Milo heard them, I would literally die of humiliation. “He’s just... a guy.”
Unfortunately, that made it a million times worse, and the women talked over me as if I wasn’t even there. It was out there now – everyone would be talking about it. I just had to hope that something dramatic would happen soon enough to take the attention away from me. It wasn’t often that something super exciting went down, but I could hope for it all the same.
***
“Sorry about earlier,” Laynee finally said as we shut the lights off. “It was only a little joke. You aren’t mad, are you?”
“Oh, no, I’m not.” I shook my head and grinned. “It’s all just a little weird.”
“You are the one making it weird.” She chuckled. “You’re making this a much bigger deal than it is. Just take some of that rent money and buy him some food for a nice dinner. See where things go. Stop getting so worked up about stuff.”
“You think?” I asked, trembling a little. Maybe she was right – maybe I was finding problems that weren’t there, looking for an excuse to protect my heart. Just because I got along well with this guy didn’t mean I had to fall for him. Maybe we could do whatever and leave it all on good terms. Maybe it was time to have some fun...
Oh, God, I just didn’t know.
“I do think. Look, if you don’t put yourself out there, you’ll never meet anyone. You can’t let Josh ruin you, especially when you didn’t even like him really.”
“Oh, I know, you’re right about that one.”
Okay, I needed to trust her. I needed to relax just a little bit. I needed to believe that everything would be fine. I had cooked plenty of meals for Milo anyway, so one more wouldn’t be suspicious.
I left the salon and headed straight for the supermarket. If Marc was there and I got to give him a piece of my mind today, then so be it. If not, then I would just buy everything that I needed for tonight... including a nice bottle of wine.
My heart raced at the idea, and my face burst out into a grin. The thought of Milo wrapping those strong arms around me and his lips meeting mine had my whole body reacting in a buzzing, thrilling way. Being smart all the time hadn’t gotten me anywhere so far, so maybe it was actually time to try something new.
And just to think, if the damn pipes hadn’t burst in my apartment, if my landlord hadn’t been so useless, I never would have gotten to know Milo at all.
I would have given him the keys, thought he was cute, and not seen him again until he left. Sure, the money would have still been there, so the whole financial side of my life would have been a little better, but not knowing him would have been a shame.
Despite my initial impression of him, personality wise, he was an awesome person. Not the sort of person I would have even given much time to beforehand, never mind considered, which just proved that my previous way of looking for love just wasn’t working.
At least that was a lesson learned.
Chapter Fifteen
Milo – Friday night
“Oh, my goodness,” I gasped as I glanced out of the window of the cabin to see Eliza trying to carry far too many grocery bags yet again. “What is she doing?”
Eliza had cooked for me far too many times already. Just because I had offered for her to stay here with me during the time I was renting the place didn’t mean she had to keep doing all this nice stuff for me. It might have been nice, and admittedly she had this way of making me feel special, but I didn’t want her to think I expected it.
“Let me take the bags,” I cried out the doorway. “You’ve been hard at work all day; what are you doing? You should have just honked the horn to get me out here.”
As she unloaded some of the bags into my arms, she gave me a sarcastic look. “Yeah, four customers all day long. We’ve been working real hard!”
“Things will pick up,” I assured her. “You’ll figure it out.”
“Well, thanks to the rent money you gave me, at least I could pay off a whole load of the bills, so that’s a good start. Laynee and I do have some ideas, so hopefully, we’ll be able to pull it off soon enough.”
We made our way inside and dropped the bags on the side, and I glanced through the bag. “What’s all this for? You aren’t cooking again, surely?”
“I wanted to say thank you.” She shrugged as if it were no big deal. “You overpaid me, I know you did, and this is my way of thanking you for that.”
“No way.” I shook my head at her. “I’ve seen what you have in these bags; tonight I’m cooking for you.”
“You can cook?” she exclaimed, clutching her chest in mock amazement. “I would have thought someone as rich as you would have cooks.”
“Do you see a cook?” I gestured around the room. “Do you honestly think that I would have come away without my cook if I needed one? I didn’t know that I was going to get lucky enough to have you stayi
ng here with me, did I?”
Uh oh. That was a little too much honesty for my liking. I probably shouldn’t have said that. I glanced at her out the corner of my eye, but luckily, she didn’t seem too caught by that statement. She just chuckled and hit me lightly on the arm.
“Okay, you want to cook, you cook. Let’s see what you can do. Meanwhile, I think I’m going to have a shower. Get this day washed off me.”
I watched her walk from the room, transfixed by her hips. As she clicked the bathroom door behind her, I set about cooking, but the whole time my mind was on Eliza... naked... in the shower. Her hot, wet body was only a few inches away, and it was impossible not to get distracted by that fact.
I grabbed the wine bottle and poured myself a glass, trying to find some way to dull the thoughts, but unfortunately, the more sips I took, the freer my imagination became. I started to think about her in ways that I hadn’t dared before.
How was I going to survive this trip if Eliza was going to be here for a few weeks longer? How would we ignore the magnetism and keep away from each other? The more time passed, the more impossible it felt. I had the horrible sense that we were both going to succumb to temptation soon enough, and I had no idea what would happen afterward.
Eventually, I heard her come out of the bathroom, but I forced my eyes to remain fixed on the pan in front of me. I didn’t want to turn around, however hard the pull was, just in case she was only in a towel. This situation was already confusing enough; I didn’t want to add to it.
“So, how’s the meal coming along?” She peered around me, making me jump.
As I laid my eyes upon her, I was glad to see she had some clothes on, rather than a towel, but what she was wearing had my eyes popping out of my head. It wasn’t a fancy dress, and she had absolutely no makeup on, with her wet hair scraped back. If anything, she looked ready for bed, not anything date-like at all, but the leggings she had on clung to her legs and butt so tightly that it made me want to nibble on her, and her white t-shirt was damp, slightly see through, and had her nipples poking through.
She wasn’t wearing a bra, and I could practically see everything. This was too much temptation.
“Yeah, good,” I stammered, foolishly. “You’ll love it. In fact, it’s almost ready, so you might want to take your seat.”
She sat down, taking the distraction with her, and I did my best to steady my breathing while I could. Just because Eliza looked sexy as hell, it didn’t mean anything. If she was trying to seduce me, then she’d be wearing something tight fitting and slutty. No, this was so casual, I couldn’t read anything into it. I just had to keep my head screwed on and get through this.
“So, how was your day at work?” I asked as I joined her at the table with the food. “Apart from being quiet.”
“It was good.” She nodded slowly. “I mean, I learned that the guy Laynee has been sort of dating is an asshole, but apart from that, okay.”
“Yeah? How so?”
“Well, I already knew it was going to turn out that way, to be honest.” She sighed deeply. “But I couldn’t tell her that. I probably should have, but I don’t know how to do it. I wish I was more like my grandma; she was great at straight shooting.”
“She sounds awesome,” I replied with baited breath. Considering how Eliza had reacted last time to something linked to her grandmother, I didn’t know how this conversation would go. At the same time, I wanted her to open up to me in a way that I’d never felt with anyone else. Plus, if we were talking, it kept my eyes off her body.
“Yeah, she was, she was great to me.” She smiled and took another bite of food. “She raised me from a very young age because my parents were killed in a car accident, so she was everything to me. I was absolutely devastated to lose her last year. I think that might be why things went under a little bit. Greif made it hard for me to focus.”
I nodded, wishing that I could have something comforting to say. I wasn’t any good at emotional stuff because I was so used to shutting down and closing my emotions off. I’d never cared about being that way before, I’d easily accepted it as who I was, but now I felt like I wanted more from myself.
But as I glanced up, racking my brain to think of anything to say, I noticed that Eliza had already moved on, and she was feeding Veil from her plate.
“What are you doing?” I exclaimed in shock. “Do you know how long it took me to train him not to beg for food from my plate?” Months and months, all undone in under a few moments. The funny thing was, I wasn’t mad about it.
“Oh, don’t be such a stick in the mud,” she said as she waved her hand dismissively at me. “You’re so strict with this poor dog; you must drive him crazy.”
“He doesn’t feel anger.” I shook my head and smiled. “He’s a dog. Dog’s don’t have the same emotions that humans do.”
But she was paying me no attention, patting Veil and feeding him regardless. I rolled my eyes and continued to eat my own food before the dog turned his attention to me; I wasn’t about to share my dinner with anyone!
“Did you buy dessert?” I asked as a joke as I stood up from the table. I was so stuffed that I couldn’t eat another bite, but I enjoyed doing anything to rile up a reaction from Eliza. I just enjoyed the attention from her, in whatever form it came. “Ice cream or cake? Something like that?”
“Are you a human trash can?” she exclaimed. “I haven’t even finished, and I wouldn’t be able to eat another thing.”
“I’m surprised you’re full, since you gave up so much of your food to Veil!”
She grabbed some of the meat from her plate and hung it over my dog. “Don’t make me give this to him, as well,” she teased, staring daringly into my eyes.
She seemed to be begging me to come over to her, to play fight with her, and my body reacted accordingly. I was at the desperate stage where I would do just about anything to touch her, and I couldn’t fight that temptation for another second longer. I feared I might explode.
“Don’t you dare,” I shot back with a glint in my eye, moving tauntingly to her. “Don’t make me fight you.”
“As if,” she snorted. “You wouldn’t dare.”
I took that as a challenge, and I grabbed her wrists. She struggled to get away from me, but only half-heartedly, laughing the entire time. I felt my pulse kick up a notch, my stomach heat up, and my cock flicker to attention. This was getting too much... I needed to pull away... I should have stood back, but I didn’t.
Eventually, the atmosphere in the room shifted, and I felt her turning into me, as if she were being pulled by invisible strings, unable to control herself. She felt amazing as her body curved into mine, and my lips moistened with anticipation.
Was this real? Were we actually overstepping the boundary that we’d been dancing around for what felt like forever?
Her eyes met mine, and I could see a fire blazing there. This thing I was feeling, she was experiencing it, as well, and that was too much. How could I reject the feelings if we were both having them?
I cocked my head and leaned in slightly, just testing the water, and I watched in awe as she imitated me. This was real, she wanted to kiss, we were getting closer...
Then our lips crashed together and fireworks exploded inside of me. I felt things that I’d never experienced before, and it was phenomenal.
At first, we were tentative, careful with one another, but soon the passion overtook us, and I grabbed her around the waist to pull her close. Eliza dropped the food and wrapped her hands around my neck, and while I heard Veil lapping it up, I no longer cared. He could eat everything he pleased! I was finally kissing Eliza.
Everything that we’d been through so far had all been leading up to this moment. All the chemistry, the emotions, the temptation, it had all been building to this, and now we were free to explore that.
“Are you okay?” I finally pulled back long enough to murmur against her lips. I didn’t want to assume anything. I didn’t want to push any boundaries. I just wan
ted to have the fun that she was comfortable with.
“Take me to the bedroom,” she whispered lustily back, lightly digging her nails into my neck. She was pressing into me, making her feelings clear – and making me ecstatic. I was the luckiest son of a bitch around.
“Anything milady commands,” I joked, picking her up as though she weighed nothing. She wrapped her legs around me, and I could feel a heat coming from her. Maybe she had been thinking about this for as long as I had. Now, in the heat of the moment, it was very difficult to understand the logical reasons I’d thought of for us keeping apart. We should have been doing this the entire time.
Chapter Sixteen
Eliza – Friday
As my legs claimed his waist, I could feel something very impressive waiting for me, pressing up against me, and it was making me intense, needy, volatile. The heat surrounding us both, the lust clinging to every inch of my skin, made my breaths come out short, sharp, and ragged. I sounded a little like a breathless crazy person, but I didn’t even care.
I hadn’t exactly planned for the night to go this way, but now that we’d overstepped that boundary, I felt hungry for him, and it was a relief to have that passion flowing free.
We crashed through his bedroom door, our faces stuck together. As he pulled back to toss me back onto his sheets, the dark desire behind his gaze sent a tingling warmth through my entire body. With Milo, in the heat of the moment, there wasn’t any second guessing myself. I knew exactly how he felt about me – it was written all over his face.
I lay there panting for a few moments, gently biting my lip while I flicked my eyes all over his face. How did I ever think that Milo was grumpy? Under that tough exterior, there was so much more to him.
As he finally gave in and climbed onto the bed to hover over me, my heart thundered excitedly at the weight and heat of his body joining mine. I lightly stroked my fingers over his face, caressing his strong jaw, the light stubble still there. The powerful heat was still there between us, still overwhelming us both, but we were taking the small timeout to just look at one another.
