The Third Best Thing

by Hughes, Maya

  I’d have never thought Berk was a cuddler—not with the way he’d taken up a permanent spot on the floor at Laura’s engagement party. But I wasn’t going to say no to his strong arms wrapped around me.

  “We should do this again sometime.” I peered up at him, pressing my lips against his chest, hoping he wouldn’t shatter my fragile hope that he’d want this again too.

  A slow rumble rolled through his chest. “Oh we’re going to be doing this more than just sometime, Frenchie. I’m setting up a permanent appointment in your calendar. It’ll be sandwiched in right after class and before baking, that way I can watch you bake in nothing but an apron.”

  After everything we’d just done, my cheeks went red at the dirty picture he’d painted in my mind.

  23

  Berk

  I watched her for way longer than I should’ve. Probably longer than a non-stalker would, but I couldn’t stop myself. The perfect curve of her eyelashes. The small indents on either side of her nose from her glasses. The way her full lips parted as she breathed. I wound a strand of her hair around my finger.

  She was soft and warm nestled against me. I loved the way my fingers sank into her hips. How I never worried my grip would be too hard or rough. The sheet slid down more over the curve of her breasts with each breath. A hint of her deep pink nipple peeked out, teasing me like her salted caramel chocolate chunk cookies with the hint of espresso.

  Blood rushed to my cock and I was seconds away from taking myself in my hand. It would be a miracle if I didn’t get a hard on every time I smelled vanilla from here on out. It was like it was embedded in her skin, sweet and heady, just like her. I wasn’t going to pounce on her while she was sleeping.

  Her eyelids fluttered and I rested my head against the pillow, trying to pretend I hadn’t been committing every line of her face to memory.

  A date with Jules. An actual date. That would maybe end with another slow dance under the moonlight. I could only hope an act of god didn’t interrupt this time.

  We were doing things backward, but I was determined to do this right with her. Show her this wasn’t some bang and run thing. She’d told me before she wanted casual, but I wasn’t a casual guy, no matter what people thought about me. The assumption that football player equaled manwhore wasn’t lost on me. And I didn’t exactly scream responsible guy most of the time, but I wasn’t scared to show her that side of me—okay, maybe I was a little bit.

  Hell, I hadn’t been with anyone since I started trading letters with TLG, but I couldn’t feel guilty about being with Jules. Last night had been blow-the-back-of-my-head-off amazing. She was an indescribable kind of perfect for me. The kind that made my heart ache that I’d only just found her and was ready to get down on my knees so I didn’t have to wait another day without knowing her beauty.

  “Are you going to watch me sleep all morning?” She grumbled with a smile and her eyes still closed.

  “I was just amazed a person could have such crusty eyes after only four hours of sleep.”

  Her eyes snapped open and she wiped at them with the heels of her hands.

  I grabbed her wrists to stop her from scraping ninety percent of the skin off her face. “I was joking, Jules. You’re perfect. Not an eye booger in sight.”

  She glared and poked at my chest. “Jerkface.”

  “How can you be so cruel?” I wrapped my arms around her, tickled her and blew raspberries on her neck.

  She finally relented, laughing until tears were in her eyes. “Fine, you’re not a jerkface.” The words came out in pants.

  “What am I then?” I didn’t let her out of the circle of my arms.

  “My new favorite audience member.” She stared into my eyes with so much openness and joy it made me want to keep her in bed and show her every single way she was mine.

  I could stay here for the rest of my life. And I wanted this moment to stretch on for eons to come. The warm, early-morning sun streaked through her slatted blinds, lighting up her hair and making the deep chestnut brown glow. The gentle swell of her curves was pressed against my body.

  Everything about her made me want to never let her go. She was the kind of woman I’d dreamed of one day being at my side. Beautiful. So warm and caring, and with a hint of a potty mouth.

  I could imagine coming back from practices or away games to a house filled with smells that made my mouth water—and Jules standing in the kitchen with a body that did the same.

  “Let’s go out,” I blurted out so fast Jules jumped in my arms.

  “We’ve been out plenty of times.”

  “Yeah, I know but there’s somewhere I want to show you.”

  “Where?”

  “A special place.”

  “I’m at B&B this afternoon.”

  “No problem, I can pick you up from there or meet you at T-Sweets.”

  “We’re going to T-Sweets? I love that place.”

  “No, we’re going somewhere even better, but it’s nearby.” Everyone on campus flocked to T-Sweets. It had taken the old real estate advice of location, location, location to heart and found itself a prominent spot right on one of the main streets off campus, but that didn’t mean it had the perfect ice cream. That was reserved for Fire and Ice, a place I’d found a few blocks away, and I wanted to take Jules there. Keep the intrigue high and show her the special spot. Where else could you order an ice cream sundae and s’mores at your table? It was new, and once winter set in people would be all over the place, but for now, it would be a special place just for us.

  “Sounds like a date.” She laid on her side with her head propped up on her arm. Her hair was all over the place and her eyes looked even bigger without her glasses on. Eyelashes framed those beautiful chocolate eyes currently raking their way up and down my body.

  “It sure does.” I kissed the tip of her nose.

  This was a perfect moment, the kind they make slow motion in a movie so you get every excruciating detail of the action. Her beauty was heart-stopping. The kind where you know someone inside and out, and everything about them only takes what you already liked to the next level. She was the kind of girl you didn’t come back from. The kind who’d always have a place in your heart to keep you warm on those nights alone long after she’d kicked you to the curb because she deserved better than you.

  But I was here now, and I’d keep the fires going as long as I could.

  24

  Berk

  Jules kicked me out at ten saying she had homework to do, which was about right because I had some papers that weren’t going to write themselves, no matter how long I tried to type using only my mind. We had the day off practice to recover. A chance to rest up before Coach brought down the hammer for even more drills once we were back on the field.

  After closing my notebooks, I jogged downstairs. The house was quiet, which meant LJ and Marisa weren’t here.

  Two days away from Jules would be torture. Maybe I could sweet talk her into a care package filled with her newly baked treats. She didn’t have to know what I’d be doing while I ate those cookies. Damn, I was becoming a baked goods perv. And it was all her fault.

  Keyton looked up from his sketchpad, pencil stilling against the textured paper. “What’s with your grin? Has TLG finally returned?”

  “No, I’ve got no idea.” I should probably take the letter out of the mailbox or write her an updated one. I’d swapped out the letter a couple times since the first unanswered one, but I needed to write a new one after last night. “I haven’t checked today.”

  “Look at you. There was a time you’d plow over anyone to yank open that mailbox.”

  I shrugged. “Things change.”

  “Was that you coming back this morning after an early run or did you stay out all night?” He went back to sketching.

  “When you moved in, did that start up a curfew I didn’t know about?”

  “Nope, just wondering how long we’ll need to wait before we can give you crap about charging across the
street with Jules last night, and maybe score some extra cookies. Those peanut butter chocolate chunk cookies were so damn good I had an out-of-body experience. You two have been doing this little dance for a long time. Plus, I won the bet.” He grinned, pumping one arm over his head triumphantly.

  “You made a bet on whether or not I’d hook up with Jules?”

  “LJ swore you’d crack at the end of last semester. Marisa said it would be the first week of classes.” He looked up from his drawing. “I said you’d hold back as long as possible. Seeing you blazing out of here dragging Jules behind you like you were a second from banging her on the living room floor, I’m surprised you lasted as long as you did.”

  “It’s official, you all freaking suck.”

  “We know. But that’s what roommates are for, right?”

  I grumbled and glared.

  “You working out today?”

  I cracked my neck. “Do I have to?”

  “Only if you want to play tomorrow.”

  “Shit.” Coach’s edict about getting in even a light twenty before game day was coming back to haunt me. “Do you still need to go? I need to get in a session this afternoon. I’ve got a date tonight.”

  “I already went this morning.” He closed his sketchpad. “But I can spot you.”

  “Meet back down here in five.”

  Keyton and I headed over to the gym with the guitar he didn’t play.

  “Do you actually play, and you’re just super embarrassed or something?”

  He set it down against the wall in the locker room.

  “No, I need to take it somewhere after this.”

  “We’ll be expecting you to pull a Johanssen and serenade us all by the end of the year.”

  “Not on your life. Do you want to work out or not?”

  We blazed through the workout along with a few other guys. Even more poured in as we were leaving. After we finished the workout, I grabbed a shower and Keyton slunk off with the guitar he didn’t actually play.

  Back home, I rushed through all my assignments to get ready for my date with Jules. Shaking out one of the button-downs hanging up in my closet, I wondered if Jules would like it.

  I opened the front door and my phone vibrated. Smiling, I pulled it out and my smile dropped. A message flashed on my screen.

  ALEXIS: I might be in a little bit of trouble…

  Shit. Maybe I could make this quick. I headed back inside.

  “Forgot your wallet?” Keyton looked up from the books spread out all over the kitchen table.

  “No, my backpack.”

  “I thought you were walking to get ice cream.”

  I rushed upstairs to grab my backpack without another word. The last thing I needed was to go over yet again, why I couldn’t just abandon Alexis.

  ME: Where are you?

  This couldn’t keep happening, but I didn’t know how to fix it. How to get Alexis to see she didn’t need to keep going out with these loser guys. She was worth so much more than that. But she couldn’t see it, no matter how much love and attention her mom and dad showed her. If anything, it made her pull back even more.

  And I felt that, deep in my bones, I knew what it was like to not believe anything good was real. Hell, look at Jules. I could practically feel the countdown timer ticking above my head, but that didn’t mean I’d go out of my way to fuck things up. For Alexis, she was like a damn magnet for shady shit she had no business going near.

  My phone vibrated in my cupholder. A name flashed up on the screen. Mason. And the message rolled in. My heart pounded. I tore my eyes off the glowing screen and back onto the road. Just my luck, I’d crash when I finally had an answer about my mom. I pulled over into the emergency lane on the highway, my leg bouncing up and down. I needed to find Alexis, but if he had information for me, I needed that now.

  MASON: I have a new lead. I’ve got a last known address in Pittsburgh fourteen years ago in March.

  That was less than a year after she left me. I’d been shifted to so many homes by then. Emergency placements where I’d barely had time to learn the names of the other kids in the houses and the amount of stuff I owned dwindled as each placement meant another thing stolen, lost, or left behind. I rubbed my knuckles along the center of my chest, like I could massage away the thudding pain like a muscle cramp from lifting too much.

  MASON: I might need more money.

  ME: There’s no more money. I don’t have anything left.

  MASON: Then I’ll have to improvise. It might take me some extra time. I’ll get back to you with the outcome soon.

  I squeezed my phone, seething, and slammed my hand against the dashboard.

  I’d already put my future in jeopardy by giving him the money I had. Waiting another year when Mom could be out there wasn’t an option. I needed to know now, before I was drafted, before I was a professional football player, if she loved me. If she’d ever loved me at all before dropping me off on my dad’s doorstep like a Dear John letter gone wrong. Dropping me off on my birthday with the last wrapped present I’d ever received. I’d been booted from my foster family with Alexis after two months. Two weeks before Christmas. No, I needed to know now.

  When you achieved anything big, hit any level of fame and fortune, people from your past came crawling out of the woodwork. I needed to know now, before I had anything for someone to want to take a piece of, that Mom cared. Now, before there was any kind of agenda based on what she could get from me… If she found me because she saw me on TV, it wouldn’t be the same.

  Otherwise, I’d always wonder.

  And that was my night going from spectacular to bad to even worse.

  With a shaky breath, I switched to a different message, trying to cool my rising anger.

  ME: Running a little late. I’ll be there as soon as I can.

  JULES: Okay, just let me know if you need to reschedule.

  ME: No, I’ve got an errand to do and then I’ll be there.

  I’d make it up to Jules and then it would all be okay. I just needed to clean a few things up, namely my sister, who couldn’t keep herself out of trouble.

  * * *

  I climbed the three sets of stairs and burst into the apartment. A guy’s head whipped up and I charged at him, tackling him around the waist and taking him to the ground. The anger clouded out the panic at what Alexis might have gotten herself into this time.

  Grabbing onto the front of his shirt, I slammed him back to the floor. He wrapped his hands around my wrists, trying to throw me off.

  “Where the fuck is she?” I growled.

  His eyes widened and he shook beneath me. “Who?”

  “Don’t screw with me. Alexis. She said you wouldn’t let her leave. Where is she?”

  “The redhead?”

  Was this asshole that dumb? “Yes, the redhead. Where is she?”

  He let go of my wrist and pointed a shaky finger down a darkened hallway to the right. “I got home from work after a twelve-hour shift and there’s some random chick in my apartment. I asked her who the hell she was and she ran into the bathroom.”

  I shoved him back down again and got up.

  “She’s been in there for hours. My roommate brought her home. He left, won’t be home until the morning, and I don’t know what the hell is going on, but I’ve got to piss,” he called out from the floor.

  Not paying attention to his bullshit, I knocked on the one closed door in the hallway.

  “Go away. I called my brother; he’ll be here any minute.”

  “Alexis, it’s me.”

  The bathroom door cracked open and she stared at me through the crack. “You’re here!” She threw the door open and hugged me with her hands away from my body. “You came.”

  “You told me you needed my help. Of course I came.”

  The distinct, acrid smell of nail polish wafted from the bathroom.

  “Let me get my stuff.” She bounced back inside like I was picking her up from a day at school, not from nearly beatin
g the shit out of a guy who she’d said wouldn’t let her leave the bathroom.

  She screwed the cap on her nail polish bottle, careful of her fingers.

  “You were painting your nails?”

  “What else was I supposed to do while I was stuck in here?” She stood in front of me with her bag looped over her shoulder.

  “I don’t know. Maybe leave?” I wrapped my finger around her arm and pulled her toward the front door.

  The guy who I’d nearly knocked out stood across the living room. “Sorry about that, man.”

  “Always the redheads,” he muttered under his breath before bolting back down the hallway we’d cleared. The bathroom door slammed before we got out the front door.

  The walk to my car was in dead silence. It was already late and Jules had to be wondering where the hell I was.

  “Alexis, I could’ve killed that guy in there.”

  “Unlikely. Maybe a black eye or something.”

  I tightened my grip on the steering wheel. “And you think that would be okay? Some dude comes home from work after a long day and we fuck that long day up even more.”

  “You’re overreacting. Thank you for coming to get me.” She blew on her nails.

  “Are you serious right now?”

  She jumped at the boom of my words. “I’m sorry, okay. I didn’t know who the guy was. I figured maybe he broke in or something, so I freaked and ran into the bathroom.”

  “For hours.”

  “Then he was pissed so I thought the best thing to do was wait for reinforcements to arrive.”

  I dragged my fingers through my hair and grabbed my phone.

  “Who are you calling?”

  “I’m late for a date right now and am late because I was rushing to you. I can’t keep doing this, Alexis. I can’t.”

  She gently took my phone from me and tucked it under her leg. “No texting and driving; it’s not safe. I won’t do it again. I promise.” She turned in her seat and pressed her palms together, the hostility draining from her words. “I overreacted. I get that and I’m sorry.”