It takes me a moment to register that she is going to make this night very difficult for me. Her defiant eyes are blazing brighter than usual, her dark hair pulled up exposing her neck, and those lips, which I can’t get enough of, tease me.
Her arms are laced tensely across her stomach, her biceps slightly pronounced with the effort it’s taking her to keep this tough girl act up. I don’t want to go out and pick up some random girl tonight, I want to stay home and watch TV with Addison. Find out who the Salmon Ladder takes out this time. Tell her all about Emily and everything she means to me, what she needs when she’s released from the hospital. I want to be with Addison, but I don’t want to be another one of her regrets, once in a week is enough.
Stepping into her space, I place my hands on either side of her throat, my fingers feeling her rapidly beating pulse. My thumb tilts her head upwards and I lower my lips to hers.
I kiss her. My tongue, slipping into her warm inviting mouth, her knees buckle and I back her against the railing, keeping her upright as she whimpers into our joined lips. My hands never leave her silken neck, feeling her heartbeat intensify as I deepen the kiss.
Damn, she tastes so good.
Releasing her arms, she wraps them around me and pulls me closer. I’m insanely hard and pressed right up against her body.
Her hands find the hem of my shirt and roam over the bare skin on my back. Pulling away, I keep my fingers on her beating pulse as I stare into her eyes. “Go inside, Addison. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
She begins to protest, and I give her one more peck on the lips as I quickly walk down the stairs and get into the waiting cab.
I give the address to the cab driver, but what I really want to do is bang on her door and go back to Sunday night. I want a restart on us, because while for the past few days I’ve placed all the blame on her, I’m the one who agreed to drunk sex, I’m the one who wasn’t strong enough to make us wait until she was one hundred percent convinced I was who she wanted. I’ve known all along that she was it for me, but Addison needed more time and I screwed it up.
Next time around, I’m going to do it right. And while leaving her on my doorstep with swollen red lips feels all sorts of wrong, it was my only option.
The cabbie drops me off on a dark corner in front of a rundown looking shack. Reed’s already inside drinking a rum and coke and I join him.
“You don’t look much better than you did an hour ago. This is a very bad idea, Damian.”
“Leave then.” I nod towards the exit. “Not like I need your permission or your company. I’m pretty sure I can get laid all on my own.” The words fall out of my mouth, but they are meaningless. My interest lies with one woman and one woman only. I just don’t like Reed giving me orders anywhere but at the track.
Reed’s eyes go cold. “What exactly are you trying to accomplish?”
I take a sip of my drink and stare straight ahead. Shaking my head, I turn to him. “Fuck, I don’t know. I feel like I’ve lost control. Emily’s situation sucks, Addison is killing me and for once, I want to know exactly what’s going to happen next. I want to be in control of the next day, not freak out every time my phone rings that it’s the hospital telling me something’s wrong with Em or wonder what the fuck is going on in Addison’s mind.”
“Dude, you know more than anyone you can’t control life, you just have to ride it. Addison will come around.”
A cold blast of air enters the bar. We look up to see a group of girls we used to hang with at the doorway. They spot us and the mood instantly changes.
“And if she doesn’t, we can come back here and I promise, I’ll be your wingman,” Reed says, right before he waves the women over to our side of the bar.
‘Big cup of crazy.’ That’s the slogan on my mug this morning, and it fits my mood perfectly. He kissed me. Damian kissed me then left. But that kiss, it said so much in the ten seconds that passed between us.
He’s mine if I want him.
I do want him.
My job . . . my boss can be a prick, but I love my job. I’m not officially on Emily’s case, there’s a good chance Thomas would never find out Damian is my neighbor and I can think of a million excuses why he can’t put me on that case. I can try this, being a couple with Damian, or at least committed sex buddies.
It’s a quiet morning. I didn’t hear him come home last night and he hasn’t left for the track this morning. I sit in my big white lounge chair and take my first sip of dark rich coffee.
My phone begins to play that damn Arctic Monkey’s song. I can’t let Matt derail me. He’s already taken up too much of my life. It’s time to move on.
“Matt,” I say, resolved to end this.
“Addy, I love your voice this early in the morning.”
I’m silent; the sound of his voice still shocks me. After so many years of waiting to hear it again, it now leaves me lost, every reason I had for answering this call dying on my tongue.
“I’ve officially moved out.”
“You’ve still been living with her?” My question is immediate. The revelation that while he’s been pursuing me, he’s possibly been sharing a bed with his wife telling me everything I need to know. The Matt Bryson I fell in love with, is not the same man who’s come back to claim me.
“No, I told you I left her and I did. She’s been staying with a friend until I found my own place.” I don’t know if I believe him and I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to trust him. “I’m sending a plane ticket. I want you to come see me. You can stay in a hotel, but I want you to see the life you could live if you moved here with me.”
I hear the sliding glass door to my right begin to open. “Matt, I’m not moving to New York.” I hit end and focus on the balcony ready to see a shirtless Damian and forget the past two days—go back to the way things have been the past few months with an added benefit of having sex, and a lot of it. My phone rings again, and I mute it, not wanting to deal with Matt or anything other than making up with Damian.
“I’ll be out here wai—”
“Amber, don’t go out there.”
As a woman with dark brown hair wearing nothing but one of Damian’s white T-shirt’s steps out onto the balcony, I have to hold in my gasp. This woman is stunning. Long lean legs, dark silky brown hair and hazel eyes. Her shirt is completely see-through and her dark nipples are peeking through the white material. If I had to guess, she’s not wearing underwear.
“Hi, I’m Amber.” She’s perky and annoying. I hate her and can’t bring myself to respond.
Damian follows her out, two plain black mugs secure in his two large hands.
I don’t know what I was looking for, guilt, remorse, shame, but as he hands Amber her mug all I see is . . . contentment.
“Hi, Addison.”
I rub my eye with my middle finger and take a sip of coffee that feels like battery acid as it slides down my quickly closing throat. He sits on the edge of his lounge chair and she slides in behind him. Her hands inch up his back and rest on his shoulders as she begins to give him a small back rub. He stretches his neck from side to side “Ah, that feels good.”
Gross.
My eyes close and I’m about to get up when I hear her whispering. “Last night was fun.”
I should go inside, but the scene playing out in front of me has cemented me to my seat.
His back stiffens, and he doesn’t respond. Her hands begin to descend, trailing along the muscles of his back, slipping around his sides to the front of him. She scoots closer, her crotch up against him. “We should do it again,” she continues.
I stand.
So does he.
He’s frowning, and for a split second, I think I have it wrong. He doesn’t want this woman’s hands on him, but as he looks at me, a slight pain filling his eyes, he reaches down and pulls her up, ushering her inside and leaving me standing there like a fool.