Love Me

Chapter Seven

Gavin walked in the door of his apartment, brains scrambled and bone-tired. He dropped his briefcase and laptop on the floor, shrugged out of his jacket and hung it in the closet. The apartment was dead quiet. Where was Melina?

He wandered into the kitchen, grabbed a beer out of the fridge, went to the bedroom, which was strangely tidy. Usually Melina left piles of clothes draped over every surface, shoes scattered around. He smiled. She loved shopping for clothes and shoes, he teased her about it all the time. She must have spent the day cleaning up.

He shrugged. He’d have a shower. A while later, feeling a bit fresher, dressed in baggy cargo pants and a soft old T-shirt, he went into the living room and grabbed the remote control. Then he saw the note on the coffee table.

He picked it up.

Gavin—I’m leaving. I don’t know how to say it or even what to say, but things aren’t working between us. I’m sorry. I wish we could have talked about it but you’ve been so focused on work lately. After last night, I realize there’s no hope for things getting better. I’ll come back some time for the rest of my things, when I figure out what I’m doing. Love, Melina.

Jesus Christ. His fingers tightened on the paper, every muscle in his body going tight. What the fuck?

After last night, things were hopeless? How did she figure that?

Oh, man. He sank down onto the couch. She’d said she was trying to make him jealous, but did this mean…she was into women?

Nah, that couldn’t be. She’d been too into him all this time to have been putting on an act. Or confused about her sexuality. That was crazy.

Or was it? Maybe last night had made her realize what she really wanted.

His heart sank, his gut felt like he’d swallowed a rock. Was that what she meant?

Hell, he knew she’d been annoyed lately about how much he was working. She just didn’t get it. But with a little pinch of guilt, he recognized that he hadn’t been available. She’d wanted to talk and he hadn’t. Talking about feelings and crap like that just wasn’t something he enjoyed. If things were going okay, things were going okay. It was as simple as that. And he’d thought things were going okay, apart from this stressful interval while he got this project launched.

Where the hell had she gone? He grabbed the phone and called her cell phone, but of course, she didn’t answer. How pathetic would it look if he started calling all their friends to see if she was there?

Pretty pathetic. He hated the idea, but he had to do it.

Six calls later, no luck. The only place left to check was her parents, but he doubted she’d go there. They lived an hour outside the city. And if she wasn’t there and he called looking for her, they’d get all worried. He ruled that out, tried her cell phone again, left another voice mail.

Finally he gave up, looked around the empty apartment. It seemed more than empty without Melina’s vibrant energy. Just her presence gave the place life, made it home.

He wouldn’t accept that things were over, couldn’t accept it. Not yet. Not until he’d seen her, talked to her, and heard from her what was going on. Meanwhile, he just hoped she was okay. And he proceeded to get drunk and despondent sitting on the couch staring at Lethal Weapon for the tenth time.

“Thanks for not telling Gavin I was here.” Melina sat in Kylie and Duncan’s kitchen Sunday morning, dressed in black yoga pants and an old T-shirt, drinking coffee.

Kylie grimaced. “He’s going to kill us. I only did it because I wanted a chance to talk to you.”

“To convince me to go back.”

“Maybe. Maybe to try to figure out what’s going on with you and Gavin. Why you got it on with my cousin Friday night.”

Melina closed her eyes. “Oh yeah. About that. I can explain.”

“Listening.”

Melina bit her lip. “I was so frustrated about Gavin not paying any attention to me lately. I was telling Abby about it and she suggested trying to make him jealous by flirting with someone else. It seemed worth a try—he was totally ignoring me! But there wasn’t really anyone worth flirting with.”

“Except Abby.”

Melina lifted her shoulders. “Yeah. It was just supposed to be a little touching, whispering…you know. Just to give a…hint…of something. But God.” She closed her eyes again. “I had a little too much to drink, and you know…” She swallowed. “I actually got turned on.” She looked at Kylie fearfully. “Does that make me…bad?”

Kylie grinned. “Oh, yeah. You are a bad, bad girl.”

Melina smiled wryly. “All right. Anyway, we got carried away. And then Gavin found us, which actually worked out sort of good, because it really did get his attention. Except…I realized the next morning, when he got up and went to work like nothing had changed, that if that’s what I had to do to hold his attention, it was beyond hope. That’s why I left.”

“Ah.”

“Kylie.” She leaned forward. “Things have been awful lately. All he does is work. You don’t even know some of the things that have happened. I’ve tried all kinds of things… I got a Brazilian, and he barely even noticed. Then I bought some sexy lingerie and he…he fell asleep while he was…you know.”

“He fell asleep during sex?” Kylie’s brows shot up. “That’s gotta be hard to do.”

“He said he was sorry, but he was so exhausted.”

“Wow.”

“One night he came home late and he started…” she lowered her eyes, “…masturbating. And I was right there. I would have had sex with him if he’d asked.”

“Sometimes guys like jerking off. It doesn’t mean they don’t like sex. They need both.”

“Really?”

“Really.” Kylie smiled.

“Well. Every time I try to talk about it, why he’s lost interest in me, he just goes to work. That’s all he does lately.”

“Duncan says he’s really stressed about this project.”

Melina rolled her eyes. “Hugely. He thinks his future at Quantum depends on this project.”

“Maybe it does.”

“I can’t believe that. They’re not going to fire him unless he completely screws up, and Gavin’s not going to screw up. Are you kidding? He’s a genius. He’s…so smart and talented and hard working. No way will the project tank.”

Kylie nodded. “That’s why you love him—because he’s so smart and talented and hard working.”

Well, duh. “Yes.”

“But you don’t like it when he works hard.”

Melina’s mouth twisted. “When you put it like that, I sound a bit…ditzy.”

“You are blonde.”

Melina gave her a look, but took the jab. She made fun of her own blondeness and Kylie’s eyes gleamed with humor.

“You know, when guys are stressed, they don’t want to talk about it,” Kylie said softly. “Duncan’s like that. He just wants to work. He wants to fix the stress, not talk about it.”

Melina nodded thoughtfully. “Yeah, I can see that, I guess.”

“Do you think you were pressuring him, too? I mean, on top of work pressure?”

Melina considered that. Of course she had been. Oh, man. She put her hand over her eyes. “Um…yeah. Pressuring him to go out with me, have sex with me…talk to me. Shit.” She sat there for a moment, then removed her hand. “I just figured he didn’t care about me any more.”

“Guys don’t always tell you that. They’d rather show you how they feel than tell you.”

“But he wasn’t even showing me.”

“Maybe in ways you didn’t recognize. Men show their love by the sacrifices they make for you. Sacrifices like…giving up work time, giving up time with the guys…you know, there were a lot of nights Duncan invited Gavin to go out with the guys and he turned him down so he could be with you.”

Melina’s mouth dropped open. “He did?” She paused. “Wow. I did not know that.”

Kylie nodded.

“I feel like shit,” Melina moaned, putting her head in her hands on the kitchen table.

“Well, I’m not saying this is all your fault,” Kylie said soothingly. “Gavin needs to learn how to communicate too. You two need to tell each other what you expect.”

Melina replayed a scene in her mind, where she and Gavin had argued about something—work again, maybe?—and he’d demanded, “What do you expect me to do?” She’d taken it as a rhetorical question, a slam, like she was wrong to expect things from him. Now she realized maybe he’d actually meant it as a question. What did she expect him to do? Sacrifice his career for her? Ha. Not likely. It was important to him and she loved him for that. “I expect him to talk to me,” she said slowly. “To tell me when he’s stressed. To tell me that he loves me. And…” she swallowed. “He has a right to expect things from me. Like supporting him when he’s stressed, not pressuring him.”

“Go talk to him,” Kylie urged.