Slow Burn

Chapter 17

The smile on my face feels good as I carry the empty platter into the kitchen for Rylee. I set it in the sink half-full of dishes and begin putting some of the condiments on the counter away so that they don’t spoil.

I hum along to the music floating in from the deck outside, where about a dozen or so of Colton’s crew members are milling around, talking or standing in the pool with beers in their hands. It’s the most relaxed I’ve felt in forever, and I hope this is a sign that things are going to be okay. That I’m going to be okay.

I shake my head, hating the sense of battle that’s always a constant in me. I want to feel hopeful, but the fear never quite goes away.

I adjust the top of my suit to make sure it covers the bandage over the incision and check myself in the reflection of the window above the sink. I nearly jump out of my skin when I see Becks’s reflection there. I yelp and spin around to see him standing on the opposite side of the kitchen, in board shorts and a baseball cap, his arms folded across his bare chest. I only have a second to take in the whole, incredible package because when I meet his eyes I can’t look away.

Figures, just as I was starting to feel like myself again—Ry’s talk helped pull bits of myself from the dust, brushing them off to take their place again as hope tried to raise its weary head—the appearance of my biggest weakness and number one complication brings it all back in an instant. My heart falls into my stomach at the sight of him, turning my relaxing afternoon into an obstacle course of pitfalls.

Our gazes lock. Although his eyes are intense, they’re shadowed by the brim of his hat, so I can’t quite see if the anger I deserve is there or not. I exhale the breath I was holding as nerves slowly flicker to life under his quiet scrutiny. I glance toward the patio doorway and then back to him in a move that earns me a low, condescending chuckle from him.

“You gonna run out that door too without saying a word? Seems par for the course. Or are you going to stand here and explain just what the fuck happened?”

The bite in his tone stings but I deserve it. I work a swallow down my throat as I stand before him feeling completely vulnerable. I fiddle with the string on the hip of my bikini bottoms, which causes his eyes to flicker down momentarily before coming back up to my eyes without even stopping to take in the deep V of my cleavage.

And I know that means he’s really pissed.

“Oh right, I forgot.” He shakes his head, contempt in his eyes. “You’d explain, but oops, you’re sorry. You thought you could, but now you can’t …,” he says, repeating my lame excuse back to me.

Yep, I’m seriously fucked here. There’s nothing I can say to explain why I left without telling him the truth, and that’s a line I’m not crossing. “Becks …” His name is a sigh on my lips as I try to figure out how to respond. I obviously didn’t think this whole silent-treatment thing through very well. How stupid was I not to realize I was going to have to face him, talk to him, explain my actions at some point since our best friends are married? Shit!

“Was it something I said?” He pushes off the counter and walks the few feet to stand across the island from me before he continues. “Because I do believe you begging for me to make you feel owned was a request. Did I not do what you asked? Did I not own you enough?” The derision in his tone matches the contempt in his eyes.

I don’t even attempt to respond to that, wouldn’t have an answer to give even if I could, because he not only owned my body that night—he started owning my heart too. My pulse thunders as I watch him, anticipating what his next words will be because I know regardless of what they are, I deserve them.

He twists his lips as his stare bores into me, daring me to answer him so that he can knock my excuse away. “You see, I’m just having a hard time comprehending what the hell happened because after hearing you say we are, I woke up in an empty apartment, which seems like your way of saying we aren’t. Care to fill me in on what the fuck happened?”

His words reach their mark, and I shake my head as his cologne hits me from his nearness and immediately makes me think of that spot beneath his jaw that smells the strongest of it. My body wants to respond—step toward him, reach out to him—but I do neither because making that physical connection is something I can’t allow myself to have.

“No, I just …” My words falter when he braces his hands on the counter in front of him, a slight smirk on his face that doesn’t reach his eyes. I can see them clearly now, along with the tension evident in the broad lines of his shoulders.

I bring my eyes back to his. “I thought you couldn’t come today?”

“Oh, I think I demonstrated that I can come just fine, City, so let’s quit your avoidance game, shall we?”

“That’s not what I meant—”

“I don’t think you know much of anything right now.”

He tilts his head to the side, no signs of the laidback guy I’ve come to know. “I didn’t take you for the kind of girl to sneak out without a word, refuse to answer your phone or respond to a text”—he shrugs—“but shit, it wouldn’t be the first time I’ve misjudged someone’s character.”

His words sting, and his questioning of my character shifts the temper I have on simmer to boil. Hell yes, I want the man, but if he can’t handle me now at my worst, then he sure as fuck doesn’t deserve me at my best. And I know he has every right to feel how he feels, but I’m in self-preservation mode—my ample ingestion of wine helping fuel my irrationality—and I don’t want to deal with this shit right now.

“We said no strings, right?” I bite out, leaning against the counter behind me, Bitch 101 in session: Don’t question me when you don’t know shit, or I’ll get nasty. “Did something change that I don’t know about? Last I checked, I wasn’t required to give lengthy good-byes before I take my shimmy of shame back to my place after a quick fuck.”

I see the hurt flash in his eyes, and it kills me but tells me so much at the same time. That brief flicker of emotion confirms that he has feelings for me, and that alone has my defenses up and panic beginning to strangle me. I may have told him that night we are, but that was before the lump and the possible results. He can’t have feelings for me.

He just can’t. I can’t allow it. I need to go back to how we were when we started things—casual, simple. Temporary.

My heart races. I grip the counter to prevent him from noticing my trembling hands. But I meet his glare and match it, waiting for the ball of hurt to be hurled at me.

“A quick fuck?” He runs his hand up and cups the back of his neck before continuing. “A quick fuck doesn’t make you forget your own name because you’re so busy moaning mine.”

His words stir the desire within me. I’m not used to this side of Becks, and as much as I like it, as much as I’m turned on by it—by him—I’m also pissed. At him. At me. At the world. This wasn’t part of the game plan here. Irritation sparks anew so that now we’re firing barbs at each other. And I’m not even sure we’re doing anything other than purposely trying to hurt each other so that we can protect ourselves.

Or maybe that’s a bunch of psychobabble bullshit that holds no relevance, and I’m trying to justify why I’m being a bitch and pushing him away.

“You’re quite full of yourself, aren’t you, Daniels?” It’s all I’ve got because he’s right. The question is how do I get out of this situation without hurting him any further and keeping possibility between us if the cards do fall my way in the coming weeks.

He rounds the counter so that he faces me in the small space between the island at his back and the kitchen counter at mine. His eyes glint with contempt as he observes me and judges me, and I hate the feeling. Hate recognizing the emotions I see within them when I just want to tell him to hold on. To hope against hope for me that I can call in a few weeks and explain this all to him. Explain the push and the pull between us and why I’ve walked away.

I just hope it won’t be too late.

We continue to speak volumes without words. “You know what, Haddie? I call bullshit here…. What I just can’t figure out is what exactly is making you lie to me, why you let me get close and then push me away.”

His words cause a sliver of hope. The good man that I’ve always taken him for has returned. Suddenly I’m both grateful and fearful at the same time that he might be able to see through my pretense. I’m trying to improvise a game plan in my head because I know with Becks I need one or else he’ll say, Come, and I’ll say how many times.

Christ on a cracker, he unnerves me in so many ways when he’s this close to me. My phone chimes with an incoming text on the counter behind him, and we both jump, startled by the sound, which shatters our accusatory silence. Becks twists and reaches for my phone, his expression shuttering when he glances down at the screen.

“Well, I guess I have my answer. It’s not that you can’t with me, but that you can with him,” he says with disbelief before handing me my phone and striding out of the kitchen.

As hard as it is to tear my eyes away from him, I’m at a loss as to what he’s assuming until I look down on my phone. Dante. His name lights up my screen as well as the text that follows it. I stare at it understanding why Becks just left, cursing and thanking Dante all at once for his inopportune timing.

Are you coming home tonight or staying at your parents? I miss you.

Dante’s words are innocent. At least I hope they are. Regardless, they’re enough to make me reconsider my instinctive reaction to chase after Becks and try to make things right.

“What the hell was that all about?” Rylee’s voice causes me to roll my eyes and toss my cell onto the counter without a second thought about the man who just upset the one I’m so focused on.

“You said he wasn’t coming!” I tell her, anger lacing my disbelief. I pick up my glass of wine and down the rest of it, glaring at her over the rim the whole time.

“He wasn’t.” She shrugs, a diminutive smile at the corners of her mouth as she walks up and sits on the barstool in front of me. “But he got done early, so he decided to stop over.”

I look out the patio doors to where he stands now beside Colton, beer in his hand, tension in his shoulders. And it’s so much easier to focus on him than to look at Rylee because I am so sick of being stared at and scrutinized today. I’m so fed up with it that I start trying to figure out how to extricate myself from this barbecue because the fun I was having fifteen minutes ago is gone now that I know I’ve hurt him.

“Don’t even think about leaving,” she warns, years of friendship allowing her to read my mind.

“Ry …” I push off the counter and pull the cork out of the partially empty bottle. I pour myself some more wine because I have a feeling I’m going to need it.

“Don’t Ry me,” she says, leaning back and locking eyes with me. I see patience there, but I also see a friend not willing to step back.” Not gonna lie here when I tell you it’s going to be awkward as hell since the last time you saw each other his dick was in you—”

I choke on my wine and start sputtering out incoherent words before just dropping my jaw open and staring at her. She struggles to keep her face serious, and I love her that much more for it.

“Well, it’s true!” She asserts. “It’s a Saturday afternoon barbecue, Had,” she says, trying to calm the situation and defuse my need to escape. “I’m not going to say a word. Have some drinks. Hide under the bushes over there. Talk to the rest of the guys. Do something because if you don’t he’s going to know he affects you … and, well, you never know”—she shrugs—“making a guy who’s interested a little bit jealous isn’t always a bad thing.”

“Who took my friend, and what did you do with her?” I ask her incredulously, knowing damn well the call from Dante might have already had that effect. I don’t think I want to push my luck any further.

Rylee glances outside and makes a humming noise of appreciation in the back of her throat. My eyes follow her sightline to see Becks reaching up to help Colton adjust the volleyball net higher over the pool. His hat falls back, and his board shorts keep slipping lower and lower on his stretched torso. Every damn ridge and etch of muscle is on display, causing every single one of mine to clench and then sing with desire.

“Damn. He’s got quite the V there when his shorts are that low,” she murmurs, her head angling to the side to match mine as we watch the show he’s unknowingly putting on.

“Infinity.” I don’t even realize I’ve said the word aloud until I see her glance my way in my peripheral vision, her brows furrowed.

“Infinity?”

I look back out toward Becks as he lifts his other arm, trying to get the tie of the net through a hole a few feet over his head. The sight of his shorts falling even lower makes my mouth water and my fingers itch to touch him in pure carnal lust, despite everything that’s happened.

I realize after a moment of admiration and daydreaming that I haven’t answered Ry’s question. “Yeah,” I say absently, pausing for a moment before I continue. “The V—his infinity zone—the place you could stare at on a man forever and die a happy woman.”

Rylee throws her head back and laughs, a low, rich sound that makes me smile. “Well, that’s a new one,” she says before taking a sip and looking back out toward our own private show again. “And ain’t it the truth!”

“Hey! You’re a married woman now. Don’t go admiring my Becks.” The possessive pronoun is out of my mouth before I even think it through. I hope it goes unnoticed, but the immediate cessation of her laughter and the turn of her head tells me she caught it.

Damn. Can’t a girl catch a break?

I keep my eyes focused on Becks. On him bending over and his mighty fine ass as he picks up his hat. Of the way he tilts the bottle to his lips and holds it there momentarily while Colton says something to him before he tips the bottle up higher. So many little things that make me want him, and all of them on a first-name basis with my libido.

“First of all, I might be married, but hell if a sane woman would turn her head away from the sight of that. Ironically, mine’s got the ink you usually go for and vice versa, but looking at Becks sure isn’t a hardship,” she says, and then falls silent as the laughter outside floats into the kitchen.

And for a second, I softly exhale the breath I’ve been holding over my claimed possession of Becks because she’s missed it.

“Oh, and, Had?” she says as she rises from her chair and starts to walk toward her company outside. “Don’t think I didn’t catch that little slip of the tongue.” She throws the comment over her shoulder and just keeps on walking without looking back.