Blindsided (13 page)

They had talked for an hour and a half about mostly nothing, followed by ten minutes of tight, angry words. Which was par for the course. Despite having grown up together and knowing almost everything about each other, they still found enough to talk about, albeit in a kind of verbal shorthand that only the two of them understood. Even their arguments were conducted in a protracted language now. Christ, they should be growing bored of the whole juvenile situation by now. Thirty four was a little old to be playing these games. Maybe she did mean it this time. Maybe she’d decided to cut her losses before she got any older waiting for him.

Jen was one of the smartest, funniest people he knew, which didn’t make it any easier for him to stand his ground. But he couldn’t just let her win, could he? Couldn’t just roll over and do what she asked. For a time right after college, they had lived together. It had been good, and Tony still thought about it often, though he was sure it had become colored by time.

Even with imperfect memory, it had been near perfect until it hadn’t been. There had been no in between, no transitional period of mediocrity. Young and badly dressed, the two of them had squeezed into a tiny apartment in New York City. Eight flights of stairs, intermittent plumbing, heat that did little more than keep hypothermia at bay and saucer-sized roaches had made them closer than they had ever been, before or since. They had had to climb over one another to get into bed, and the shower was approximately the size of a tube of toothpaste, but they had made the most of it.

Jen had hung cheap tapestries she bought at street markets up over the cracked plaster of the walls and had put plants in every window. It was bohemian and jungle-like, and for two years, it had been blissful. Then everything fell apart. Jen was offered a partnership at an architectural firm in Santa Fe and had taken it without discussing it with him. Just came home one day, excited and bubbling, telling him how much they were going to love it there, with the lower rent, more money and sunlight galore. He’d already begun his own business, already worked his odd hours from their apartment.

He had exploded, he remembered with some embarrassment. He had been so temperamental in his youth, and remembering his behavior now made him a touch queasy. But how had she expected him to react? Supportively, probably, he thought to himself wryly. He had been such an idiot when he was younger, and he’d been paying for it for ten years now. So had Jen.

In his better moments, he knew that his continued refusal to move to Santa Fe for Jen was just a stupid, protracted reaction to not being considered when she had taken the job. He knew it, but he just couldn’t seem to get past it. Even when he’d had enough of the city and had moved across the country, he was too stubborn to move to Santa Fe to be with Jen. And how dumb was that, he wondered.

Absentmindedly, he poured himself another cup of coffee. Without Chelsea around, he had no one to distract him from his own misery. Annabelle didn’t offer a distraction so much as she offered variety. Catching up with Chelsea had been great. Hearing her stories of being on the road had kept him from realizing he was spinning his wheels. Now, thinking back on those stories, he was just reminded that even Chelsea, his baby sister, had a life that was going somewhere. Before her breakdown, he hadn’t seen her in months. No, close to a year, since the previous Christmas.

So his sister was only a fleeting part of his life, his mother was a hurricane, and his girlfriend was laying out ultimatums. My life sucks, Tony thought. The only problem was, he wasn’t sure how to fix any of it while keeping his pride.

###

The light was still early morning watery when Chelsea awoke in Nate’s bed wearing one of his undershirts and her own underwear. The last thing she remembered was putting her head down on the table after dinner. They’d talked about her sleeping in the guest room, but apparently, Nate had taken it upon himself to bring her to his bed instead. Not that she minded.

Asleep, Nate looked adorable. The hard lines of his face softened, making him look younger and like less of a badass. Unable to stop herself, she ran her hands over his body, slowly finding her way from his sculpted abs to his hips, tracing ever lower. She was about to slip her fingers under his boxers and explore his morning erection when his strong hand gripped her wrist.

“You fell asleep at the table last night, Chelsea,” he said, his eyes losing their teasing glint and taking on a shade of something deeper.

His comment was an invitation for her to explain. But she couldn’t. Not now. Once she started, she was certain she wouldn’t be able to stop, and she didn’t want to get to the end, was always trying not get to the end. Or was it the beginning? It didn’t matter, she just didn’t want to wind up there.

“I was really tired, you know, after the drive an everything,” she said, hoping for a light tone. The shrillness in her tone belied her unease though, and she winced inwardly.

“People don’t normally fall asleep like that unless they’re sick, Chelsea. Are you sick?” Nate asked.

He stroked her hair, his fingers soothingly tender and for a moment Chelsea almost relented. She almost got into the whole shebang. Then she pulled back. This was one week, not a lifetime. Telling him of her breakdown, of the reasons she had realized only while lying in a hospital bed, would only make him feel sorry for her. She didn’t want his pity, she wanted a fling, with no thought, no emotional outpouring.

“No, I’m not sick, Nate. I’m just sleepy, okay?” she said. She had meant to make her voice a bit sharp, to discourage further prying, but it came out quiet and small.

“Okay,” Nate said with a narrowing of his eyes that told her that he meant the exact opposite.

###

There was no way not she was going to be able to tell the difference. To her, green things were green things. Clearly, her thumb was not one of them.

Though she had grumbled and whined about it, Nate had gotten them both some old clothes and dragged her out to play in the dirt after breakfast. He had claimed that it would lift her spirits and clear her mind. Which meant he’d noticed the panicky fidgeting that still overwhelmed her. It was only a matter of time before he asked her about it.

So far, all the gardening had done was make her dirty and guilty for ripping up Nate’s flowers. It gave her hands something to do and the sun felt nice, but not as nice as Nate’s hands on her body would. Watching him work was not good for her concentration, and it certainly didn’t help her hold up her end of the bargain. Dressed in only a pair of old work pants, his muscled, tattooed torso was on full and glorious display. The sun was warm enough that he was building up a nice sheen of sweat. Distraction personified.

“Nate, if we stay out here, I’m going to destroy your garden. I’m hopeless,” Chelsea said.

She flopped back on her butt and stared at him. He worked deftly, separating weed from flower and pulling only the appropriate one. She had harvested rice in a paddy in Vietnam, and she hadn’t been very good at that either. Living plants were not her thing, but they were clearly Nate’s. The gardens were so beautiful. And time consuming, she now saw.

Nate looked at her over his shoulder, still working.

“So, what messes does Tony clean up for you?” he asked. For a second she wondered what he was talking about, then remembered Tony’s comment the day before.

“Oh, Tony’s always cleaning up my messes,” she said, “He’s always saying this is the last time. Maybe this time, he means it, but I doubt it.”

Nate had stopped working and stared at her as if he knew there was something she wasn’t telling him. There were a lot of things she wasn’t telling him.

“Can we go inside, now?” Chelsea asked as she tossed the little green strands in her hand onto the ground. She was sick of this conversation and sick of feeling incompetent.

Nate flopped down next to her and put his arm around her. Unable to resist, she nuzzled her face into his neck, trying not to think about sex even as her insides pooled and warmed at his touch, at his smell. She nipped at his neck just a little, just to feel his skin in her mouth. A rumble came from deep inside Nate and Chelsea tried again, taking more skin in her mouth this time, turning her body towards him for a better angle. Nate pulled away just enough to take his neck out of her reach.

“If we go inside, I’m going to break my promise and throw you down on the table, sweetheart. And the rug, and the desk. Get the idea?” he said.

He nuzzled his head into the top of her hair and she clung to his strong body, tracing her fingers over the tattoos on his forearm. Here was that amazing physical intimacy again, but this time, Chelsea felt warmed by it, not scared. That alone should have set off her alarm bells, but she had decided to block them out.

“And what makes you think being outside is going to stop us?” Chelsea said, laughing. “You could throw me against the dirt. That would be fine with me.”

While she spoke, she straddled him and pushed him gently onto his back. She couldn’t have forced him to if she had wanted, but he was apparently willing to follow her lead.

He stared up at her, rubbing his hands over her hips. Hips that were covered in a very baggy pair of paint-stained pants that he had dug up. She probably looked awful. He looked gorgeous, with his hair a mess, the sunlight playing on the angles of his face. Nate shirtless looked better than a person had any right to look, and Chelsea was not going to be able to stop herself. What had she been thinking when she’d agreed to this asinine plan of his? Not only had she willingly submitted herself to this torture, she’d driven two hours for the honor.

Her eyes stuck on him, she lowered herself down until their noses were touching. She rubbed his lightly with hers and was surprised to find the silly motion turning her on. Leave it to him to make an Eskimo kiss sexy. It had to be the scent of him. Besides his normal heady aroma of masculine sweat, earthy musk and the lime soap he used, he smelled like rich dirt, not a scent Chelsea had ever found attractive. Now, she might find herself in garden centers, sniffing dirt and going into raptures. What a lovely thought.

She opened her mouth and kissed him, sucking on his lip, poking her tongue into his mouth, satisfied all the way down to the pair of grubby sneakers she was wearing when he groaned and tightened his grip on her. He was surrendering to her. She deepened the kiss, her eyes still open. She enjoyed seeing his eyelids, the soft coal black of his eyelashes spread out against his cheeks. She prodded his tongue with hers and watched as his eyelids spasmed a little. Working hard to control her smile, she wiggled her bottom a little over the hardness she felt growing below her. Just a little bit more, she thought…

Then she was on her back, Nate pinning her down and carefully keeping his hips out of range of hers. Her arms were above her head, pinned down by one of his big hands. His knees were clamping her legs in place. It was a delicate, wonderful bondage which she wriggled against, testing the limits of his strength. She wasn’t strong enough to even find the edges. His grip on her never wavered, despite her half hearted struggles. He didn’t seem to be exerting himself at all, though he was hovering over her using only his arms and toes to stay upright. If he was hoping this little exercise was going to make her less aroused, he was in for a big surprise.

Nate’s eyes were dark with desire, but there was something else there. Amusement. She was amusing him. Wonderful. Just what she had been going for.

“You’re not going to make me break my promise, sweetheart,” Nate said, “But I’m glad to see that it’s enough to keep you around. By Friday, you’ll be putty.”

The smug tone of his voice should have been enough to kill her desire, but it wasn’t. He had the audacity to dip his head and rub his mouth against the tender skin of her throat. She was in a Nate cage and he was intent on making her prisoner in more ways than one. She wasn’t about to tell him that she was already putty and that by Friday she’d be in flames, but she was fairly certain he knew that already.