Breathe Me In (12 page)

“It’s really messed up,” he agreed. Ethan glanced down the hall and lowered his voice. “Look, uh, I’m not trying to interfere but I’m going to tell you what I was told about Chloe and the same applies to Anya. You can’t do casual here. You either need to be all in or you need to walk away.”

I don’t know what I was expecting him to say, but it wasn’t that. “That’s a pretty big leap,” I told him. “Look, we’re just getting to know each other. It’s definitely a casual thing right now.” Maybe that wasn’t entirely accurate, but Ethan’s words made me nervous. Just because I thought I liked her didn’t mean I was making any sort of commitment. I wasn’t signing up for life here. And I was pretty sure that Anya knew that.

“There is no casual when a woman has a baby. There’s a one-night stand and then there’s meeting her kid.”

This conversation was starting to piss me off. “I appreciate your concern for Anya, but I think she can handle herself.” Before I could hear any more of his well-intentioned words of wisdom, I stood up with Asher and moved towards a closed door I had to assume was the bedroom and knocked hard. “Hey, Anya, you ready?”

Something about my tone must have sounded off, because the door suddenly opened and she was standing there, frowning at me. “Hi! Is everything okay?”

“It’s fine.” I took her hand and tugged her into the hallway. “Just hungry.” That wasn’t a lie, but it was more that the apartment walls were closing in on me. I just wanted to be alone with Anya.

Asher made a sound of complaint and held his arms out for Anya to take him, like by seeing her it had just occurred to him that a stranger was holding him. She took him from me and went into the living room. Another woman appeared in the bedroom door, smiling shyly at me. She mouthed, “hi,” and followed Anya.

They were both petite with delicate features, but Chloe had darker hair and more fullness to her face. But as they both walked, they carried themselves the same way and it was actually a little disconcerting, especially knowing they hadn’t been raised together.

I waited by the front door as Anya gave Asher a kiss and handed him to Chloe. Her sister gave several hand gestures that Anya seemed to understand. “Yeah,” she said to Chloe. “I will. Thanks.”

Chloe nodded. Then she smiled and waved at me.

“Have a good night,” I said, because I wasn’t sure what else to say. I opened the door for Anya and went through. In the hallway I closed the door again and for a second we just looked at each other.

“What?” she asked defensively. “So Chloe doesn’t talk. Don’t be a dick about it.”

I felt my eyebrows shoot up. “What? I’m not being a dick! And I didn’t even know she doesn’t talk.” That explained the fact that she hasn’t spoken, but wait a minute. Who didn’t talk? “Is she deaf?”

Anya started down the hallway. “No. Which is why we need to start walking. I feel weird talking about her when she’s just on the other side of the door.”

“Okay.” I was starting to feel weird about everything.

When we were downstairs in the parking lot, heading towards my car, Anya glanced at me. “She has selective mutism. It’s where you stop talking because of extreme social anxiety. It started when she was trying to learn English and people made fun of her and it just got worse. I’ve seen her whisper in Ethan’s ear, but that’s it. I’ve never heard her talk to anyone.”

“Wow.” I didn’t even know what to say. That sounded hard-core messed up. “Is she… happy?”

Anya shrugged and stopped next to my truck. “Yes. I mean, I think she’d like to be able to communicate better and sure, people look at her like she’s a freak, but she’s not a bitch like me. She lets it roll off her back. I’m the sister with attitude.”

No argument there. “I guess there were a lot of repercussions from your adoption.” I opened the passenger door for her.

She looked up at me, her expression unreadable. “You have no idea.”

“You could tell me.”

“Not when you’re looking at me like that. Like you’re sorry you got… entangled.”

I probably did look like that and I held my hands out. “You could have warned me, you know. That Chloe doesn’t talk and her boyfriend was going to tell me how to date you.”

Her eyes snapped. “I told you I didn’t need to be picked up here. That I could just meet you somewhere. But you insisted on picking me up. So deal with it.”

I sighed. “Is this how we’re going to do this? You getting pissed at me when I look confused?”

Anya just yanked the door shut, leaving me standing in the parking lot. For a second I pressed the heel of my hand into my forehead where I suddenly felt a headache coming on. Did I really want to do this?

Then I pictured Anya, desperate at the convenience store, stealing food for Asher. Anya, tossing a glass into the sink with lust and fury in her eyes. Anya, shattering beneath my tongue. Anya, pushing Asher in the park, looking beautiful and serene. Yes. I wanted to do this.

So I got into the truck and started it. “Where would you like to go for dinner?” I had asked her for dinner because I figured we could talk and because I couldn’t resist the urge to feed her.

“I want to go to your place.”

“There’s no food at my place.”

“I don’t care.” She was sulking, looking at the window.

Now what? I was hungry and I’m a guy who likes his meals regular. “Should I order a pizza or something?”

“Sure.”

I ordered a pizza to be delivered while I drove. Then once that was done, I took a left turn into my apartment complex and I reached over and put my hand on Anya’s thigh. Her head jerked towards me.

“What?”

“I don’t want anything. I’m just touching you to touch you.”

“Oh.” That single word dripped with suspicion.

She kind of cracked me up sometimes even when she was being irritating. “So did you grow up in New York?”

“Long Island for awhile. Then by fourteen I was in the City. Did you grow up here?”

“Yep. I doubt I’ll ever leave either. My brother went to Connecticut for college and stayed there, and my sister is going to school in Boston, but I don’t have any burning desire to get the hell out like they did. Nothing wrong with here.”

“So you don’t want to like see the world or whatever?”

“I’d like a vacation somewhere warm once a year, but I’m good with that. I don’t have wanderlust. How about you?”

“There isn’t anywhere I want to go because I figured I’d never get there. What’s the point in fantasizing about it?”

“That’s cheerful.”

“Yeah, well, if I admit something will you promise not to laugh at me?”

I parked my car. “I swear I will not laugh at you.”

She bit her lip. “I have a secret Pinterest board. Of cute little houses and clothes I’d like to buy for Asher. A playset for the yard. Is that totally stupid or what? I’m never going to be buying a house.”

Her expression wasn’t angry and she didn’t scoff. She looked and sounded just… wistful. Like sure, she knew it wasn’t realistic but despite what she said, she hadn’t entirely given up on dreaming. “It’s not stupid. Everyone wants a home.”

I did too, at some point. Not anytime soon though. I was supposed to be in my carefree selfish phase right now. Clearly it was working out phenomenally for me since I was sitting there staring at Anya wishing I could buy her a fucking bungalow with a white picket fence. When I’d seen her in the park, pushing Asher, there had been something tempting to that, something I hadn’t even thought I was interested in. Given how much I’d helped my mom with my siblings, I had actually thought I would abstain from doing the family thing. That I wouldn’t have kids, just be the favorite uncle to my siblings’ children.

It was really unnerving to think that Ethan’s warning had some measure of truth to it- I could fuck Anya or I could
be
with Anya. I couldn’t date her like I’d date a grad student or a marketing assistant.

Holy shit. I had no clue what to do.

So I opened the truck door. She did the same.

When we got to my apartment she gave me a sheepish look. “I’m sorry if you really wanted to eat out. It’s just, well, I’ve never actually been on a date. It kind of freaked me out.”

“What do you mean, you’ve never been on a date? Everyone’s been on a date. And I happen to know you’re not a virgin.” I gave her a grin.

She stuck her tongue out at me as we went into the apartment. “Shut up. No, it’s just, in high school, I just hung out with my boyfriend and then when I was eighteen or nineteen, I met Sam, Asher’s father, and we didn’t date. We just met at the park, then he came home with me and never left.”

Wow. “Doing that would never occur to me,” I told her honestly. “Like, I’m not even sure how that happens.” It seemed like Anya lived in a world where people didn’t have stuff. Even at eighteen I had possessions. But that aside, how the hell do you know in one night you want to be with someone long term? It seemed risky. “Weren’t you afraid he was a stalker or something? I mean, obviously he wasn’t, but didn’t it make you… uncomfortable?”

She sat on my couch. “Honestly? It never occurred to me to think it was weird. I have pretty much lived my whole life transiently. People came and went. I came and went. Sam didn’t have anywhere to stay and I needed help with the rent and it just… happened. We got along really well for the most part. He was very chill, unlike me.”

I went to the kitchen to grab a couple beers to go with the pizza that would hopefully be arriving soon. I really was starving. That had to be the reason I had a pit in my gut. Not because I was jealous of the mysterious Sam, baby daddy extraordinaire. “So what happened to Sam?”

“He overdosed.” Anya kicked off her boots and put her feet on the coffee table. “And don’t go cop on me. I have never used. Ever. I didn’t realize he was addicted at first.”

Maybe because she hadn’t known him when he moved in. Christ. I tried to keep my expression neutral. She didn’t need my opinions. “When was that?”

“Nine months ago.”

“I’m sorry. You must miss him.” I had paused in the doorway of the kitchen and I stood there, propped on the doorframe, watching her. Afraid she was going to cry. I felt like I figuratively had my hands out, waiting for the moment she fell off the emotional monkey bars. But she didn’t look upset. Maybe she was used to losing people. Or maybe she had tamped down her grief so she could cope and focus on Asher.

“Sometimes. But if I hadn’t gotten pregnant, I probably would have left him. He was an energy suck. I had to spend all my time bolstering him up, you know.” She rested her arms on her knees and her chin on her arms. “I have a hard enough time bolstering myself. I don’t need to do it for two adults.”

I almost felt relief that I wasn’t competing with the dead love of her life. That made me go straight for the beer. What the fuck was I talking about? I wasn’t competing for her. I wasn’t trying to win her. I brought one for her too and sat down next to her. “Has anyone ever bolstered you? Ever?”

She frowned and took the beer that I had popped open for her. Cans, not bottles. Cops live on a budget.

“I don’t know. I have a neighbor who is nice to me. I have some friends that I consider genuine friends.”

“But who has your back?”

Something flickered in her eyes and she looked small and young and lonely. “I guess Chloe. I don’t know.”

Fuck, fuck, fuck and fuck. I took a massive swallow of my beer and set it down. “Come here.” I reached for her.

“What? What do you mean?”

“Come here.” I yanked her onto my lap.

“This is weird,” she said, holding herself stiffly away from me.

Her pert ass rested on my thighs and my rapidly stiffening cock. Her hair smelled like shampoo. I held her tightly when she tried to shift back off of me. “Stop wiggling.”

“Stop being weird. I don’t need you to feel sorry for me, Kane.”

“So you keep telling me.”

I was curious about something. I had been since she’d sent me that first text. “Why did you text me originally and ask to come over? What did you really want?”

Her amber eyes were trained on me. For a minute she didn’t say anything at all. Then she lifted her hand and she brushed it through my hair, down my cheek, and gently scratched through my chin stubble. It made me hard, even though I knew what she was going to say wasn’t going to be good.

“I wanted to use you. I was actually planning to use sex to have you fall for me so you would protect me and Asher from the drug dealer in New York I owe money to. I thought I would just sort of stay and not leave.”

And there it was. “I just thought you were going to rob me,” I told her honestly. “Steal my cell phone and whatever cash was in my wallet. You’re more ambitious than I realized.”

She gave a self-conscious laugh. “Yeah, I guess in the normal people world you don’t let a stranger just move in with you. Sometimes I forget to think like normal people.”

“Stealing from me probably did have a greater chance of success.” I flipped the tip of her hair up, down, up, down. She wasn’t any less fascinating to me than she’d been before. If anything, more so. “I don’t think I’m that impulsive, though you did get my pants down pretty damn quick. Props to you on that.”

We’d get to the whole drug dealer thing in a minute. First, I wanted to know if she was actually even remotely attracted to me or not. If the whole thing had been a ruse, I was going to be more than a little pissed off. And disappointed. Because if she wasn’t into me, there was no way I could fuck her again, and I really, really wanted to fuck her again.

She licked her lip. I gripped her waist tighter. “I have only been with two guys,” she said. “And I never really liked sex all that much.”

Pretty much anything she might have said would have been better than that. “You’re an amazing actress then because I was convinced you liked it. Holy shit. Two guys.” I hadn’t exactly given her number any thought but I’d figured she was street-smart and probably somewhere in the five to ten range. Like me. Though I might be more in the eleven-fourteen range.

Anya nodded.

“So the hair pulling and the lip biting wasn’t an erotic thing, it was that you actually probably hate me for having what you need and you wanted to ditch some aggression while making it look sexy.” The truth put a whole different spin on what to me had been hotter than hell when it was happening.