Everything in Between (20 page)

“I think that was meant for me.” Dawn chuckled. “Who was the last one, Chip? I don’t remember her name, but Gian called her Ramses.”

Chip looked at Gian.

“I think I need to get some ice for my broken shin,” Gian said. “Let me out, guys.”

Cory and Eve didn’t budge. While Eve didn’t have her sister’s overt mischievousness, she wasn’t above contributing to it. “I think her name was Ashley, but the guys called her Trojans.”

“Heather was my last girlfriend,” Chip said. “One of the Ashleys came before her.”

“Right,” Dawn said. “First there was Trojans, then came Ramses.”

“The Ashley before Trojans was Durex,” Cory volunteered.

The dim light of the club wasn’t enough to conceal the raging blush coloring Chip’s face. “What are you guys talking about?”

“There was one time last year when you were…” Cory cleared his throat. “Doing something in the private studio with one of your girlfriends.”

“He was mopping the mats,” Sionne chuckled.

“With his butt maybe,” Dawn added.

“You had a woman in my private studio?” Gian asked, horrified.

“We heard a snap of latex, and then…” Laughing, Cory couldn’t continue.

Zae placed her hands over CJ’s ears.

“She said she couldn’t stuff you into the Magnum,” Dawn finished. “So we started calling her Magnum Girl.”

“And that gradually got shortened to just Magnum,” Cory said. “Then there was the time I was looking for a time slip, and I saw the red, white and blue Kameleon condoms in your desk drawer. You were dating some girl named Yvonne then, so we started calling her Kameleon.”

“You have quite the love life, eh, Charles?” Dr. Dudley smirked. He patted Zae’s hand.

Zae and Chip both wanted to give Dr. Dudley a chop to his windpipe.

“I don’t know that I’d call it love, and I certainly never called any of my lady friends by the names of the condoms we used,” Chip said, an icy smile aimed at his friends.

“I’m sure you didn’t,” Zae muttered, “when you could remember their names at all.”

Chip stared at Zae. An uncomfortable silence developed, which was broken only by the reappearance of their perky waitress, who set their drinks before them. “Your appetizers will be up lickety-split,” she said. “Is there anything else I can do for you in the by and by?”

“I don’t know about everyone else, but I’m good,” Chip said. “Thanks.” He downed his whiskey in one gulp.

Dr. Dudley took Zae’s hand once more. “Would you be interested in joining me for a nightcap?” he asked her. “I think we should head out and let the young people finish their birthday celebration.”

Zae’s jaw hardened. “I’ve got to take CJ home,” she responded tersely.

“Cory and I can drive him home and stay with him until you get in,” Eve offered.

A clicking sound came from Zae’s jaw.

“It could be a late night,” Dr. Dudley said, his eyelids half-closed. His rubbery mouth pulled into what he probably thought was a seductive smile.

“I can give CJ a ride,” Chip offered. “I’m going in that direction, and I owe you one, for letting me use your washer and dryer.”

“Excellent!” Dr. Dudley said.

“Come on, CJ,” Chip said, standing. “I’ll let Del know that I’m cutting out.”

CJ yawned, struggling to keep his eyes open. “I’m not tired,” he insisted. “I’ve got plenty of balloon juice left.”

“Sure you do, kid.” Chip put an arm around CJ, who was so sleepy, he buried his face in Chip’s side and leaned on him for support. Chip reached past Zae and Dr. Dudley for CJ’s clarinet case. “Sionne, enjoy the rest of your birthday.” He met Zae’s gaze. “I’ll wait for you at home. Have a good night.”

Everyone said their goodbyes. Zae stared after Chip and her son.
I’ll wait for you at home….

Her heart seemed to swell and contract at once. Home. Her house never felt more like home than when she was there with CJ and Chip. With each step he took toward the exit, Zae wanted to rush after him, to beg him to take her with him.

So many times she’d wondered if what she felt for Chip was real. Was it even possible? So many elements of their relationship were in place, but there were other unknown variables. They loved each other, but was it merely the sort of love reserved for good friends? They were compatible sexually, both adventurous, imaginative and in the best shape of their lives.

But did Chip love her? He’d never specified in the way that turns a friendly “I love you” into the meatier, deeper, I’ve-found-my-rib “I love you.”

He hadn’t even tried to stop her from accepting a nightcap from Dr. Dudley—although, in truth, she knew that had he tried to stop her, she would have stubbornly clung to Dr. Dudley as if he were the best thing since mail-order sex toys.

Chip behaved as if seeing the woman he supposedly loved holding hands with another man didn’t trouble him in the least. Not that it should. They hadn’t spent an intimate moment together since the night he’d given her the Nestea plunge in the whirlpool at the gym.

A night table drawer full of half the
Eve the Goddess
fall collection had helped her while away her more intense recollections of time spent with Chip, but the real thing hadn’t once approached her, despite his flirting.

And she hadn’t made a pass at him either. She’d wanted to and would have if her job meant only a fraction less to her than it did. Even though she strongly suspected Chip would have been worth it, she had resisted all attempts to seduce him on campus.

Zae’s heart sunk in on itself as Dr. Dudley squeezed her knee under the table. Chip didn’t care if she dated. It was obvious now. He loved her…but only as a friend.

“CJ fell asleep on the sofa in the basement,” Chip said when Zae came in close to two. “He was playing on his Xbox. I covered him and turned everything off, except for the light over the bar. I didn’t want him to trip over something if he woke up in the middle of the night.”

“Thank you,” Zae replied. She followed him into the foyer. “I want to talk to you.”

“Can it wait?”

His curt response took her aback. “No.” As tired as she was, she straightened her spine and gave him the haughtiest angle of her chin. “I’ve waited all day to talk to you about your transfer to Washington University.”

Chip’s shoulders sank. He slowly turned to face her, his denim jacket dangling from one hand.

“Why on earth are you transferring, at the last minute, to Washington University?” Zae crossed her arms over her chest. “Missouri University is one of the best liberal arts colleges in the Midwest.”

“I’m tired, Zae,” Chip sighed. “This can wait.”

“We have some of the finest instructors in the academic world in our science and literature departments,” Zae continued. “We’re smaller than most schools, which allows students to customize their degree programs.”

“God almighty, you’re so damn stubborn!”

“What reason could you possibly have for wanting to go to Washington University?” She threw up her arms. Her voice rose with each question she threw at him, confident that nothing short of a furnace explosion could awaken her slumbering son. “Do you think it’s more prestigious? Does it offer a program MU doesn’t? Why are you going there?”

“Because you aren’t there!” Chip shouted, his heated breath in her face. “Even as I signed up for the summer semester, I knew I shouldn’t have been going to MU. The temptation was too great.” He paced the tight confines of the foyer, like a tiger in a cage too small. “I never want to do anything that jeopardizes your career, but at the same time, I couldn’t stay away from you.”

Staring at her feet, Zae used the nail of her right thumb to pick at the cuticle of her left. “We haven’t done anything wrong.”

“We didn’t have to. We got called to the dean’s office on pure suspicion.” He took her upper arms, giving them a meaningful squeeze. “I can’t look at you as if you’re just another person. I can’t hide what I feel for you. I won’t try.”

She gently shrugged from his grasp. “You’ve got a funny way of showing you care that much for me.”

“You don’t make it easy and you know it.”

“There’s not a damn thing easy about loving someone,” she said softly. “Hallmark cards and romance novels make it seem like a sure thing. They make you believe in happily-ever-afters.” She raised her head. Tears bleared her vision. “But there are no guarantees. Anything can happen. Your happy could be snatched right from under you, leaving you all alone in your ever after.”

Chip abruptly cupped her face, his long fingers diving into her hair. “Isn’t the risk worth it?”

“Colin’s death…” Her words snagged on the hard lump of sorrow wedged in her throat. “It broke my heart.” The admission pained her not only because of its content, but also because it had always been so hard for her to show any sort of weakness. She covered Chip’s hand with her own.

Chip wanted to sympathize with her, to ease her pain. But his own was too great. “Hearts don’t break, Zae.” He searched her dark eyes, willing her to accept his point of view. “They shrink and expand, but they don’t break. I didn’t know Colin very well, but I spent enough time with him to know that he’d be thrilled with the way you’ve turned his death into an excuse to avoid taking a chance with someone else,” he said with bitter sarcasm. “I think he’d just love the way you close yourself off to any chance at happiness. He was a kind, generous and smart fella. Tell me, Zae, would he have even married you if he knew that you’d crawl into the crypt with him when he died?”

Zae slapped him. Her hand went numb after the initial shock of pain. Her palm print bloomed in red relief on Chip’s cheek.

Chip grit his jaw but showed no other outward sign of pain. “The truth hurts, doesn’t it?”

Zae drew back her hand to slap him again, but Chip caught her wrist before she could make contact. She tried to punch him with her free hand, but Chip was the one who’d taught her everything she knew about fighting. He easily blocked her blows and tripped her onto her back. He straddled her, pinning her to the plush sand-colored carpet of the foyer.

Tears of frustration and anger flooded Zae’s eyes. “How dare you speak to me like that?” she cried. “You, with your string of floozies! You have no idea what it’s like to love someone so much that every day, you wake up wishing that the past eight years were only a horrible dream! You don’t know what it’s like to hear someone breathe your name in his sleep! And even though I want to kill you right now, I hope you never know what it feels like to lose the one person who understood you, and was there for you no matter what, and who made you feel as though you were a treasure!”

Chip grimaced. With each flex of her torso, each tear, each breath she took, he shared her pain. He freed her wrists to hunker over her, smoothing loose tendrils of her hair from her face. “I know what it’s like to love someone who’ll never let herself love me. Is my torment any less than yours? The difference is that the person you love didn’t leave you hurting on purpose.” He climbed off her and wearily sat with his back to the wall.

Her arms wide, Zae drew her knees up. Quietly weeping, she wanted to curse at him, to kick him so hard her footprint would become a permanent part of his anatomy. The only thing she hated more than being wrong was someone else being right.

“I didn’t know you played,” she finally said, wiping her eyes.

“I didn’t know you sang.”

“I guess we don’t know each other as well as we thought.”

“I know
you
, Zae. We’ve been filling in the details as we go.”

“The devil is in the details.” She chuckled sadly. “At least, that’s what they say.”

She sat upright, elegantly tucking her legs beneath her. Her snood hung from the pearl brooch still clipped to her hair, so she removed it completely. Chip held out his hand. Zae placed the snood in it. Rolling his eyes, Chip chucked it onto the key table against the wall. He took Zae’s hand and pulled her to him, nestling her into his side with one hand on her hip. She rested her head on his shoulder, her right hand on his chest.

“I’m not sorry I slapped you,” she said.

He pressed his lips to the top of her head. “I know.”

“You shouldn’t have said what you did about Colin.”

“I know.”

“Even though I know you’re right.” She cursed under her breath at the fresh tears welling in her eyes. “We talked about it before he died.
He
talked about it. He didn’t want me to be alone.”

“So why are you?”

“I hadn’t met anyone I could stand well enough to make a part of my life.” She wiped her nose on the cuff of her sleeve. “Most men are extremely annoying.”

“So are most women. The ones worth waiting for, at any rate.” He nuzzled her neck, inhaling the scent of her hair and skin. “You didn’t go back to his hotel.”

“How do you know?” she challenged him.

He laced his fingers through hers, holding tight of her hand. “You were at Cinder and Gian’s.”

“Did you call around checking up on me?”

“I wouldn’t dare. Cinder makes those little bowls of leaves and twigs for her guest bathroom. You smell like them.”