Friends Without Benefits (Knitting in the City) (29 page)

Blue bean being, of course, the female equivalent of blue balls.

My lashes fluttered open, and I was thankful to have the solid weight of the door behind me. If I’d been left adrift in the middle of the room I might have fallen over or crumpled into an embarrassing puddle of arousal on the floor.

“
. . . Nico?” I flinched at how small and unsure my voice sounded. I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from saying anything further; not until I had a plan, and not until that plan involved
not
hot monkey sex.

He didn’t turn, didn’t look at me. He stood in profile, his hands on his hips. He also seemed to be breathing with some difficulty. He swallowed then cleared his throat. “You should—”
He cleared his throat again, this time louder; “You should get ready. The reservation is for seven-thirty.”

I held my breath, waited for him to say something else. When he said nothing I felt my eye twitch. “What?”

“I’m sorry about— I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done that. It wasn’t very . . . friendly of me.”

I stared at him, at his
exasperatingly beautiful face. It took a full ten seconds for his words to sink in. When they did I felt like I was being torn into several small pieces.

“I don’t want to be friends anymore.”

He glanced at me over his shoulder, his eyebrow lifting along with a corner of his mouth. “Being friends isn’t optional.” He stalked back to me, his steps full of swagger, his eyes full of blazing machismo. “We can be friends and something else.” He lifted his hand to my temple and tucked a loosened strand of hair behind my ear. “But we’re always going to be friends.”

I smacked his hand away. “No. We’re not. We’re not friends anymore. I don’t want to see you again.”

“Why?”

I lifted my chin. “Because I’m tired of your games.”

He had the audacity to look pleased with himself. “Games? What games?”

“That. R
ight there. What just happened a second ago. And the pornographic shirtless apple-fritters scene last Sunday and the ‘friend kiss’ and the straddling last night. You’re playing with me and I don’t like it.”

“I’m not playing with you.”

“Yes. You are. You know that I want you . . .” I swallowed the end of my sentence, suddenly out of breath. His eyes flashed at my words, and he shifted forward. I placed a hand on his chest to keep him from coming any closer, having already admitted too much. “You know how much I want you and you’re trying to use it against me, you’re teasing me with it, pushing me, trying to cloud my judgment.”

“If you want me then take me.”
The words were impatient, sounded like an order.

“It’s not that simple. I don’t want to hurt you.”

“You won’t.” Nico’s eyes tangled with mine, ensnared me.

“I
will.” I wasn’t so certain anymore.

“It’s too late. You already have me.”

I started to shiver. “I don’t.”

“You do.”

“You’re not being fair.”

Nico flinched and pain flickered within his green eyes. He struck the wall next to my head, causing me to ju
mp. “I don’t want to be fair! I’m not interested in being nice! You’re right. I’m playing games with you and I’m playing dirty because I want you, I
need
you, to be with you, to hear your voice, your laugh, to hold you, to touch you . . .”

I held back a sob
, and he pressed closer, making my hand against his chest irrelevant. “I can’t love you back.”

“That’s a lie
.”

I shook my head,
closed my eyes. “It’s not. I can’t, I won’t do it.”

We stood like that—my hand separating us, feeling the rise and fall of his chest,
the beating of his heart—for an excruciating moment. Then he covered my hand with his. I opened my eyes in time to see him bring it to his lips, kiss it, then step away.

I lifted my eyes
, and he caught them at once. Instead of the anger or recrimination I was expecting, I found only steady determination.

Nico tugged at the lapels of his jacked and smoothed his hand down his tie. “Are you coming to dinner?”

I shook my head. “No.”

“Ok
ay, then.” He nodded, placed a severe smile on his lips. He winked. “Game on.”

When cornered, I have a tendency to react much like any other hot
-blooded control freak—I do something stupid. In this particular case, I waited two days before doing something stupid. Nevertheless, it was decidedly stupid; so stupid in fact that, while I was getting ready for the stupid not-date, I kept thinking to myself:
Self, this is the most stupidest thing that anyone has ever done in the history of forever.

Regardless, there I was, sitting in front of my mirror,
going through the motions of getting ready for my not-date with Dr. Ken Miles. My stomach hurt; I had a headache; my body was revolting; my heart felt sick. And yet, I applied a liberal amount of blue mascara.

I was wearing cotton underwear and a sports bra—basically the equivalent of a boob chastity belt—and settled on a pair of black, wide
-legged pants. Sandra told me once that they made me look extremely short and suggested I never wear them. But, tonight, I wore them. And under the pants I wore leggings . . .because it was cold outside. My shirt had both buttons and ties, and I added two sweaters on top, both with buttons and ties. My shoes were unsexy, laced flats which took forever to get in and out of.

I gave myself a once over in the mirror. Yep. That was me. And I
looked just about ready to go. It would only take me one hour to get out of this outfit when sexy time arrived.

Thinking about sexy time with
Dr. Ken Miles made my stomach roll.

This was a mistake.

But, in all honesty, I felt driven to it. Since mine and Nico’s fight on Tuesday—because it was most definitely a fight—he’d been relentless. The last two mornings he paraded around penthouse in his boxer briefs, brushing against me, teasing me, touching me.

When the appointments were at the hospital he would stare at me with h
is hot, smoldering Italian eyes. His charisma and magnetism detonated all over everyone and in all directions; he made women on the periphery swoon with his bedroom voice and suggestive smile. I wanted to both choke him to death and kiss him senseless.

He
refused to give me a moment’s peace.

And I missed our phone calls. I missed
talking
to him. The few days he’d been in New York we talked every day, usually more than once a day. Since he’d returned we’d barely spoken. When we did speak he was on a constant seduce-offensive; therefore, I was perpetually defensive as I endeavored to deflect his advances.

But h
e was wearing me down. I felt it in my bones. I was losing the will to do the right thing because I wasn’t sure it was the right thing anymore. I wasn’t sure who I was protecting. I thought I was protecting him from big, bad Elizabeth Finney and her unreachable heart. But, with each passing minute I wondered if Rose had been right—was I just trying to protect myself?

Which brought me to now and my
horrible, horrible mistake.

And yet, when Dr. Ken Miles arrived I opened, exited, then locked the door. I walked to the elevator. I pressed the button for the elevator.

Then, Dr. Ken Miles spoke. “You look so beautiful, Elizabeth.”

I glanced at
Dr. Ken Miles from the corner of my eye. He was leering. I sighed. “Thanks. You also look very pretty.”

He smiled, laughed lightly. “I’m really, really looking forward to tonight.”

I might have thrown up a little in my mouth.
What am I doing?

He continued, leaning close, invading my space. “And I bought some flavored condoms for us
, for later . . .”

That was the moment it happened. That was the moment I knew with absolute certainty that I coul
dn’t go through with it. I shuddered in revulsion—not at the flavored condoms because, with Nico, that sounded like fun—but at the idea of getting close enough to Dr. Ken Miles to see his wang in a condom.

His pasty, white wang. Gross.

In fact, penises in general grossed me out in that moment; but one penis in particular continued to hold my interest. And, by interest, I meant flaming, hot, mad lust. I wanted to find Nico. I wanted to find him and maul him and attack his penis. I wanted to kiss him and touch him, but he still terrified me.

I knew what I wanted
, but I wasn’t certain if wanting Nico was enough. I’d wanted him in the past, allowed him to invade my heart, and I left him. I hurt him. Neither of us had quite recovered.

Regardless, whatever I ultimately decided
, I first needed to extract myself from this horrible situation and send Dr. Ken Miles—and his wang—far, far away.

“
Oh god.” I drew in a long breath then sighed. “I can’t do this, Dr. Ken Miles.”

“Uh, what?”

I shook my head then met his confused stare. “I can’t do this.”

“Is this about dinner?”

The elevator dinged, marking its arrival.

“No, but I can’t do that either. The thing is, I don’t want to have sex with you.”

He blinked at me, his pretty pale-blue eyes—vapid in their near colorlessness—didn’t heat nor cool and they certainly did not twinkle. “Uhh . . .” His mouth fell open, a disbelieving sound rushing forth. He shifted a step closer, and I stood my ground, lifting my chin to maintain eye contact so he could read the seriousness of my expression.

However, before Dr. Ken Miles could speak, the elevator doors opened and revealed a man. And that man was Nico
Manganiello. And I wanted to die, right there, in my cotton underwear and uniboob bra.

His eyes moved between me and
Dr. Ken Miles then back again. His expression morphing from slightly confused, to stunned understanding, to drawing all the wrong conclusions in the span of three seconds.

The hurt in his glare splintered me into a thousand pieces
, and I knew the precise moment that his heart split in two; I felt it because mine started to bleed in unison. I opened my mouth, but movement to my right distracted me, made me glance at Dr. Ken Miles, and I saw him staring at Nico, my Nico, with a smirk. He placed his arm around my shoulders.

I immediately recoiled
, but the doors to the elevator were closing, and Nico was still looking at Dr. Ken Miles’s smirky face.

“No!”
My single word was an involuntary whisper.

Nico’s eyes
flickered to mine, and, without really thinking about it, I launched myself into the elevator just as the doors closed. I was in the elevator, with Nico, and one of my pant legs was caught in the door.

He
sequestered himself to the corner of the large lift, effectively out of my tethered reach, and gave me his shoulder. His eyes were closed, his head rested against the red velvet wall, and he was laughing. It was a maniacal, unbalanced kind of laugh. I held my hands up and tried to reach him, to touch him.

“Nico, listen. Just listen to me for a minute.”

He still wouldn’t look at me. “You already told me. At least you tried to, but I wouldn’t listen.”

“
Listen to me now.”

“Ah, god, what’s the point?” He thumped his head once against the side of the lift, still not meeting my eyes.

“Nico, just—”

“How long have you been with
him?”

“It’s not like that.”

“Never mind, I don’t want to know. I don’t want to know. Just, I need to get off this elevator.” Nico reached for the buttons on the panel, but I beat him to his goal, pressed the Alarm button and stopped the car.

A shrill ring pierced the small space
, and we both covered our ears. As abruptly as the screeching started it stopped, plunging the small car into a fierce kind of silence, made more complete by the absence of the alarm. Nico charged forward again, presumably to start the elevator once more, but I blocked his path with half my body.

He recoiled backward, as though dreading any contact with me, as though disgusted by it.

“Will you listen to me? Please?” I was yelling, mostly because I was panicked by his inability to meet my gaze.

“How long have you two been together?” His shout matched mine in volume and vehemence.

“We haven’t—”

“Then it’s a recent thing
? You
like
him?”

“It’s not like that! Not with him.”

“So, explain it to me!” His eyes finally met mine and nearly knocked the wind from my lungs.

“He doesn’t
 . . . He doesn’t care about me. Not like, not—”

“Just say it, Elizabeth!”

“Fine. Not like you do.”

His mouth opened, his eyes flaming with something between disbelief and outrage
, but his voice was eerily quiet. “I don’t just care about you. I’m in love with you.”

“I know that!” I hollered in response, my hands balling into fists. I didn’t know why I was so angry. Nico’s anger made sense. Mine did not. But I couldn’t help it. I was angry and, damnit, I wanted to yell at him.

“So . . .?” His eyes widened mockingly.

“So
 . . . That’s why!”

“
Let me get this straight.” Nico gestured to the elevator doors behind me, where Dr. Ken Miles had been abandoned. “He doesn’t care about you.” He pointed to his chest with both hands; “I’m in love with you.” I flinched at his words and the intensity, rawness in his voice. “He gets to sleep with you and I don’t. Did I get all that right?”

I swallowed
the building thickness in my throat and shook my head, but said nothing. My warring emotions rendered me mute.

I was an idiot. I was an idiotic nitwit. I’d convinced
a small part of myself that the stirring or feelings or whatever mojo voodoo was going on with Nico would magically become irrelevant if only I could get myself laid. It was a shred, a hope, a flicker that I wasn’t, in fact, already in love with Nico.

It was a lie.

I was in love with him.

All attempts at avoiding
the truth were too late.

In retrospect,
even though I put the brakes on the not-date early, actually stepping outside my door with Dr. Ken Miles was probably the dumbest thing I’d ever done.

But
Nico was making me crazy. He was playing mind games. I couldn’t stop thinking about him. It was driving me to distraction. Now, standing in the small elevator, literally and figuratively unable to reach him, engaging in a yelling match, everything felt strangely clear.  

“Well?”
His single word carried more rage than I thought possible; I jumped, flinched, startled.

I unclenched my fists and flexed my fingers. I was surprised to find that my breathing had become labored, heavy.

He turned away, lifted his hands up—palms out—and shook his head; “I’m done. Do whatever. I don’t care.”

“Hey!
” I finally found my voice. “You’re the one who wanted to be friends! You’re the one—turn around—” I pulled my leg from the door and ripped the bottom half of my pants. Finally able to close the distance between us, I pushed at him; it was just with my fingertips, but I immediately regretted it.

He abruptly spun, backed me up against the wall of the
lift. I almost tripped over my laced flats.

“You know what I felt at Garrett’s funeral? I felt relief.” He kept his tone light and conversational despite the weight of the words, despite his aggressive body language.

“Nico . . .” His words sliced at me; I gripped the wall at my back. “No you didn’t.”

He ignored me and continued as though I hadn’t spoken. “I felt relief
—for Garrett—because he wasn’t in pain any more. I saw it every day of that year, but he hid it from you. He thought it would make things easier.” Nico chewed on his bottom lip, studying me. “You were in denial the whole time. At his funeral you looked so shocked, like you couldn’t believe he was dead.”

“You’re right.”

“About which part?” His gaze was belligerent, almost feral.

“I was shocked. I didn’t expect
—” I took a deep breath; “I wasn’t expecting it.”

Nico nodded twice; “I grieved for Garrett the year before he died.” He focused his gaze on the
red velvet behind me. “I said goodbye to him a month before the funeral. And the hardest thing for me after,” Nico paused then met my gaze, his voice softening. His eyes lost focus even as they moved over my face. It was as though he was seeing a memory of me then, rather than seeing me now. He looked at me like he’d done under the bleachers at the reunion; “The hardest part was watching you trying to deal with it.”

I opened my mouth to respond
, but didn’t know what to say.

He was still scrutinizing me
, though his expression gave away nothing tangible of his own feelings; “The irony is, I could have saved myself a world of hurt if I’d just walked away from you after the funeral, like you did to me at the end of the summer.”

I flinched
, and my mouth snapped shut.