I Love My Secret (Nicole's Erotic Romance) (7 page)

Amber tells her, as if it’s the most obvious
answer in the world, “Because you love to tease.”

I jump in, too. “Oh please, Jessica. You love and
I mean looooooove to lay out bait for us to eat, without giving us the promised
meal. It’s part of who you are.”

“She speaks the truth.” Amber shoots her a look
that says that arguing would be a stupid move.
 

Jess looks from Amber to me and says, “Meh. You
guys have me all wrong.”

I roll my eyes. “You keep telling yourself that.”

Amber waves a hand of impatience. “Back to you
Nico. News at ten; are you sleeping with your loft-mate?”

Jess may be good at teasing, but I’m better at
evading. “Why do you ask?”

Amber opens her mouth. “Because…” is the only
world she gets out. Something over my shoulder takes her breath away. I heard
it – a little gasp escaping from her lips. Jess, because she’s standing
next to Amber, follows her gaze with raised eyebrows, but I have to turn to
look. When I do, I see a handsome guy with dark brown hair that falls over his
forehead, and green eyes intently locked on my girl Amber. All three of us stare
at him as he stops and asks only her, “Who are you?” …as if Jess and I do not
exist.

“I’m Amber,” she says, breathlessly. The way these
two are looking at each other, sparks flying, chemistry palpable, I feel like
I’m intruding… but I can’t help but watch whatever the hell this is.

He says, “No, you’re the color of the ocean. Blue
and gold and breathtaking.” I shoot a look to Jessica but her eyes have gone
misty. The dude holds his hand out, introduces himself to Amber as Josh and
asks if he can
talk to her a second
.

“Umm… sure,” she answers, shoots us both a look
that says,
remember when I said my guy
would say that??!!
Jess smacks me, and I realize now that my mouth has
fallen open. I shut it fast. The Josh guy nods to us, then leads her away to a
corner of the room as we watch, shocked as hell.

I grab onto Jess’s arm. “What just happened?” Jess
asks.

“I think Amber just met her soul mate,” I answer.

“Shut the front door. Did that really just happen?”
Jessica asks, turning to look at me. I’ve still got her arm like we’re about to
do a square dance or something.

I suck on my teeth for a thoughtful moment. “I
think so, honey. You know me… I have a sixth sense about these things.”

“You do… that’s true.” Jess says, looking off in
the direction they went.

“Plus he said that thing.”

“He did! I want that.”

I turn to the bar and say, “I’m empty. You want
another?”

Jessica looks to her Chopin vodka, rocks, and lime
– still half full – and raises it to her lips to finish it off. She
makes an
ahh
noise, and raises her
eyebrows. “Yeah.”

I laugh and motion to the male bartender –
mid-thirties, hip tattoos, no smile, his black sleeves rolled up for work
– and he throws me a busy nod.

“David’s not it then, huh?”

Jess frowns and focuses on an invisible something
on the tile floor. “Maybe? I don’t know. We’re really happy. I’m just not sure.
I think I’ll know when I know, right?”

“That’s what they say. I wouldn’t know.” I adjust
my weight to accommodate the ache these heels are giving me. I shouldn’t have
worn new shoes tonight. But I needed a pick-me-up, and they went the best with
the 70’s style black jumpsuit I’m working. Lot of good they did me, these
heels. Now I just feel tired and overdressed. Which is crazy, because
overdressed in Manhattan? Please. But tired, I understand. It’s the way I feel
most days, lately. What’s wrong with me?

“Well, if they’re right, then I don’t know.”

“I don’t know Jess, I think when you meet him,
it’s pretty clear. Maybe not at first, but after awhile, it should be.”

“Yeah,” she says, thinking about something. The
bartender gives me our drinks. As I hand her hers, she gets really serious. Uh
oh. “Nicole?”

I brace myself. “Yeah?”

She pauses, reticent, then looks me directly in
the eyes to where I cannot escape. “Do you think Michael is the one? Is that
why you never talk about him… why we haven’t met him?”

I laugh and frown at her, like she just said the
craziest thing in the world. “What? No! Now why would I hide a guy from you? I
told you guys already. He’s just a guy I share a loft with. He’s giving me a
rate I can’t refuse and I’m never there when he is.” Even I can hear how fast I
said all that. I never talk fast.

Jess notices, but doesn’t pry. If she were Amber,
she’d ask more questions, but Jess looks at me like she knows more than I’m
telling and she’ll let me tell it when I’m ready. We break eye contact and look
around the place, not sure where to take the conversation. Ah hell, I have to
talk to someone about it. Why haven’t I confided in my girlfriends, yet? I
should talk to her about him, tell her he makes my soul hot – that
there’s something about us that feels like I’ve known him in a past life or
something and we’re working out problems for that one, too, and not just this
one. That it’s bigger than I can handle.

I touch her arm and she looks at me. But then I
see Josh and Amber returning and my chance is gone. I motion for Jessica to
turn around and look.

Josh does some really cute stuff that lets us know
that while he is absconding with our girl, she’s in safe hands. He wins both
Jess and I over instantly, and when they leave together, we stare after them.
Jess catches my face.

“You okay?” her eyes search mine, worried. I must
be wearing my feelings on my sleeve. That’s not like me at all. Is it?

 
“Yeah.
Totally. I’m just really happy for her.”

“Hey. Look at me,” Jess says, and I can see she
didn’t buy my casual brushoff for an instant. “You’re going to find him,
Nicole. You will. You’re too amazing a girl not to be snatched up.”

The second I hear her say that, a thought slithers
from the recesses of my mind… s
he doesn’t
know you’re broken
. I order it to shut the fuck up. But it’s too late. You
can’t un-hear what you hear.

I reach out and squeeze her hand. “Thank you. You,
too. David or no David. Your man is coming.”

“Now, let’s get wasted. What do you say?”

I whoop, “I’m all aboard
that
boat!” We clink glasses and I take a sip to wash away whatever
it is I’m freaked out about, and happy for the distraction. How she can turn
sadness into laughter is beyond me. I love her for it. It’s a gift. Maybe she’s
right. I’ll find him. Maybe I already have.

And if I haven’t…what’s the rush? I’m young… ish.

3:33 A.M.

After we ate and had more drinks, talking about
everything but love – to save our sanity – I said goodbye to Jess. Now
I’m on the wrong train to my house. Not because I’m a little inebriated, which
I am. I took the wrong train, because I’m not going to my house. When I walk
off it, and turn the familiar right onto Little West 12
^th
I tell
myself I’m just taking a walk. I might stop in. I mean, I forgot my scarf there
the other day, didn’t I? Yes. It is cold out, yes? Yes.

Few people are on the street, and they travel in packs,
intoxicated more often than not, at this hour. I’m keeping my eyes focused
ahead, but I see I’ve got unwanted company coming. Walking toward me are three
guys in their early twenties; Italian, stocky… trouble.

The shortest one with the most muscles and the
most to prove, locks his eyes on me and calls out from twenty steps up, “Where
you going, long legs? Can we come?”

I don’t answer.

“Hey, I asked you a question. Cat got your
tongue?” he snickers, more loudly, closer now. The other two stare, slowing
their pace.

I keep my eyes forward, never meeting theirs, my
pace steady and deliberate. Leave me alone. Leave me alone. Leave me alone.

They stop.

The leader watches me walk by and says, “Why don’t
you come party with us?” He reaches for my arm. His fingers begin to wrap
around my skin. I snatch my arm away, throwing him off balance, and flip around
to face them all.

“HEY! Don’t fucking touch me!”

The rage I feel for all the women before me who’ve
been bullied by men over the centuries, flares up and boils. My harassers back
a step away, surprised at the look on my face. Pure unadulterated rage.

I stare down the little one, the leader. “What the
fuck is wrong with you that you would touch a woman who’s walking by herself alone
at night? Do you not know what we women have to go through? How when we walk
down a street, we’re aware how we might be in danger just by
being there
? That when we go into a
parking lot, we practically run to our cars in case someone is there
to attack us
. And here I am, walking
home and you think you’re being funny ganging up on me, because there’s
three of you
? Hear me good and hear me
now, don’t you
ever
treat a woman the
way you just treated me, again. I guarantee that if you were
just
you
,”
I point to the instigator, the three of them silent. “There is no way –
NO WAY – you would have pulled that shit you just pulled with me. So, why
don’t you try a new way of impressing your friends by being a gentleman,
respecting
what we women have gone
through, what your mother has
given you
,
and next time, do what you can
to protect
us,
for God’s sake.”

“Shit. I was just asking you to…” he says
nervously, chuckling and looking at his buddies in a way that’s supposed to
make me feel like I’m crazy. But it isn’t working.

“Hush. I know what you were doing. Now leave me
alone and keep walking. Hear?”

“Yeah,” the little one says, and walks off first,
in a huff of macho bravado. It seems he’s the only one with a voice. But the
taller one, still a bit shorter than me in heels, looks at me like he’s sorry.
The third is the shyest, and he just looks mortified by the whole thing. At
least
they
heard me. Maybe they’ll
handle things differently next time.

I wait until they’re on their way, to start
walking. A girl across the street stopped to watch. She meets my eyes as I
turn. She nods at me; a nod of understanding and sisterhood. We don’t smile.
This is no smiling matter. My heart rate is pounding and my adrenaline is still
engaged. She and I walk our separate ways, but we just bonded in the way that
all women are bonded… it’s just something we often forget. I look forward to a
time when we lift each other up more than we bring each other down.

As I make my way up the pavement another block and
a half, I hold my arms around myself. Looking up, flickering candlelight lets
me know he’s in there, painting. I pull out my keys and bring them to the lock,
but I hesitate. My hand is shaking a little from the run-in. I think it’s from
the run-in. I look up again, see the glow drifting out above me from the paned
glass. Dropping my hand, I step away from the door, walk to the other side of
the street; see if I can see him from there. For awhile, I see only the
ceiling, the walls, nothing more. I lean against a lamppost and relax. Michael,
why do you have this pull on me? I’ve never met another man who makes me feel
as alive as you do.

I see him come into view now.
Walk closer to the window
. Like he hears me, he walks to it, a
coffee mug in his hand, his loosely hung t-shirt resting on his broad
shoulders, a long smear of paint on it from where he wiped his hand. He looks
out the window at his eye level, at nothing in particular, thinking about
something. I should get out of the street, move out of view, but I can’t tear
myself away.
What are you thinking about,
Michael, as you take that slow sip of coffee and frown like the world’s
problems are only yours to solve?
He runs one hand through his hair and
shakes it out, then walks away from the window and out of my sight.

I let out a breath and realize... I was holding it.

“He’s very handsome,” a voice says, next to me,
her sound aged and thick with a Romanian accent.

I shoot the old gypsy woman a look and focus back
on the window.

“Have a dollar?” she rasps.

I sigh. “Sure. Yeah.” I have a few for her. That’s
what my mother would do, and it is her money after all.

She takes them with glee and asks, “You want I
read your fortune?” Then she smiles, surprisingly still in possession of all of
her yellowed teeth.

I smile back and push myself off the light pole.
“No, thank you.”

She smiles wider, her eyebrows high enough to look
silly. “I can tell you what will happen between you and the man?”

I freeze. Oooo those gypsies are good. I look back
at her and consider it but. But I know in my heart that she can’t help me. “Thanks,
but I think I already know. You have a good night.” I walk back to the subway,
casting one furtive glance up to the window before I leave.

At Marlena’s Party