Spiralling Skywards: Falling (Contradictions #1) (5 page)

“You giving me relationship advice, Sarah Sunshine?”

“For what it’s worth, yes I am.”

“Well, thanks for that but I’ve got this covered. Do me a favour though, yeah?”

“What’s that?” I asked him with a smile.

“Stay the fuck away from Liam Delaney. He’s too old and too complicated for you.”

“Don’t even go there, not after what you’ve just told me. I’m a big girl, I can look after myself.” I kissed his cheek and turned towards where I knew Liam was waiting for me. “And put some fucking clothes on. That top . . . it’s not even a top, it’s fucking underwear.”

I flipped him my middle finger, and feeling like a total bad arse because of it, I kept walking.

***

“Thank you,” I said with a smile when Liam handed me my drink.

“You’re welcome. You looked good out there, you and your brother. I didn’t realise Luke could dance. He’s kept that quiet.”

“He had no choice when we were growing up. I loved to dance, and if I needed a partner, he was it. Will sometimes too. He’s not bad either.”

“He likes you.”

“My brother? I should hope so, he practically raised me.” What a strange comment. The smile left his face as he shook his head.

“Will. Will likes you. I’ve been watching him, his eyes have been on you most of the night, especially while we were dancing. He’s actually watching us right now.”

I felt my cheeks burn, his observation making me feel uncomfortable.

“Will’s just being protective. He’s known me since I was three or four, he’s like a big brother.”

He nodded his head but didn’t look convinced. I looked around the room, not sure what else to say, and spotted Sasha with my brother. He had his arm thrown around her shoulder, and they were listening to something his friend Callum was telling them. Will was just to the side of them, leaning against the bar with his eyes on me. I swallowed but tried not to let the surprise I felt show on my face. Why the fuck was Will watching
me
?

He raised his glass and smiled, and I returned the gesture, feeling a little too warm and slightly uncomfortable.

“So, Sarah Carter, when you gonna let me take you out?” Liam asked from beside me.

My eyes met his. I was no longer just a little warm, I was burning up, about to ignite and combust in fact.

“I don’t recall you asking to take me out, Liam Delaney.”

“Well then let me rectify that. I’d really like to take you out for dinner or just for a drink if that’s what you’d prefer, and I’d really like it to be soon.”

“How soon?”

“Tomorrow night soon.”

It didn’t matter how soon. I was all over that shit. If he’d had asked me to go right at that very moment to the all night burger and kebab van on the roundabout by the motorway exit, I would’ve said yes. I would’ve said yes to just about anything he asked. I was drunk and so fucking high on him and the fact that he was paying me attention and wanted to spend time with me that I could almost touch the sky. Almost, but not quite.

The main problem with being so high was that it hurt so much more when you fell. It was even more painful to be dropped.

Excruciating in fact.

“Get up and
make me a coffee pleeeeeeaaaaaase,” Sasha begged from somewhere beside me.

“Why are you in my bed again, please enlighten me?”

“No clue, I think we made tea and toast and then we were talking and must’ve just fallen asleep in here.”

“Ahh yeah. I vaguely remember. See this is the reason I don’t drink. I bet we had a really great night last night, but I remember very little after my brother blew out his cake.”

“Candles.”

“What?” I wanted to open my eyes and give Sasha my best what-the-fuck-are–you-talking-about look, but my head hurt too much.

“He blew out his candles, not his cake. You said ‘cake’.”

“Again, another reason I don’t drink, it makes me stupid.”

“Meeehhh, don’t think that can be blamed entirely on alcohol.”

I bent my knee and kicked backwards like a donkey until the flat of my foot made contact with my friend’s arse.

“Oofff! What the fuck was that for? Keep on, and I won’t remind you that you need to get up soon and start getting ready for your big date tonight.”

My eyes flew open. I sat up and the room swayed. I closed my eyes and laid back down, all the while my stomach churned.

“Holy shit. Liam Delaney. How did I forget about him?”

“My point exactly when it comes to you blaming alcohol on your stupidity.”

“Do you wanna walk across the landing and go back to your own cold bed?”

“Do you want wardrobe advice and your hair curled later.”

Yes, indeed I did. I remained silent and hoped that the bed, the room, and our house, would all stop moving.

“Exactly.”

Neither of us spoke for a few minutes.

“Fuck my head hurts,” Sasha finally whispered.

“Hm hm,” was all I had.

“Fuck, you’ve got a date with a smoking hot Aussie tonight.”

My insides and my toes all curled at once. I did, I really did have a date with a smoking hot Aussie tonight.

“Will you shut up? I already feel sick.”

“Noted.”

“I really need coffee. What time is it?”

“No clue. Not sure what was in my gin, or those tequila shots, or that champagne last night, but I think it’s made me blind this morning.”

“I think it was bleach, it made my tongue feel funny. Bleach would do that—” I paused and tilted my head. “This morning? It’s still morning then?”

“Seriously, that’s all you got from that? You think we may have potentially drank bleach and will need a Labrador and a white stick for the rest of our lives, which doesn’t even begin to explain how you know that bleach makes your tongue swell. When was the last time you drank it?”

“Why are my brother and Will standing at the end of my bed naked?”

I opened one eye and watched as Sasha sat upright, her own eyes open as wide as could be.

“You bitch.”

“Yep, and now you’re upright and we’ve ascertained that you have 20/20 vision, you might as well go make the coffee.”

“You fucker.”

“Love you.”

“Fuck off, I’m gonna spit in your cup.”

“Whatever. Just make sure you add a sugar and stir it, I need the energy.”

I laughed as I listened to Sasha stomp out of my bedroom and down the stairs. Rolling on to my side, I curled into the foetal position and wrapped my arms around my knees as I tried to recall everything from the previous night.

After Liam had asked to take me out, and he’d given me his number. I’d explained how over protective Luke was, and Liam, thankfully, said he didn’t want to cause issues within their working relationship. We both agreed to keep it quiet. It was only a date after all.

Saturday the eleventh of October two thousand and six.

Just a date.             

Our first date.

I lay flat
on my back and stared up at the ceiling of my motel room. The clock on the bedside chest of drawers had just told me it was three forty in the afternoon. I told Sarah I’d pick her up at seven thirty tonight.

What the fuck had I been thinking? Luke was gonna kill me.

I let out a long breath before reaching for my phone. It had buzzed with a couple of text messages earlier, waking me from a deep, dream-filled sleep.

Both messages were from Luke.

Luke:
U wanna move out of that motel and into my place today? Give me a shout and I’ll come and pick u up.

Luke:
Hey, fuck face, u can’t still b sleeping surely? Ring me when u wake up.

If I rang him, he would want me to move into his place today. Then he would ask where I was going tonight.

If I didn’t ring him, he would just keep messaging or start ringing me, or worse still, he might turn up.

Me:
I’m exhausted. I’m gonna stay in bed 2day and catch up on some sleep. I’ll call u 2morro. I’ve hired a car so I won’t need picking up. Thanks for the offer tho, bro.

Luke:
Ok. Sleep tight, u pussy.

Well that was easy. Now I just had to think about where I was gonna take Sarah for our date. Our secret date that her brother couldn’t know about.

Ever.

What the fuck was I thinking? Yeah, I’d come full circle and was now back to that.

Never, in all my life had I been affected by a woman like I was last night. I’d desperately wanted her to come back here with me, and I even went as far as to whisper into her ear, “
I want you, come home with me?
”

Her chest, neck, and cheeks had flushed a perfect pink as her eyes darted around the room to make sure no one had heard me before she shook her head.

I’d watched her throat move as she swallowed and was grateful for the darkness surrounding us that hid my hard-on.

She was the opposite of every woman I had ever taken out or slept with; she was young, too young for me anyways, and yet I’d found her engaging and interesting to talk to and a lot more mature than a lot of women my own age. She was short and curvy, not long and lean like my usual types. Her clothes were sexy as fuck in a retro kind of way, and it was obvious she wasn’t all designer label straight off the catwalk. Despite all that, I was more desperate to have her beneath me than I’d ever been for any one of my “usual” types, even my soon-to-be ex-wife.

“Fuck,” I groaned aloud to no one but myself. Olivia. What a fucking mess.

I’d not seen her since the
evening I’d caught her fucking another man in our Sydney apartment, but then the night before I left for England, she turned up at my office. She begged, she cried, she told me how sorry she was. She wanted us to try again, she wanted me to stay in Australia. I fucked her over my desk. I fucked her again while she was bent over the arm of the leather sofa in my office. I’d held her while she fell asleep on that same sofa, and then I gathered her clothes and dumped them in a bin on the street outside my office when I left. I went home, packed the last of my personal items in my cases, and headed to the airport. She’d called and screamed expletives, leaving me more than one voice mail. She’d then continuously texted me abusive messages, but I was numb to her, and nothing she said or did could touch me. I simply didn’t care. We never should have married in the first place. We weren’t in love, not
that
kind of love any way. I’d known Olivia since she was born. She was the daughter of my dad’s best friend. We were always expected to end up together and because I was always trying to please my dad, I went along with it.

We went to the same school and mixed in the same crowd. I’d spent most of my life thinking of her more as a sister than anything but then hormones happened, Olivia was willing and I was more than able.

At sixteen, I took Olivia’s virginity and gave her mine, but having her on tap at such a young age turned me into an arsehole. I earned myself a reputation and gladly lived up to it, sleeping with other girls behind Olivia’s back.

Olivia chose to turn a blind eye to it all. For her, being with me meant she was allowed a little more freedom. What we had was convenient, and convenience was basically all that our relationship had ever been based on.

I let out a long breath as I thought back to those times. I was young and stupid, a fucking idiot. I promised those girls the world, but once they gave it up, I walked away. I still liked to fuck without commitment these days, the difference was, I was honest from the start. Sex, no strings attached sex. That was what they would get from me. That and nothing else. I had a few regulars, but most were just hook ups. That was why I was so blown away by my reaction to little Ms Carter. I actually couldn’t remember the last time I took a woman out on a date. I met women while I was out, and I invited women to attend work related functions with me, but I really couldn’t remember the last time I had specifically gone out on an actual date.

My phone vibrated on the bed next to me, and I flipped it open.

Unknown:
Hey, my address is 76 Victoria Street. It’s about a 5-minute drive from where ur stayin’. We still on for 7.30?

I smiled as I read the message. I’d given Sarah my number last night, but she hadn’t given me hers. I’d completely forgotten that I’d asked her to text me her address. I contemplated fucking with her and sending a reply asking who she was, but before I could, my phone buzzed again.

Unknown:
It’s Sarah BTW ;)

A winky face? I wanted a come fuck me face, whatever that looked like, not a fucking winky face. I programed her number as I thought of my reply. Much like how I couldn’t remember the last time I actually went on a date, I couldn’t remember the last time I had cared enough to keep one of the girl’s numbers.

The weird thing was, I grinned as I did it. Saving her number didn’t scare me, it made me smile like a deranged person, and I actually chuckled to myself as I pictured how I must’ve looked lying on my bed and smiling at my phone. Obviously the alcohol I’d consumed the night before had turned me into a thirteen-year-old girl.

Me:
Ah, Sarah, thanks for clarifying. I have so many dates tonight that it can get a little confusing ;)

There, I could do winky
.

Sarah:
Well if ur 2 busy, we could always reschedule or cancel!

Shit, I’d pissed her off. That was the trouble with texting, sarcasm and jokes didn’t work. Someone really needed to develop fonts for that. After composing and deleting at least a half dozen messages, I gave up on texting and called her instead.

“Madam Sarah and Sasha’s slut club. We are fully booked until twenty fourteen but we can add you to the wait list if you think you can hold out that long. Our hand jobs
are
so
worth it.”

I was silent for a few seconds, not quite sure how to respond to that. I heard a mumbled conversation happening and then, “Hey, Sarah speaking, please excuse my whorey housemate and her lack of telephone decorum.”

“No worries, I was just disappointed that I was gonna have to wait for so long.”

“Really? I thought the wait might suit you, you being so busy and all that yourself.”

Shit. Note to self. Never attempt jokes or sarcasm with someone you had just met and were trying to impress.

“Yeah, about that. It was meant as a joke. Of course I knew it was you. I was actually getting worried that you’d changed your mind and weren’t gonna text me your address.” I cringed and screwed up my face as I lied.

I mouthed the word
sorry
as I looked at the ceiling, my Catholic guilt coming into play.

“Yeah, sorry my text was a bit late, we slept in and I only just remembered that I met this bloke last night. I’m pretty sure he wanted to take me out and needed my address so he could pick me up. That was you, right? You’re my date for Saturday night, not the one taking me out Sunday or Monday? Alcohol seems to affect my memory.”

“So you don’t remember how charming and good-looking I am then?”

“I remember that your eyes are blue and that you smell good.” I could hear the smile in her voice as she spoke, and I found myself again smiling like a numpty. I pictured that one dimple in her cheek and my cock twitched. Never in my life had I been so turned on by a dimple.

“Well, you are in for a treat tonight then. You’ll be blown away by what’s on your step when you answer the door later, I guarantee it.”

“Is that right?”

“Bloody oath it is.”

“Oh my God, it’s coming back to me now. You’re from South Africa, that’s why you talk funny.”

Again, I was lost for words. Fucking South Africa.

“Close but not quite.”

“New Zealand?”

“Ehhh, na bru, but you’re getting closer, at least now we’re on the right continent.” I gave her my best Kiwi impersonation, which seemed to go right over her head.

“No, you’ve got me then.”

“Okay, well you have a think while you pretty yourself up for me, and I’ll be at your door at seven thirty to knock your socks off with my handsome face. How’s that sound?”

“That sounds like a plan. What should I wear, where are you taking me?”

All the way, baby, if you just give me the chance.

“Yeah, I’m actually new to the area, coming from overseas and all that. Can you help a bloke out and suggest somewhere?”

“What exactly would you like to do?”

You
!

“I really don’t mind. I’m happy staying in with a pizza, as long as it’s you I’m sharing it with.”

I heard a gagging sound in the background.

“Is someone being sick?” I asked, genuinely concerned.

“They will be if you keep coming out with all that ol’ bullshit.” That sounded like Sasha’s voice, not Sarah’s.

“Have you got me on loudspeaker?” My voice sounded all high-pitched with indignation.

“Yeah sorry, I’m shaving my legs and it was easier. Sash brought the phone in to me after she answered.”

It was then that I realised I could hear water running.

“Shit, are you in the shower?”

My cock shot from half-mast to full in an instant.

“Yeah, but it’s okay, Sash is holding out my phone to me so it doesn’t get wet.”

Fuck!

“Are you naked?” I heard her giggle before she answered.

“Well yeah. I’m not sure how it’s done in Austria, but we tend to take our clothes off in England before we shower.”

Fucking Austria?

“Fuck, I can’t . . . I need to go. Pick somewhere nice to eat and dress appropriately. I’ll pick you up at seven thirty.”

I needed to rub one out before I saw her later, otherwise my blood flow would be redirected to the wrong head all night and I wouldn’t be able to string a sentence together.

“Yeah make sure you have a wank before you get here, pretty boy. You don’t wanna be embarrassing yourself on your first date.”

“Fuck off, Sash,” I called out before flipping my phone closed.