COULD I BE more of an asshole? I should probably figure out a way to get out of here before Hailey woke up or came home. When I swallowed a couple of pills with the water she’d left for me, my stomach rolled in protest. I needed grease to absorb whatever alcohol still filled my belly. But, first, I needed a ride home.
Who could I call to come get me?
John? No way.
Lori? Worse than John.
Cara? Worst choice of all.
Mom or Dad? They wouldn’t know the house, but I might as well hand over my man card for having my parents pick me up from a failed drunken booty call.
I could walk the couple of miles into Langley or hitch a ride to pick up my truck. The clock on the microwave said it was 9:00 A.M. Nothing suspicious about a hungover man walking along the road on New Year’s Day this early in the morning. Nothing at all.
Staring out over the lake from inside the living room, I thought about throwing myself into the icy water. It would probably sober me up and the resulting hypothermia might freeze away this headache if I was lucky.
In the corner of the deck sat a hot tub I hadn’t noticed before. I wondered if she ever used it naked.
Or if she and Kurt had had sex in it. If I had a hot tub, I would have sex in it. Not one of those public ones. That would be gross, but in my own? Hell yeah. I wondered if after last night, I’d ever have sex with Hailey again. If it were ever on the table, I’d request hot tub sex. After she drained the water.
Probably a long shot at this point, but there was always hope.
“Look who’s alive and awake.” Her voice deadpanned behind me.
Feeling sheepish, I gave her a small wave. “Thanks for not leaving me outside to freeze.”
“Now why would I let you die? We’re friends, right?” I didn’t see her expression because her head was hidden behind the cupboard door where she pulled out the coffee filters. “Coffee?” The cupboard swung closed to reveal her messy hair and sour expression.
“You hungover, too?” I shook the bottle of pills at her.
“Not at all. I came home completely sober last night after spending the evening at my parents.’”
“Sober on New Year’s?”
“Shocking concept I know. How’s the head?”
“Bad enough I’ve been standing here thinking about throwing myself off the end of your dock to see if the freezing water helps.”
Her laughter caught in her throat. “Long walk off a short pier?”
“Kind of my own version of a polar plunge. Want to join me?” I wiggled my eyebrows.
“No, but thanks for the offer. Coffee?”
“Not sure my stomach can handle it. Before you came downstairs I was contemplating hoofing it to Langley to get my truck.”
“I can give you a ride after the coffee finishes brewing.”
That was soon. “No rush. Thanks for letting me crash on your couch.”
“How’d you get here anyway?”
Whatsherface had given me a ride. “Some friend of Diane’s brought me.”
“Why would she think you lived here?”
I shrugged and studied the pattern on the linoleum floor. “I think I mentioned something about Goss Lake last night.”
“Tom . . .”
I held up my hands. “I know. Shitty move randomly showing up here.”
“And nearly freezing to death on my porch. What if I didn’t come home last night?”
Jealousy flooded my veins over the thought of her being out all night with another man. I had no right to stake a claim on her.
She studied me with a curious expression. “Simmer down, I was speaking hypothetically.”
I glanced at my balled fists resting on the counter. “Oh. Right. Hypothetically.” I relaxed my hands and stuffed them in my pockets. “Well, I really owe you one for letting me crash on your couch.”
“No problem. That’s what friends do. They watch each other’s backs.”
The scent of brewing coffee filled the kitchen as a steady stream of brown liquid filled the pot.
“You want some eggs?” She opened the refrigerator. “Toast?”
“I don’t want to put you out.”
“Too late.” At my frown, she continued, “It’s fine. But you should go wash your face. Or if you can handle it, take a shower. You still look like you’ve been mauled by a makeup artist and you smell like the Dog House.”
I sniffed my T-shirt. “I’m disgusting.”
Upstairs, I tucked a towel around my waist, my decision made.
She sat on the counter, eating peanut butter from the jar with a fork when I returned to the kitchen.
“Where are your clothes?” The fork paused in her hand like a sparkler on 4th of July.
I swept my tongue along the tines, licking off some peanut butter. “I’m throwing myself in the lake.” With a smile and a wave, I opened the sliding glass door to the deck. Cold air prickled my skin into goose bumps. “Damn, damn. Damn. It’s cold.”
“It’s January,” she yelled from the counter. “Close the door.”
I slid the door closed behind me, and then ran across the deck, down the steps, and over the mossy path to the wide dock protruding into the water. Without hesitation, I dropped the towel mid-run and leapt.
The thin, icy surface crackled before water swallowed me whole, sucking me down into the freezing darkness. I surfaced, sputtered and kicked my numb legs to reach the dock.
“Fuck shit damn motherfucking fucking fucksonofa fucking iceberg shitshitshit damnit.”
My teeth chattered as I pulled myself on to the dock, and flopped there, attempting to expand my lungs enough to catch a breath.
“I have neighbors,” Hailey yelled from the deck.
Glancing around at the few houses on the other side of the lake, I cupped my dick and laughed. “Darlin,’ they’d better have a telescope if they plan to see anything. Everything’s crawled inside my body. I’ve created a new definition for blue balls.”
“Come inside before you die out there.” Her words were stern, but laughter crept around the edge of her voice.
I hopped up, still cupping my junk, and picked up the towel, already cold with frost. With the towel around my shoulders, held in place with one hand, I ran up the path to the house, the other hand hiding my goods from the eyes of curious neighbors with telescopes and binoculars.
“You’re insane.” She held open the door for me as I bounded up the stairs.
“Probably.” I jumped from foot to foot to avoid frostbite I was certain had begun to take over my lower extremities.
“Go take a shower.” She kept her eyes on the top of the cupboards.
I chuckled and waited for her to glance at me, then dropped my hands and the towel. Not my finest glory, but it wasn’t anything she hadn’t seen, or touched, or kissed before.
The sting of a dishtowel hitting my naked ass made me jump, but before she could reload, I ran out of the kitchen. Her laughter followed me up the stairs.
In the shower, scalding hot water poured over my head. I leaned into the spray and let my skin absorb the heat. It was barely shy of being painful, but distracted me from my headache. Thoroughly thawed out, I sniffed a bottle of her soap, and deciding it didn’t smell too girly, I used it to clean my face. Suds stung my eyes when I rinsed. Another bottle held Hailey’s familiar floral scent. I skipped it for something smelling like oranges. She had at least five bottles lined up on a shelf in the shower. I found some shampoo and after rinsing, called it good.
My clothes still reeked of last night, but I had no other options. At least all of the lipstick stains were gone.
The scent of eggs and sausage cooking greeted me in the kitchen. Over the speakers, some woman sang about hating the rain and Hailey sang along—loudly, and off-key—shaking her ass a little as she flipped the sausage. Oblivious to my arrival, she belted out the lyrics while I enjoyed the show from where I leaned against the fridge.
“Shit!” she screamed and dropped the spatula.
“Sorry.” Giving her a little wave now that she spied me, I handed the spatula to her. “I was having too much fun watching.”
“Great.” She tossed the dirty utensil in the sink and pulled out a wooden spoon.
“It was awesome.”
“Don’t kiss my ass. I know I sound like a cat in heat when I sing. That’s why I only do it when I’m alone, or think I am. I didn’t hear the shower turn off.”
“You were really into the music.” I turned down the volume. “Believe me at my word. I won’t lie to you.”
She stared at me for a few beats and shook her head. “For some reason, I do believe you.”
“Good. You should.” I ran my fingers through my hair and scratched my scalp.
“Your hair’s really curly when it’s wet.”
“I know. It was worse when I was a kid. Got picked on and called a mop head in elementary school.”
“Moppy fits you.”
I narrowed my eyes and snarled at her.
“Okay, Moppy, breakfast is ready.” Right on cue, toast popped up from the toaster.
We ate in silence for a few minutes. The frozen lake, the hot shower, and now grease from the sausage restored me.
“So how cold was the water?” she asked, chomping on the edge of her toast.
“Fucking cold.” I gave her a smile.
“You’re crazy, you know.”
“I think we established that outside.”
She arched her brow. “We established it a long time ago, trust me.”
I picked up a link of sausage and bit it in half. “Some people like crazy. It’s a helluva lot more fun than normal and boring.”
“Trust me, I know normal and boring. I almost became Mrs. Boring.”
The energy shifted between us. Without meaning to, I’d referenced her ex, something I’d managed to avoid since the first night together over a month ago.
I dropped the sausage on my plate. “None of my business, but I called that on Halloween.”
“What?” Her eyes widened.
“I told Lori you’d never marry him.”
“What? She never mentioned it to me.”
“Why would she? I’m not psychic or anything, but I do have a sense about relationships.”
“Says the man who never, ever has them? Do you give marriage counseling, too?”
I sat there and took her words like the small assaults they were intended to be. “I’ve spent a lot of time around couples, often as the third wheel. People forget to play nice in front of me.” I raised a shoulder. “From high school on, I’ve had a good sense of impending break-ups. Sadly, my skills are much less profitable than picking winning horses at the track.”
“What about us said ‘doomed’ to you?” She crossed her arms in defense.
“You want me to discuss your ex with you? Are you sure?”
“Go for it.” Her words were clipped and she stared me down in challenge.
“Okay.” I drew out the word. “First, your costumes didn’t coordinate. Second, he didn’t understand the irony of his. Third, he’s shorter than you.”
She opened her mouth to protest and I silenced her with my hand. “You’re still kind of a tomboy, and sometimes you like taking control in the bedroom.” I swore her cheeks pinked, and I smiled because I knew I spoke the truth. “But at the end of the day, you want to feel feminine and cherished, not like a towering giant next to Napoleon.”
Her mouth closed and I knew I’d nailed it.
“Where was I? Right. Fourth, you shrugged off his attempt to claim you by putting his arm around you at the party.”
“Okay, point proven,” she mumbled.
“Come on, Hailey. How could you seriously think about marrying a guy who didn’t get a Heathers’ reference? You and Lori were obsessed with that movie in middle school.”
She shrugged, but chuckled. “I know. It’s the reason I called off the wedding.”
It was my turn to let my jaw drop.
Her throaty laughter made her eyes crinkle. “No! But your analysis of us is eerily spot on.”
“See?” I resisted full out saying I told you so. “My other theory is all your friends are getting married and having kids, so you panicked. The first nice guy with a stable job, money in the bank, and the whole line about ‘two-point-five kids, a golden retriever, and you staying home with the kids’ sounded like everything you didn’t know you wanted until the thought of being an old maid was staring you in the face at the ancient age of twenty-nine.”
She huffed. “We started dating when I was twenty-seven. He is super successful, has money in the bank, and a golden retriever. After a string of starving artists and poor musicians, a guy who could afford to take me out, spoil me and want to take care of me sounded like heaven.”
“You haven’t mentioned having the hubba-hubba hots for him.”
She focused on the table. “There’s a lot more to relationships than sex.”
I nodded. “Right.”
Her eyes flashed to mine. “There is!”
I wanted to comment, but didn’t care to know more about their sex life. No way. “When did he propose?”
“Early summer.”
“And you were how old?”
She glowered at her plate and used her crust to stab a few small pieces of eggs. “Twenty-nine,” she whispered.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t hear that.”
“Twenty-nine,” she shouted.
I leaned against my chair and crossed my arms in triumph.
“Shut up.” She matched my pose and pouted her beautiful, full lips.
“Told you I have a knack.” I smiled smugly.
“If you have such a knack for reading people and seeing relationships play out, why are you perpetually single? Scared?”
Scared? Me? I chuckled. “I know myself well enough to know I’d be a disaster at the boyfriend thing.”
She studied me, running her index finger along her bottom lip. I squirmed as her examination continued.
“What?” I finally whispered.
“Maybe you don’t see yourself as clearly as you think you see others.”
“We never do.” I swallowed the last of my water and brushed my hands on my jeans. “So, you want to have sex now?”
Coffee sputtered out of her mouth and hit the table. “What? No!”
I pressed my lips together. “Didn’t think so, but it was worth the shot.”
“Have you not paid attention at all? To anything?”
“I’m teasing. Remember? It’s what you and I do. You’ve made it pretty clear sex isn’t going to happen. While I can’t say I’m not bummed, I understand and respect it. Doesn’t mean I won’t still flirt with you. It’s my first language.”
A small smile appeared on her lips. “Ready for a ride?”
Guess I’d stayed long enough. “Sure.”