Chapter 7
GIRL CODE
MAC
Lifting my head and seeing Edward walk through my office door, I smile and push my chair away from my desk. “Hey, you.” I stand and walk around my desk to greet him with a hug. “What are you doing here?” I let him go and take a step back.
“I came to check on you. I haven’t seen you in a while. What’s been going on?”
“Work. You know how it is.” I shrug and take a seat on the edge of my desk while he sits in one of the chairs across from me.
“Just work?” he asks curiously.
“Well . . . when I’m not working, I’m spending time with Wesley,” I say.
He tips his head to the side. “Is Wesley the big guy I saw the last time I was here?” He raises his arms away from his body like he has too many muscles.
“Yeah.” I smile.
He rubs his hand down his jaw. “He seemed a little intense,” he says.
My stomach tingles as I remember the way his intensity feels whenever it’s directed at me.
“He’s a cop.” I use that as explanation, and he nods. “So did you just come by to check on me?”
“Actually, I wanted to see if you had time to give me a massage. Bonnie and I are heading to her parents’ for Christmas, and I’ve been stressed.”
“Why? I thought you got along with her family.”
“I do get along with them, but . . .” He pulls a box out of his pocket and flips the top open. “Carrying this thing around is making me anxious.”
“You’re asking Bonnie to marry you!”
“That’s the plan.” He snaps the box closed and shoves it back in his pocket.
“I’m happy for you. The ring is beautiful. She’s going to freak when she sees it.” I stand and give him another hug. “I wish I had time to help you out today, but I have clients back-to-back. Everyone wants to come in before they go away for Christmas. You should have called me,” I tell him as the buzzer next to my door goes off, letting me know that my next client has already arrived.
“I should have.” He moves his neck side to side, cracking it, then pulls out his phone as it rings. “One second.” He looks at the screen before he puts it to his ear to answer. “Hey, baby.”
Thinking that it’s Bonnie, I smile at him.
“Yeah, I’ll meet you there. But remember—you can’t call me next week since I’ll be with Bonnie at her parents’ house,” he says.
That smile slides right off my face, and nausea turns my stomach. I fight the urge to kick him in his balls or pick up my stapler and toss it at his stupid, fat, cheating head.
“All right. I’m just gonna say bye to my friend, then I’ll be over that way. Yeah, see you soon.” He ends the call and puts the phone in the inside pocket of his jacket just as my next client, Dorothy, comes into my office.
Giving her a smile, I look back at Edward.
He leans down to kiss my cheek. “We’ll talk after the holiday.”
“Sure.” Swallowing down bile, I watch him go. I wonder how the hell I didn’t see it before, how the hell I didn’t notice that he is a complete man whore and a huge dick.
Pushing thoughts of him away, I lead Dorothy down the hall and into the massage room. I instruct her to get undressed and onto the table, then tell her that I’ll be back in a few minutes.
After I leave, I rush to my desk and pick up my cell. I group text Libby and Fawn.
Edward just stopped by my office. He showed me the ring he is going to use to propose to his girlfriend, then he went to go meet a woman that I’m pretty sure he is cheating on Bonnie with.
Fawn: Shut up.
Libby: Oh my god you so dodged a bullet.
Fawn: His poor girlfriend.
Me: I know, I feel like I should warn her.
Libby: Don’t do it. She will find out on her own. He won’t be able to hide it forever.
Fawn: I would want to know if Levi was cheating on me. I think you should tell her. It’s girl code.
Me: I’ll have to think about it.
Libby: I swear you two never listen to me. Whatever . . . I have to work. We will talk over Christmas shopping.
Me: <3
Fawn: Talk soon.
Setting my cell phone down on the top of my desk, I get back to work. That is, I try to. For the most part, I spend the day trying to think of a way to tell Bonnie that Edward is cheating on her without telling her directly.
Taking a sip of my soda, I stare at Wesley over the rim of the cup. He stares back at me with a disbelieving look in his eyes. I’ve just told him about Edward’s phone call in my office earlier today and my plan to send Bonnie an unmarked letter with a note explaining that she should not marry Edward because he is a cheating dick.
“No.” He shakes his head. “You need to stay out of it.”
“I can’t just stay out of it—it goes against girl code. If you were cheating on me, I would want to know about it,” I say as he finishes chopping up an onion to add to a pan on the stove that already contains ground beef and chopped tomatoes.
It’s weird to have someone cook for me, but he’s done it every night without question since we really got together. His only request is that I sit with him while he prepares it.
“First of all, I would never cheat on you. Cheating is something cowards do. Second, I don’t give a fuck about girl code. You don’t need to be the one who tells her about her boyfriend being a piece of shit.”
“Who else is going to tell her, then?” I ask, throwing my hand in the air.
He moves toward me, takes my cup from my hand, and sets it on the counter next to me before pushing my legs apart to stand between them.
“Gorgeous, I get that you feel she needs to know, but I don’t like the idea of you being the one to tell her about it. She could freak—or he could.”
“It’s going to be anonymous . . . ,” I remind him.
He sighs.
“I won’t leave any trace that it was me who told her. I won’t say a name or anything. I will just say something like ‘your man is a cheating dick.’”
I expect that to make him smile, but it doesn’t.
He moves his face closer to mine and wraps a hand around my jaw. “Please, just leave it alone.”
Searching his gaze and seeing worry there, I chew on the inside of my cheek. I want to ask him why, but I don’t want him to shut down on me. Not when we’ve had a great couple of weeks. Letting out a huff, I give in.
“Fine. I’ll leave it alone.”
“Thank you.”
“Whatever.” I pout, and he smiles, then kisses it away.
“Are you excited about tomorrow?” he asks.
My stomach instantly fills with nervous butterflies. His mom and stepdad are flying in. Christmas is in three days, and since I only have one client in the morning, I stupidly agreed to go with him to the airport to pick them up.
“So totally excited!” I lie.
“Liar.” He kisses my forehead. “It will be fine. My mom will love you.”
“If you say so.” I kiss his scruffy jaw, then smile when my stomach growls. “Are you going to keep kissing me, or are you going to cook me dinner?”
“I don’t know. I like kissing you.”
“Me too.” I kiss him again and again.
About ten minutes later, when my stomach growls loudly, he finally pulls away.
“So what are you making anyway?” I ask him as he grabs a pepper and starts to chop it up.
“Tacos.”
“Yum.” My mouth waters, and he smiles at me. “Did your mom teach you how to cook?” I ask, picking my drink back up.
“She did. After the summer of hot dogs, she taught me. She figured that I would need to know how to cook for myself so I could do it while I was at my dad’s house. The first thing she taught me how to make was fajitas. The second was lasagna.”
“My mom never taught us how to cook. I think she secretly liked keeping us dependent on her for food.”
“I’ll teach you.” He smiles at me, and my heart does some weird double beat.
“You will?”
“Of course. I’m not the best cook, but I know the basics. I can show you those.”
“Well, I know nothing, so you are already a million times better than me.” I laugh and take another sip of soda. I love this. I love how easy things are between us. Spending time with him is like hanging out with my best friend. That’s something I’ve never had with anyone before him.
“What are you thinking about?” he asks as he pulls a pack of tortillas out of the fridge.
“How easy this whole relationship business is with you,” I admit.
I watch as his face gets soft and his eyes get warm.
“Have I told you today how much I like you?” he asks.
My heart skips and my stomach tingles.
“Not today.”
“I like you a lot.”
“Good. Because I like you a lot, too.”
I reach forward, grab hold of his sweater, and pull him toward me. Kissing him once, I let him go and then hop down off the counter to help him finish up dinner.
We eat while watching TV. Then we head to bed for the night, where we do a lot more than just sleep.
“Calm down.”
“You calm down!” I snap at Wesley as his hand tightens around mine. I wonder if he’s afraid I’m going to run away like a coward. I might. “I think this is too soon. Don’t you think it’s too soon for me to meet your mom? Isn’t that something couples do after they have been seeing each other for months and months? Sometimes years and ye—”
His mouth crashes down on mine, and his tongue slips between my parted and stunned lips. Cupping my cheeks, he tips my head to the side to deepen the kiss. It makes me forget that we’re in the middle of a crowed airport where hundreds of people can see us.
“It’s not too soon,” he growls, pulling his mouth away from mine.
“Okay,” I breathe as my eyes flutter open. “I’m just a little bit scared.”
“I know you are. I knew you were this morning, because you asked me a million times what you should wear, if you should wear makeup, and how you should do your hair.”
“It wasn’t a million times,” I mumble.
He grins. “Okay, a hundred thousand times.”
“Whatever.” I blow a strand of hair out of my face.
He runs his thumbs across my cheeks.
“Worst-case scenario, my mom hates you. So I never talk to her again.”
“Your mom wouldn’t be very happy with that plan, sugar pants,” a woman says from behind me.
I close my eyes and groan internally, realizing the woman is his mom.
I force myself to open my eyes, then turn with Wesley to face his mom and her husband. I don’t know what I was expecting his mom to look like, but the blonde standing across from me who looks a lot like Michelle Pfeiffer wasn’t it.
Letting me go, Wesley greets them with a joint hug before stepping back and placing his arm around my waist.
“Mom, I’d like you to meet Mackenzie. Mackenzie, my mom, Monica.”
She smiles at him before looking at me.
“It’s so nice to meet you.” I stick out my hand.
Her eyes drop to my outstretched hand, and she rolls them before pulling me in for a tight hug, saying close to my ear, “We don’t shake hands.”
“It’s nice to finally meet you,” I whisper as her arms tighten around me.
“You too,” she whispers back, letting me go and taking her husband’s hand. “Mac?” She pauses, tipping her head to the side, studying me briefly. “Can I call you Mac?”
“Of course. Everyone does—except Wesley,” I say.
His arm wraps around my shoulder, and his lips touch the top of my head.
“Mac, this is my husband, Peter.”
“Nice to meet you, Peter.” I smile and try to give him a handshake, but once more I’m pulled in for an unexpected hug.
“Nice to meet you, Mac.”
“You too,” I agree as he lets me go.
“How many bags did you bring, Mom?” Wesley asks as he tucks me right back under his arm.
“Just two,” she says.
Peter clears his throat.
She glares at him. “Fine, three. But one of them doesn’t even count—all it has in it is my makeup and meds.”
“What about my bag? You took up all its space by shoving your shoes in there.”
“You can’t complain about that now. You should have complained when we were home and I was doing it. Now it’s too late.”
“I’m not complaining, doll, just pointing out that you have a lot more stuff than you say you do.”
“Well, I had to bring gifts for my son and his girlfriend.”
My eyes widen. I haven’t gotten her anything for Christmas. Thank goodness I still have a shopping trip planned with Libby and Fawn for tomorrow. It’s something we’ve done every year since we were old enough to go out on our own.
“Let’s go see if your bags have come out. While we wait, you can tell us about your flight,” Wesley suggests, leading us all toward baggage claim.
He keeps a tight hold on my hand—he’s probably more afraid now than ever that I’m going to take off on him. To be honest, for once I’m not thinking about it. All I can think about is the fact that Wesley has made it a point to remind me over and over that I mean something to him and that he has chosen me and will keep on choosing me.
“Are you doing okay?” he asks against my ear.
I tip my head back to look at him and smile. “Totally okay.” I squeeze his fingers, then lean back against him.
I listen as his mom tells us about their trip, and I do it smiling, too.