Sully

“I don’t know what the hell you are doing, or what you were thinking blowing your one chance with Kim, but I’m seriously starting to worry about you man.”

I grunt, looking back at Cord where he’s silently watching me across the table and shake my head. I’m not really sure what the hell I’m doing anymore, but I know that the night I went to dinner with Kim things just felt off.

It wasn’t that I didn’t want her, trust me, my cock was pounding fit to break out of my pants, and all I could think about all night was the way her breasts looked in her low cut dress, and wonder what shade her nipples would be.

I was ready, willing, and more than able to take her inside, pull every stitch of clothing from her sexy body, and explore her with my mouth for hours. Fuck, I wanted that blowjob like I wanted my next breath, but it just didn’t feel right.

I can’t even tell you why because I don’t know. For some reason when she looked up at me when I walked her to her door I didn’t want to just fuck her.

I wanted it to mean more and I was afraid that it wouldn’t, that we’d have sex and that would be it. I’d be ruined, and Kim would just walk away without so much as a goodbye.

So, I decided that I would rather not have anything than to have a taste and never get another shot again. It sounds fucking pathetic so admitting it to myself isn’t exactly easy, but there you have it.

I want it all or nothing. I’d rather stay friends, as much friends as she lets us be, than to have her once and never have her again, not even her friendship.

“Cord, drop it okay,” I say, picking up my glass of coke and drinking deep to clear the dryness in my throat.

“Nah, no, I am not dropping this. It’s been over a month since you went out and in all that time you haven’t said a thing. You went to Dee and Ky’s wedding and spent all night flirting with Kelly when I know you won’t do women younger than twenty-three. You didn’t look at Kim once, but for the brief moment I saw you talking to her.”

“Cord, I don’t want to talk about this man. Just fucking let it go,” I say, my voice going hard because I do not want to talk about this.

Jesus, what is it with these guys and their meddling?

“And I told you I don’t care if you do or don’t. We’re going to talk, and you’ll tell me what the hell is going on. Jeff says you haven’t been out on one date since and that can only mean you’re celibate. You haven’t been celibate since you turned sixteen.”

“So maybe I just don’t want to have sex, and maybe I just don’t give a shit about flirting with a woman over dinner and drinks when I am not interested. I’m taking a break, Cord, because I’m tired and I need some time to myself.”

It’s all true in a way. I am tired. After high school I went to college on a football scholarship and worked my ass off to get a degree in business, and then came back here because my dad passed away and mama needed me to keep things going.

When I lost dad’s business because it had already gone too far to save it, I pumped everything I had into the restaurant and have worked tirelessly to make it work.

It wasn’t easy. Not with a mama who hadn’t worked a day in her life but to look after a family and raise three children, and not with two sisters in high school who needed a shit ton of things that cost way more than I had.

I haven’t stopped working since I left college and it has been all I had besides sex that kept me going. My sisters Shelby and Shelly are both out of school now, married and living in other states, but my mama is still here, still relying on me and now that I have a good income and enough money to take a break, I’m doing it.

Yes, part of it is about what I felt for Kim, but mostly I just need to chill out and have a little time to myself. That’s not really possible when all I do is date and fuck and then do it again the next day.

I can’t remember the last time I just went home and watched TV, or had a beer and watched the sunset. It’s been a long time and for now, I just need to have a rest.

“And I get that, Sully. Hell bro, I have always been here for you trying to make things better and just be your friend, so I get it, but it still doesn’t explain why you turned Kim down when you’ve had a hard-on for her for years,” he says, sounding exasperated.

“It wasn’t right,” I say, running a hand through my hair.

“What the hell…?”

“It didn’t feel right, okay?” I grate, looking into my glass with a frown. “She was giving me the signals, and everything was a go, but it just wasn’t right. I’ve wanted Kim for a long time, Cord, and I’ve become accustomed to the wanting, but I know, if I have her and get to know what it’s like I won’t be able to go back to wanting again. It would drive me insane.”

He goes still and just stares at me, his eyes wide and mouth opening and closing before he curses and mutters.

“Did it ever occur to you that maybe she wanted more too? To hear Jack tell it, Kim would never just sleep with a guy she didn’t want.”

“Oh, please. She’s always with a guy, no matter what day of the week it is,” I scoff, hating that I feel jealous of every guy she’s been with.

I need to just move on and let this go, find someone who will make me happy and give me what I need.

Cord curses, this time at me and for the first time in years I see him look me up and down with scorn and anger. He’s pissed, really pissed, which isn’t a good thing with Cord because he’s usually so easy going that when he gets mad, it’s real.

“You fucking prick! Are you seriously sitting there judging Kim for playing the field when you fuck every woman you come across?”

“Cord–”

“And for your information, Kim is not like that. Yeah, she dates but she doesn’t just sleep around. You may think so because you’ve got your fucking head shoved so far up your ass, but she’s a good person, and she doesn’t deserve to be thought of as a slut. She’s only ever had four real relationships and the rest of the guys you assume she’s been with? They’re friends of hers.”

“Cord–” I try again, feeling like hell because I know what I just implied and I don’t mean it in an insulting way.

He slashes a hand through the air, stopping me again and stands to throw money on the table, a direct insult that finds its mark. My friends never pay in my restaurant, so him doing this, it’s his way of telling me exactly how angry he is right now.

“I think you should take some time to really think about what you want out of life, Sully, because this…your shitty attitude and the things you just implied, they aren’t the man I know. I don’t know if you’re in a bad place, mainly because you won’t talk to the guys or me, but I do know that you’ve become a shitty friend and you just insulted the same woman who sends your mother care packages from the Honey Badger every Thursday. No, I don’t even want to talk to you right now man, just go home and do something about your shit or you’re likely to lose the people who love you,” he grates before turning on his heel and stalking off.

I watch him leave and fall back into my seat with a sigh born of pure frustration and anger. I am pissed at myself for saying something I didn’t mean because I was angry and I felt cornered, and I know there is no excuse, so I won’t even try to make one.

What I just implied was out of order, especially because it’s true that Kim is a good person. She does nice things that hardly anyone knows about like yeah, sending my mama packages from the Honey Badger because she knows she likes the lemon apple squares and the little donuts with the blueberry filling.

I know Kim is nice and she can be as sweet as she is acerbic but here’s the thing, she’s also never once indicated that she’ll give me more than one night and that’s made me crazy.

It was not easy walking away from her the night we went on a date. In fact, I would easily say it’s the hardest thing I have ever done. It was harder than working seventeen-hour days and living with mama for two years because I couldn’t afford anything more. It was worse than selling the car me and dad restored because I needed to pay the mortgage because we were three payments behind.

It sucked, and I have spent the last few weeks both kicking myself for it, and also for being a stupid asshole who blames Kim. That stops now, right here and I take full responsibility for my actions.

I have been an asshole and a shitty friend because I haven’t yet come to terms with the fact that it is time to stop dreaming about Kimberly Brady and move the hell on.

It’s time to do that and also to tell myself the full truth. I hate her as much as I love her for making me feel this way for years. If just once she could have looked at me and seen what I feel I could have accepted that she didn’t want me.

But she never did, and I have carried a lot of resentment along with love for her. It’s been eating me up alive so yeah, maybe that night and me walking away was also about letting her feel what I felt.

It was a horrible thing to do, leading her on that way and then dumping her ass, and I know that. I should have talked to her and just told her the truth. Instead, I wanted to hurt her, and the worst part is that I think I did.

And I hurt her at Dee’s wedding because hearing her taunt me, which I know was all it was, pushed me over that edge again.

Sighing, because I am just tired and too strung out to think about anything right now I prepare to get up and leave the restaurant in Paul’s hands, my night manager the only guy I trust to keep things running.

I’m just about to call him over when the door opens and I see Bayou Brady slither in followed by Kim and two walking peckers I want to kill on sight.

They remind me of Felix, that limp dick little chump Ky and I slapped around to get him over to Kim’s and man up for Mel. I feel my chest tighten and the anger I’ve been fighting since dad passed wash over me, making my skin go hot all over my body.

I have to sit down and breathe I feel so light-headed with rage, and it’s while I’m counting that I watch Kim and her party walk after the hostess towards a table a little way to my left.

Kim is dressed in a tight black dress that highlights the curve of her ass and shows her religious gym trips, the shiny black fabric cupping her breasts lovingly and showing off her cleavage.

I go hard instantly, just like I do every time I see her and groan when she sits, the graceful slope of her slender neck in my line of vision. I don’t know what it is about that neck that makes my balls full, but with Kim, it’s as erotic as every other part of her.

I’ve had fantasies about spending an hour on that neck, just licking and sucking at the milky skin and leaving love bites all over for other men to see. Like a marker that shows she’s taken and very well satisfied.

Bay sees me, that woman sees everything, and smirks, the little smile almost cracking my eyeballs it’s so rare. Of late I’ve seen that smile three times, and I just know it’s because she’s taunting me.

I don’t even care. I only have eyes for Kim as she smiles at the man to her right and shakes her head before leaning over to talk to Bay. Whatever she says gets a firm head shake, and instead of moving I sit at my table alone and watch her like I always do. With another man. Smiling at him. Letting him look at her.

It makes me crazy to see it, and yet I can’t move or look away because she’s here and Jesus, I have wanted her here for weeks where I can watch and pretend that she isn’t with someone else.

The force of my obsession hits me then, and I groan, slumping back to think while I watch her. The truth is that I can’t walk away, no matter how much I have tried to tell myself I can.

I want that woman too badly to keep pretending that I can quit, and now that I know, I have no idea how to fix what I’ve done to drive her away.

“She’ll forgive you if you just talk to her.”

I look up, my eyes straining as I force them from my woman to see Jefferson taking the seat beside me, his ever-present look of humor making me grin because it makes him seem mocking when he’s really being serious.

Many a time I’ve had to step in and save his ass when he made a comment many people misconstrued. I shudder to think what it would sound like if Bay were to give him the time of day and they slept together again.

It would probably sound like a dead, soulless drone followed by a naughty chuckle that would be Jefferson trying to compliment her. I don’t know, in my head it just sounds wrong. The drone and the humor. I wonder what any children from them would be like. Wednesday Adams crossed with the mad hatter.

“I was an asshole, Jeff. I treated her like nothing on purpose, and now she doesn’t even snipe at me anymore. Hell, she hardly looks at me at all,” I huff, looking back over to see Kim thanking the waitress and accepting a glass of what looks like water.

That is so not her. She usually orders an apple martini with an olive, don’t ask me why she likes it that way, but she does. Kim’s not a drinker usually, but she isn’t dry either.

She must be off is all I can think when she sips the water and stares out the window, seeming bored and tired and not at all into her date. I’d be happy but again, this isn’t Kim, and it concerns me that she’s so off.

“I heard Jack tell Cord that Kim has been staying out at her mama and daddy’s place lately, and she was talking to Grace Pratt about renting her house,” Jeff says, his eyes glued to Bay like a starving man to an oasis.

“What? Why?”

Jeff shrugs and picks up Cord’s still full glass of gin and tonic, grimacing at the taste but shooting it anyway.

“I think she also told Jack that she’s taking a leave soon because she wants to rest. I don’t know man, whatever you did to her has really fucked her up.”

I rejected her, I think. Not once. Not twice. Three times.

It doesn’t escape me that every time has been my way of hurting her and I groan, hating myself because it hits me that three strikes is an out. The first time was in school. I’d asked Kim out after she punched me, my adoration growing by leaps and bounds because people usually gave me a wide berth since I’m six-five and built like a thug.

She clocked me but good, stole my heart and then told me to fuck off when I asked her on a date. A while after that she must have thought better of it and asked me out in this shy voice that still makes me tremble.

I said no out of spite and have regretted it since because I know that if I’d given in on that one occasion and not been a douche, Kim and I would still be together. Probably married with some kids to drive us crazy.

The second time was after our dinner but you already know about that, and then the third was Dee’s wedding when I walked away without once considering that she was on pills and lashing out because of our date and the conclusion.

That’s my problem, I never consider the consequences when I’m angry, and it’s always messed up my shit. And now it’s messed with Kim who despite what people think, is pretty vulnerable.

“I don’t know how to fix this, Jeff,” I confess, my chest going tight when I consider that maybe I just can’t.

He smiles, a twinkle showing in those blue eyes and slaps my shoulder to comfort me.

“I have a Brady favor on the books compliments of Bay. I’ll let you use it if you promise me you’ll not fuck this up again. I don’t want to waste it if you’re only going to let your temper rule you,” he says, making me glance up with a disgustingly pathetic amount of hope and gratitude.

“I’ll do anything.”

“Great. Let me talk to Bay.”