Tiff…

“Wait, you like him as in like him, like him?” Delia was staring at me, agape.

“Yes.”

It had been three days since he’d stayed the day in my apartment the first time and he’d stayed every day since, except we still hadn’t had sex. I wanted him, and I knew he wanted me, but what he was giving me was far more important right now. What he was giving me was an intimacy I had craved for a long time, yet hadn’t known with the front part of my brain that I’d needed.

He held me. We talked. Sometimes he just listened, sometimes I did, but it was a bonding that I think we both needed. A friendship that was definitely going somewhere, but one of the things I needed was my best friend to accept him and the only way that was going to happen was if she got to know him like I did.

Unfortunately, the closer I was growing to Nik, it felt like the further away I was getting from Lia, and I would be lying if I said that didn’t hurt.

“Come meet him,” I practically begged and Delia rolled her eyes at me but followed along reluctantly. Of course, that was probably because I had her by the hand and was towing her out the door past Zeke and across the back lot to where Nik sat bundled on the back of his bike.

“Gidday, ladies.”

“Hey,” I said softly, smiling.

“You must be Delia then?” he asked, and held out his hand to her. She eyed him suspiciously but took it and gave it a solid shake.

“Yep, I’m the best friend,” she declared.

“Nice to meet you.” He gave her a smile that I increasingly was finding to be disarming and asked, “Join us for a bit of brekkie?”

“A bit of what?” she asked and laughed a little.

“It’s what Kiwis call breakfast,” I told her.

“Sure, but for us, it’s sort of dinner time for us, isn’t it?”

“True, but Nik and I have been going to this diner with really good breakfast food that starts up around this time.”

“Maybe another time,” she said. “I’m meeting someone.”

I blinked, taken aback. Delia was my best friend, we shared everything about one another’s lives. How did I not know about this until right before? I rocked back on my heels, surprised to feel more hurt well up and I immediately overruled my heart with my head, thinking to myself Delia is her own person with her own life apart from yours… Besides, you haven’t exactly been forthcoming about Nik. Of course, there was a reason for that. Delia, while having her heart in the right place, was also pretty judgmental about the Sacred Hearts as a whole. It made it hard for me to want to share.

“Don’t look at me like that, please?” she asked softly. “It isn’t like that.”

“Like what?” I asked back, frowning, my sixth sense tingling. Why would she put it that way? She read the look on my face clearly and sighed.

“I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want you to worry.”

Oh, that was rich! Now I really wanted to know just who it was she was meeting up with.

“Why would I worry?” I asked, and now I was like a dog with a bone.

“Cooper called,” she hedged and I felt myself scowl.

“You’re going to meet up with Cooper Roth?” I demanded.

“Like I said, it’s not like that,” she said quickly. “I was suspicious, too, but he swears he just wants to catch up.”

“Conveniently, after three years and right after Silas is released from prison?” I asked. “Yeah, no. I don’t believe that for a minute, and you shouldn’t either, Delia.”

“I’m with Tiffany on this one, Girl. Sounds sus to me,” Nik chimed in.

“Nobody asked you,” Delia snapped at him defensively.

“I asked him,” I said shortly, suddenly angry and feeling pretty betrayed. “I asked Dragon, and he asked Nik. I went to them and asked for their help. I need them to watch my back and here you are, my best friend, and what do you do?” I demanded, thinking to myself you stand there and put a knife in it.

“This is why I didn’t tell you!” she said, exasperated. “I knew you’d be upset. You know I like Coop; that I have since like forever. Honestly, I figured it would be a good idea! That I might be able to find out what Silas is thinking or if he really is up to something. I wasn’t going to tell Cooper anything! I’m not going to tell him anything. I already told him that you are strictly off-limits as a topic of conversation.”

I shifted from foot to foot and shook my head. “Now isn’t the time to play super-secret double-agent spy, Lia. Seriously. Leave it alone, don’t go. Come with us instead.” I could tell by the look on her face that she was going to be stubborn. She had the idea in her head and she was going to do what she was going to do. I hated how it sounded like I was begging when I asked her to come with us instead of meeting up with her long-time, one-time crush, but I couldn’t tell you how desperate I was for her not to do this to me.

“It’s gonna be fine,” she said and she was already walking backward away from me. Emotions churned up from somewhere in my center and I jumped when Nik’s hands fell on my shoulders, kneading them reassuringly.

“Lia,” I called out and she waved and went around to the driver’s side of her car.

“Let it go, she’s a stubborn sort.”

“Don’t I know it?” I asked, unease raking its claws down my insides.

I trusted that she wasn’t going to say anything about me, at least not intentionally, but this was a dangerous game. One that I could potentially lose even though I didn’t even want to play.

Nik sighed as she drove past us out of the lot, waving through her window, her face set in stubborn lines that were only accentuated by her worry. She was worried that she was hurting our friendship, which she was, but I was worried for a completely different reason. Cooper was Silas’ best friend. He also knew that Delia had a crush on him, so he was likely working her for information.

My poor, much-loved but totally-being-an-idiot friend was trapped between her libido and her loyalty, and I knew that she had nothing but the best of intentions… but Jesus! Who was being the naive one, now? It certainly wasn’t me.

God, what a mess.

“She’s playing with fire, that one,” Nik remarked, and I loved that his voice held a similar worry for my friend that I was feeling.

“I know,” I said, and the frustration was a palpable thing, rising to choke me. I sniffed and tried to pretend it had nothing to do with the warring emotions in my heart and head but rather had everything to do with the frosty winter air.

“Let’s get you home,” he murmured and I realized that without knowing exactly what Delia was doing, I didn’t really want to go home. I knew she had my back, she’d always had my back, but the ‘what if’s’ were dogging me hard and I would be lying if I said I wasn’t just a little bit worried about what if she slipped… what if she said something without meaning to?

“Your home or mine?” I asked, staring off, after where her taillights had faded into the dark.

“Mine, if you’d like, or the club. Anyplace that’s warmer than out here.” His voice was gentle, and I felt the tension in my shoulders ease.

“Kind of can’t wait to learn more about that self-defense stuff.”

“Tomorrow we teach you to shoot,” he reminded and I turned with a sigh. I didn’t know how I felt about the whole ‘guns’ thing. Bitterness and anger aside, I was a lover, not a fighter and I hated that Silas was making me turn to violence as a solution, but sometimes, just sometimes, it was the only one. The practical part of me recognized that, even if I didn’t like it.

“Your place, if that’s okay.” I searched his face and took a half breath before letting it out. I had been about to ask if I could use his bathtub, but I tended not to ask things for myself anymore. I got too used to ‘no’ from both the way I was raised and Silas to the point I still had a hard time asking for anything.

I think Nik knew that about me, though. His face split into a broad smile as he said, “Go on, ask it.”

“Ask what?” I tried playing it cool.

“It was all over your face, Wahine. Ask me what you were gonna ask me, don’t ever be afraid of asking me for anything.”

“What’s the worst that could happen?” I agreed, “You could say ‘no?’”

“Too right,” he nodded and sat down on his bike, waiting me out, breath pluming the frigid air.

“I was wondering if you’d let me use your bathtub, my apartment doesn’t have one, just a shower.”

He nodded. “Sounds like a good idea; you need to relax. Come on, let’s go.”

“Thanks,” I murmured but I couldn’t be sure he heard me over the bike starting up. I made sure my bag was secure across my chest and got on behind him. The air was so icy I tended to bury my face in his back in an effort to hide from the wind. He stopped at the twenty-four-hour pharmacy on the way to his place and ran in real quick while I stared at my phone in the parking lot, shivering and trying to decide what, if anything, I should text to Lia. I finally decided there wasn’t anything I could say that wouldn’t make her angry or upset her and as much as I loved her, my trust in her was more than a bit broken right now. The ‘what if’s’ were whispering some pretty awful things from their dark corner of my mind.

If you text her, what if it makes her angry? What if she ratted you out? What if she’s sick of you and doing things for you all the time? What if, what if, what if…

The mechanical tones of the doorbell went off signaling Nik’s return. He came over to me and asked, “Put this in your bag for the ride, yeah?” and held up a rather doubled up grocery bag with red 'thank you’ lettering on it.

“Yes, of course,” I said swinging my gym bag around and unzipping the top. He shoved the bag of items away and zipped it closed and got back onto the bike in front of me.

The ride to his place was pretty short but it was freezing. I was so ready to be warm again.

He pulled into the alley behind the bar he worked at and we took the rickety wooden staircase on the outside of the building up to the floor Nik’s apartment was on. The door back here opened right into his apartment as he keyed his way into the two locks. It took me a minute to realize we were going in through the fire escape, but it was handy and it got us inside quicker. The problem was, it was just about as cold in here as it was out there.

I pulled his bag out of mine and handed it to him. He thanked me and rooted around in it, setting a couple of big cans of stew on the kitchen counter and handing me first a box of bath stuff and then a plastic wrapped bath bomb.

“I wasn’t sure what you liked,” he said, and finally added a big bag of lavender Epsom salts to the top of the growing pile in my arms. “So I got it all.”

I blinked, surprised, and laughed a little, “You didn’t have to do all this,” I said softly and sniffed, my nose running from the cold.

“I’ll get a fire going in the fireplace and the soup on. Your best bet on getting warm is the hot water from the tank, so, go on.” He hooked a hand behind my neck carefully and stepped up to me, pressing a kiss to my forehead, his thumb stroking along the side of my neck. I closed my eyes and sighed, grateful.

“Okay,” I murmured and he let me go, moving past me to the cold, dark, fireplace grate set in one wall.