It was another lovely day with Lydia. I was taking a shower after our usual activities. Lydia had insisted on us taking separate showers because she was tired. We’d gone two rounds already. Because I didn’t want to overburden her, I agreed to it. I pouted the entire time, but she’d turned her head away and pretended not to see.

“Ken!”

I paused, wiping water off my face. I turned around to see Lydia standing at the door, dressed in a pair of cotton track pants and a t-shirt, hair still wet.

“What is it? Did you change your mind?” I asked with a smirk, feeling a little hopeful. I pouted again when she shook her head.

“Your phone is ringing. I don’t know if it’s anything important…”

Now that she said it, I could hear it over the sound of the shower. My heart thumped for a moment, but the call cut off. There was another sound, this one for notifications, and I felt relieved.

No way would that guy send me a text.

It was probably something else that had come up.

“Can you check what it’s about for me? I’m almost done here.”

She looked surprised, probably that I was so trusting of her to handle my phone, but it wasn’t like I had that many secrets. I regretted it the moment I was out of the bathroom, and I found her sitting on the bed, frowning down at my phone. I’d forgotten the other secret I was keeping from her because most of my focus was on the news I was still waiting on from my friend.

“Who the hell is Kenji?” she asked, and my chest tightened.

“Um…”

Fuck, what do I say to her?

She didn’t look angry or anything, but I had hoped that this one thing would never make it on her radar. It wasn’t something I needed her knowing, but I’d grown so comfortable around her as to be careless. I took too long to reply, and she set the phone down on the nightstand, arching an eyebrow at me.

“Is there something you need to tell me?”

“What was the message about?”

“Someone’s messaging you about some woman called Ella. She’s getting married.”

I tightened my lips. It must have been one of my old friends. I could have told them I didn’t need any news about that woman. She’d already left me at the altar, what would I care if she walked down it for someone else? I wished the bastard luck with her, whoever he was.

“It’s nothing important, then,” I muttered, picking up the phone and deleting the message without reading it. I canceled the whole thread, and thought about deleting the idiot’s number, but decided to leave it.

“Are you going to tell me why this person called you Kenji?” Lydia asked.

I sighed as I sat down on the bed. I still had only a towel wrapped around my hips, but I didn’t have the energy to move around at that moment.

“I’ve been a little worried about this,” I admitted.

“About what?” she asked, frowning.

I took a deep breath and turned to face her so I could explain. “I’ve been going by Ken since I was a kid, but the name my parents gave me when I was born was Kenji.”

“I’m pretty sure that’s a Japanese name, though?”

“My parents are…” I started to explain, twisting my lips. “Hippies, you could say. They like to make their own rules instead of following the ones laid down by society. Around the time I was conceived, they were touring Japan. I was born here, but they were still in a bit of a craze over the country, so Mom named me Kenji.”

Her frown deepened. “Why did you hide it from me? It’s nothing bad; kids can't help what their parents name them. When I was younger, I didn’t like my name.”

I smiled, my chest warming up at her attempt to make me feel better. She placed one of her hands on my shoulder and rubbed gentle circles against my skin. Usually, when she touched me, I would be turned on. Right then, though, my mind was filled with the entire childhood trauma surrounding my name and my family life.

“I didn’t like my name either, but it was more than that,” I admitted. “Yeah, the name Kenji is Japanese. A lot of people surprisingly know this, and when I was a kid, I got a lot of heat because of it. My parents’ response to it all was that I should have ignored them. It’s not an easy thing to do when you go to school, though, not with so many people ganging up on you. My parents didn’t understand that I wasn’t like them. I wasn’t very happy with them for a long time.”

Her hand stilled, and when I glanced at her out of the corner of my eyes, she was looking at me with her eyes widened in surprise.

“You were bullied as a kid?” she said, tone incredulous.

I nodded. “It’s part of why I got into boxing. I had a lot of frustration to let out. Not that I beat people up. I just needed a release, and I found it in boxing.”

After a moment, she got back to rubbing those soothing circles that had my tense muscles relaxing. I could understand her surprise. Most people wouldn’t look at a guy my size and assume I’d been bullied in high school. It was because of stupid stereotypes, like only little guys had shit growing up. That wasn’t true at all.

“So, who’s Ella, anyway? A friend of yours?”

I scowled. “Not even close. In a way, you could say it’s tied down with the issue I had with my flighty parents. Ella was my attempt at putting down roots. I wanted to settle down pretty young because I didn’t want to be like my parents. We made plans to get married, but… she wasn’t very into it. I wasn’t the only boyfriend she had, and I didn’t even find out until she didn’t show up to our wedding.”

Lydia winced. “Oh, wow. That’s bad.”

“I know, right?” We shared a look, and I knew she understood.

“Why would someone message you to tell you she’s getting married, though?”

I sighed, shrugging my shoulders. “He’s a friend. He was a groomsman at the wedding that never happened. I guess he’s trying to tell me to move on? As if I haven’t already. Why would I stay hung up on a woman like her?”

Besides, she’d been a way to escape the destiny that was my parents’ lifestyle, and she ended up being even more flighty than they were. I had no use for a woman that couldn’t keep her pants on in front of other men.

“It was humiliating at the time, getting stood up at my wedding and having to explain what happened, then finding out everything else afterward. But I consider it a gift now, the best that woman ever gave me. She dumped me because she couldn’t change, and I moved on to a better life.”

That didn’t make it all hurt any less, though, not for someone I’d given up so much trust to. The betrayal had cut deep, and it wasn’t something easy to forget.

“Well, I like your name,” Lydia declared, diverting my attention. “It sounds nice, and I don’t think it’s anything to be ashamed of.”

I smiled at her, pecking a kiss on her cheek. “That’s nice of you to say. Even most of my friends my age give me shit over it, sometimes.” You’d think people would act grown up at the age of twenty-five, but no.

“I’m not going to,” she reassured me. Then she gave me an inviting smile. “Also, I was thinking. Bryson’s at a friend’s house for part of his break for Thanksgiving. That means we have the house to ourselves…”

Just like that, my body was heating up, and I looked at her with growing interest.

“I’m listening,” I said huskily, pulling her hand from my shoulder and placing kisses all over the back of it, never once straying my gaze from hers.

She gave me a sultry look through her lashes. “I did kind of like it that time we had sex on my couch,” she admitted shyly.

I grinned roguishly at her. “Is that so?”

Lydia was rarely playful, so I took advantage of it in the times when she was. Still dressed in nothing but a towel, I picked her up and carried her downstairs. I’d already had her twice in her room, and it was still early. If she wanted some couch action, I wasn’t going to complain.

We stripped down in the living room and fucked on the couch. Then we went to the kitchen for a drink and made out on the counter. We spent the evening doing all the shit I imagined parents dreamt of when their kids had somewhere else to be for a free day. We did all the stuff we didn’t normally do. Lydia even let me take her in the kitchen, bent over the counter with me fucking her from behind.

We walked around naked. She was shy about it, but I’d pause every few minutes to kiss and touch her, and she grew more comfortable with herself. I found her body beautiful, and I let her know. I was pretty comfortable myself, feeling satisfaction every time her gaze lingered on my body. I was smiling as we went to sleep later that night, wrapped in each other’s arms.

This time, I stayed until morning.

My phone ringing on the nightstand woke me up. I grumbled, reaching for it with one arm, the other still holding Lydia’s warm, naked body to my chest. I even had thoughts of waking her up for some nice, slow morning sex. Until I saw the name on my phone’s screen.

It was like a bucket of cold water had just been dumped on my head.

After so long, my friend was calling back, likely to report his findings.

“Shit,” I muttered.

I pulled away from Lydia, slowly. I cut the call and sent him a text, telling him to call me back in five minutes. I glanced over at Lydia, feeling a little guilty because I’d forgotten all about it. The words that strange woman had told me, how I’d called my cop friend to investigate Lydia like there was any possibility she could be a criminal.

My face was warm with shame as I left the room, but my heart was beating faster because I was curious.

I rushed around the house getting dressed, cursing myself for tossing my clothes all over the place. I didn’t even leave a note as I went back to my place. As soon as the door closed behind me, my phone was ringing again, and I picked up the call.

“Hey, Ken,” he said, and the serious tone he was starting the conversation with had dread growing in my chest.

“What is it?” I asked, anxious.

My friend sighed. “I’m afraid I don’t have any good news for you here, Kenji.”

I didn’t even react to his use of my full name. “You’ve got to be kidding me?”

“No, I’m serious. I looked into it just like you asked, and I spent so long because there’s hardly anything to find. Whoever that woman was… she might have been onto something. This husband, Mike, literally disappeared. I’d think he didn’t exist if I hadn't looked up a copy of his old driver’s license. I think you need to be careful around this woman.”

No way.

It just wasn’t possible, but even my friend seemed to be suspicious about her now.

If only I could bring myself to go back to her place and ask Lydia what happened.