Duke
“Are you sure about this?” Lydia leans against the bar, nursing the same beer she opened an hour ago. She’s been worried for me ever since I crawled to her apartment with my tail tucked between my legs, ready to hear an ‘I told you so’ that never came.
Instead, she got me unnecessarily drunk, made me spill my heart to her and Randy, and cooked me breakfast the next morning when I could hardly lift my head, let alone comprehend how I was going to fix things with Charlotte.
“Quit giving him shit, baby.” Randy kisses Lydia’s temple as he walks by.
“Yeah, baby, quit giving me shit,” I tease, nudging my elbow into hers. “You going to explain when you two shacked up or not?”
“We aren’t shacking up.” Lydia grabs a bottle of rum and two shot glasses. One of the newer bartenders’ eyes her as she pours the drinks. We cheer and swallow the liquid. “I’m in love with him,” she whispers into the glass.
“Oh, I know you are. Just wanted to hear you say it. And just so we’re clear, I’ve never been more positive about anything in my life than I am about Charlotte.” I glance at Rachel standing at the front entrance, waiting to give me a signal.
“What changed it all for you?” Lydia’s eyes soften at the sight of Randy talking with Derks near the stage. “What got you here at the bar, ready to embarrass the shit out of yourself?”
Not quite the encouragement I’m looking for, but I’ll take it.
“A lot of small things got me here, but mostly because, when I’m with her, just in the same room, I’m a better person.”
“I can see the difference in you.” She nods, a distant expression on her face, until she’s pulled back to reality. “The harshness is gone.”
“I’m still me, Lyd.” I smile over my shoulder and turn back to Rachel for my cue.
“Just better.” She moves in front of me. “Don’t fuck this up, okay? She deserves a little bit of honesty and love.”
“Who said anything about love?”
“If I can admit it, then so can you.” Her eyebrow perks up. She’s begging me to challenge her, and when I stay silent, she leaves me alone.
How did I get here? The true answer is I’m not exactly sure, but I’ve never been more at peace in my mind and secure in who I am.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see Rachel frantically wave and nod to the stage. That girl is going to have a heart attack if she doesn’t calm down. When I told her my plan, she tried to discourage me. I didn’t heed her warning because, quite frankly, I don’t give a shit what anyone says or thinks about how I feel or what I do to prove it.
As if they know I have business to attend to, the crowd opens a path to the stage.
“Wish me luck.” I place my liquid courage on the table next to Lydia.
“You don’t need it.” She turns in Randy’s arm, and they wait for the show.
The crowd is packed, of course. Why wouldn’t it be one of the busier Tuesdays on record? Did Derks send out a newsletter, for fuck’s sake? I push through the last line of bodies, reminding myself to take deep breaths to control the anxiety brewing inside me.
“I know it’s not Karaoke Thursday,” Derks says, and the crowd roars with excitement. “But we have a special treat for you all tonight. This asshole is going to embarrass himself for a girl.”
I face the crowd and see a mixture of responses. The guys look unamused, while every female looks at me with lust-filled eyes, secretly wishing it was their men doing what I am.
The only one who matters steps through the door in all her beautiful glory. She and Rachel speak for a short moment, and my eyes track Charlotte’s long legs as she works her way through the horde of bodies. On command, she spins on her heels when the music starts to play through the speakers.
Our eyes lock, and the entire world disappears. This should be no surprise. It’s how it’s always been for me when it comes to Charlotte. A girl like her has this way of making the impossible seem easy.
She’s the reason I have this stupid microphone to my mouth, ready to make a complete fool of myself. With pushes and pulls, she tests my patience and raises my self-awareness, to the point I don’t recognize myself. She may not know it, but she’s the reason I’m entertaining the idea of letting my mother be part of my life again.
Charlotte puts everyone first. Hell, she played the part of Jacob’s doting girlfriend while dealing with the hurt he’d caused with grace and dignity. She never wants to be the reason anyone’s world is disrupted. This girl, staring at me, makes me want to be a better person.
The upbeat cheesy music begins to play and I fumble through the first verse of “I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles).” A sheen of sweat forms on my forehead. Charlotte’s eyes widen, and something close to a smile forms on her lips. If I wasn’t fully focused on her, I’d miss it, but right there, the corner of her perfect mouth, the part I like to kiss the most, turns up just enough to know I haven’t completely lost her.
When I take a step forward, the crowd shifts, clearing the path straight to Charlotte. Her legs are bare, perfectly toned, and dammit, do I want to take a minute to absorb everything about her. There’s time for that later.
Charlotte doesn’t blink. A herd of elephants could stampede through this bar, and she’d remain unmoved, but I push through the performance. When the music fades, the silence is deafening. No one cheers. The room is completely still, waiting to see what my next move will be.
Charlotte sways slightly on her heels and turns away.
“Stop her,” I say into the microphone.
Rachel steps in front of her best friend and holds her at arm’s length before leaning forward and whispering something in her ear. Charlotte reels around and we come face to face again.
“You ambushed me.” She smacks my chest as I walk to her.
“You ambushed me.”
“How do you figure?” She holds her arms out and looks around the bar.
“I have my own list, Charlotte.” Her eyes widen at the mention of her graffiti artwork. I needed a way to clear my mind, so I ran, and as fate would have it, Charlotte popped out from the trail I showed her, what feels like a lifetime ago. I saw her words scribbled, much like she does in her notebooks, but instead of random thoughts and ideas, her words were specific and thought out. “Don’t say anything, but listen. You’re to blame for a lot, too, but just like you, I’m willing to shoulder it.”
“Did you put them all up to this?” Charlotte scans the packed bar.
“All these people?” I laugh at my own joke. “No, these people are strangers.”
“They’re looking at us.” Her cheeks pinken. Desperate to brush the back of my hand over them, I retreat, so not to scare her like a baby bird.
“They’re looking at you.” I smile. “Dammit, why do you have to be so beautiful?”
“Beautiful is a word only boys use to appease a woman.” The memory of us at the furniture store is one I’ll never forget. If I look back, that’s where it all changed. Everything inside me knows she’s meant to be mine.
“You’re right. Beautiful doesn’t even begin to describe you.”
“Don’t try to flatter me now. I’m really mad at you.” She crosses her arms over her chest, but I witness her resolve cracking.
“Yeah, well, I’m mad at you, too, but you showed up here anyway. Now, are you going to listen to me, or what?” I smirk because I can see how badly she wants to say something. “I blame you, Charlotte Novak, for making me believe I’m worthy of someone like you. I blame you for stepping through that door and never allowing me to look back. You are the girl who makes me pause and think, ‘Fuck, this girl is it’. You’re to blame for all of that and so much more.”
“So, what are we going to do about it?” Her eyes sparkle with an excitement I feel in every ounce of my body. I want to wrap her in my arms, carry her out of here, and disappear for a while.
“I can’t do this without you.” I place my hand on her heart, and it races under my touch.
“Do what?” Her lips loosen from the tight line she’s trying so damn hard to hold in place.
“Love you.” I just said I love her, out loud, and I’ve never felt more naked in my life. “I’ve never felt like I was enough. You can fight this all you want, but it’s there like I promised. When you close your eyes, you’ll always feel me because, whether you like it or not, Charlotte, you are just as much a part of me as I am you.”
“Attraction isn’t enough, Duke.”
She’s right. When I first laid eyes on her, it was all physical. I would’ve done anything to rip off her clothes and lay her bare on my sheets. Over time, it’s all shifted, slowly and on purpose. She can kick and stomp, but no amount of fight will work.
“And thank fuck for that, or else we’d all be screwed. These looks aren’t going to last forever.” I draw an imaginary circle around my face.
“Forever?” Her voice breaks under the weight of one single word.
“Isn’t that what I said?” She shivers when I brush her hair behind her ear and guide the back of my hand down her soft cheek.
“You think you can give me forever?” Like she can’t get enough, her head tilts to lean into my touch.
“I can give you what you need, Charlotte.”
“What is it I need so bad?” She fights hard against the tears, but her heart breaks open. I allow one tear to fall, sweeping it away with my thumb and promising myself it’s the last tear I’ll ever cause.
“You need flaws.” I wrap my arms around her waist and pull her in close until our bodies feel like one.
“Excuse me?” The way her brow furrows when she leans away from me makes me happy. She’s completely unaware of what’s coming next.
“From the start, we’ve been flawed, and I don’t know about you, but I’m okay with it. Perfection isn’t something we should strive for. You once thought you had that, and if that’s what perfection looks like to you, then I want to give you the opposite, Charlotte. I want to hand over messy and damn near disastrous. I want you to look back at the scars of our relationship and still see something beautiful.”
“Is that what you’re offering me? A disastrous and messy kind of love? You aren’t very good at this romance thing, Duke.” She eases back into my arms, where she belongs.
Her cheek leans against my chest, and I close my eyes for a second to take it in. The feel of her hair weaving through my fingers. The way my entire body is aware of hers. This is enough to know I’ll never remain the man I am right now, in this moment, unless she’s by my side.
“I’m twenty-two years out of practice, but I think I could love you like you deserve,” I whisper into her hair.
“Could?” Through her eyelashes, love sings from her eyes like a familiar song. I want to put it on repeat to remind me how it makes me feel.
“I already love you like you deserve.” I pull away, suddenly aware of the audience gathering around us.
“So, what now, Duke Anderson?” Charlotte tilts her chin, and her blue eyes fill with a deep longing.
I skim a finger over her bottom lip and then replace it with my own lips. Kissing Charlotte is like coming home, and dammit, I’ve never felt more alive than I do when her tongue dances together with mine.
“Breakfast?” I say between our lips.
“I could go for some sausage.”
Damn, I love this girl. She throws her head back in laughter when I tickle her waist. A familiar song plays, drowning out the crowd, and we sway, every inch of her against me.
“Breakfast in bed, then?” Her wide-eyed innocence is for show. Her hips grind into me, and I groan.
Charlotte’s weaseled her way into my heart and cuddled in close, and now, I refuse to let her go. She once said Jacob never danced with her, and as she grins at me, happier than I’ve ever seen her, I know I’d do anything to keep a smile on her face.
Even if it means spending a lifetime shouldering the blame.