Crossing the Line Part One (A Novella) (7 page)

"Hmm. I don't think Mom let us near girls
until we were fifteen or so. Or at least she thought we didn't go
near them."

"Oh God. Don't give me something else to
worry about. Like them sneaking behind my back. Have you lost your
mind?"

He laughed. "Sorry. Guess I could've kept
that to myself."

By the time they reached the first flea
market, Victoria definitely got the sense that while Nick could
charm her endlessly but anything serious about his home life was
off limits. Any time she mentioned it or asked a question, he
deftly changed the subject. He wasn't rude about it, just very
unwilling to talk about it.

The air carried a spring morning chill, but
she'd anticipated it and brought a gray cardigan to wear over the
dress. Her feet were clad only in sandals but the day would warm up
before that started to bother her. They crossed the gravel parking
lot to the furthermost, tin-roof covered aisle. It wasn't busy yet
and only a few people mingled through certain vendors.

Nick followed her patiently through the
aisles, making her laugh or just standing with her in companionable
silence.

They spotted a perfect 1900's desk and a
lamp for one of her clients and loaded it into the truck, then
headed to the next flea market. The temperature had risen while
they'd been in the truck, so she left her cardigan behind. Victoria
began to lightly sweat underneath her dress so she took a rubber
band from her purse and pulled her hair up in a pony-tail. Her hair
frizzed out in little strands from her pony-tail because of the
humidity and she wished that the heat didn't turn her into Cousin
It. She snuck a glance at him while they strolled through the
aisles. When he reached to pick up something, his muscles flexed
underneath the thin cotton material. Her stare followed the sleeve
of tattoos, eyeing one of various bright colors. Cherry blossoms
surrounded a kneeling samurai. It made him look sexy, especially
with the gleam of sweat on his skin. She wondered how he looked
shirtless.

He stopped at a table selling water and
bought them each a bottle. It didn't seem like that big of a
gesture, but it made her feel special. That he cared about her.
Just like how he brought her a cup of coffee that morning. None of
which he had to do.

"Nick?" A bubbly voice called out.

Both Nick and Victoria stopped, and panic
crossed his face. The voice called out again, literally trilling
like a bird. Nick winced.

Victoria turned and watched a pin-up blonde
come across the aisle, arms outstretched. She launched herself into
Nick's arms and planted a raunchy kiss on him, leaving hot pink
lipstick behind. Victoria's eyebrows rose.

Nick tried to disengage himself, but the
girl clung tighter. "Oh, Nicky. I've missed you. Why don't you come
around anymore? I loved playing your nurse, fixin' up all your
bumps and bruises." Nick shot her a pleading look. Victoria knew he
wanted her help but she was too busy trying to tamp down her
irrational hurt at seeing another woman all over him.

"Nicky?" The girl paused when she noticed he
wasn't giving her any love back.

"Uh, Sabine, it's been a while." He peeled
her arms and legs from his torso and set her down. "I haven't been
fighting for the past two years. I quit."

Sabine crossed her arms, pushing her breasts
up and out. She even pouted. "But Nicky, that's no excuse. We used
to have so much fun."

Victoria wanted to know what he meant by
fighting. Was he a violent person? It was weird, she hadn't really
thought he was. She turned to give the two of them more privacy,
and herself space to breathe, and went further down the row to a
seller that had shelves of wood statues. She tried so hard not to
listen to the conversation carrying down the aisle but she couldn't
not
hear.

Sabine had that whiny voice that she'd
always hated. She remembered a few girls from school who'd talked
like that because they thought it made the guys like them. That it
made them seem fragile and womanly. Victoria snorted. Ridiculous.
She didn't know how men put up with it. She didn't realize that
Nick liked that kind of thing.

Victoria snuck a glance over her shoulder
while she pretended to sift through lace doilies a stall over. Nick
stood with his arms crossed and a frown on his face. Apparently he
didn't find Sabine adorable anymore. That little warmth she felt at
that could shove it. She didn’t care if he had a woman, or several
women. It was none of her business.

With a few more words, Nick broke away from
Sabine and strode over to Victoria, frown still in place. "Thanks
for deserting me."

Victoria scowled. "You looked like you had
it handled."

He rubbed the back of his neck. "Is she
still standing there?" She peeked over his shoulder, nodded.
"Christ."

"Maybe if we walk further down, she'll lose
sight of you." Victoria pulled him with her, ignoring the warmth of
skin when she placed her hand on his arm. "So, fighting?"

Nick sighed. "I used to do fights when I was
younger. With my brother. I quit the national circuit and came home
two years ago, opened this business."

"That sounds nice." Victoria said to be
polite. She hated fighting, always had. It seemed brutish and
primitive. She could understand doing it for self-defense, but for
fun? She didn't understand that at all.

Nick searched her face for a moment. "Maybe.
But it came at a point in my life where I needed the structure and
discipline of it. Me and my brother. If not for MMA, I probably
would've ended up a felon."

"A felon? Were you a troublemaker as a kid?"
Victoria led them over to a table full of eccentric figurines. Some
of them were beachy, and she could use them in some of the condos
and beach houses.

"I got into some trouble."

Victoria exhaled slowly. "You're not going
to go into it, are you?" She picked up a pink starfish; looked
closely and set it back down. "I guess it doesn't really
matter."

"Okay." Nick looked at her, confused. "You
against fighting?"

"I think it's stupid." She let it slip
before she thought about it and heat crept up her neck and into her
cheeks. "Oh, God. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that."

When Nick laughed it didn't make her feel
better. "It's okay. My mother hated it, too. Couldn't stand it when
we came home, bruised and beaten. My brother broke a few bones. How
about this?" He showed her a picture frame that held real sand
dollars in different sizes.

"That's actually cute." She took it from
him, checked the price sticker. "Only seven dollars."

"Actually? I have some design sense."

"I bet your apartment, or wherever you live
is bare. Only essentials. Nothing hanging on the walls." When he
didn't say anything, she laughed. "I thought so. Usually when
people leave their homes bare, it's because they don't actually
feel like it's home. They haven't quite settled into the house, and
don't decorate it because they feel like at any moment they may
leave. Or they're afraid of the commitment." She left him staring
at her as she went to pay for the frame.

Spending an
entire day in Victoria's company probably hadn't been his best
idea. Nick stared at his empty walls, and his 'bare essentials' and
damned if she hadn't been right. He sat back on the couch, propped
his feet up on his coffee table, and took a sip from his beer. He
didn't like the fact that she made him rethink his bachelor pad. It
suited him just fine. And what was that shit about not wanting to
commit? How the hell do you commit to a damn apartment? Bare walls
didn't mean he had issues and she wasn't going to make him rethink
bachelorhood, no matter how much he wanted her in his bed.

When a knock sounded on his door, he swung
his feet over and stood. The beer dangled in his fingertips as he
opened the door.

"Hi, Nick."

Just his luck. Another of his one-night
stands had hunted him down. "Hey, Alyssa." He stood in the doorway,
blocking her way in. She wore a short, denim mini skirt and a
shimmery halter top that looked like she poured glitter all over
her torso. She'd teased up her hair and wore too much make-up. When
she stepped closer, she smelled of cheap beer and cigarettes, and
it almost choked him. Funny, none of that used to bother him.

"You going to invite me in?" She licked her
lips and leaned into him, giving him what she thought was a sexy
glare. To him she just looked ridiculous. When had all this
changed?

"No, Alyssa. It's late, and I have to work
in the morning." He tried to shut the door but she maneuvered her
body through the small opening.

"That never stopped you before." She cocked
her head to the side. "You look like you could use some fun. You
seem tense."

He rubbed his eyebrow, wondering why the
hell he'd thought these women were sexy. "I'm fine. I don't need
company tonight."

"Oh, come on, Nick."

He could tell he needed to be an asshole to
get her off his back. "Alyssa. I used to be interested, but I've
grown out of it. Go back to the clubs and hunt someone else down."
He pushed her out the door and locked it.

She banged on the door for a good ten
minutes, yelling at him. He sank onto the couch and waited for her
to go away. He spotted his cell phone, fought the urge to text
Victoria and lost.

Hey. Hope you found everything you needed
today.

It took her a few minutes to reply.

Victoria: I did, thanks.

He stared at the screen, at a loss. Why did
he have this compulsion to talk to her? And what did he want to
say? He'd never had a problem talking to a woman. They usually just
fell right into his bed, no heavy seduction needed.

Anytime you need a ride, or a truck, you can
ask. Let your father enjoy retirement.

Victoria: Yeah, maybe.

Was she deliberately being aloof? Did he do
something wrong? He'd never understand females. He thought back
over the day, wondering what could have made her give him the cold
shoulder. He took another slug of beer, and it hit him.
Sabine
.

The girl practically wrapped herself around
him, and it had taken him much longer than he would've liked to get
her to leave him alone. Victoria had witnessed that.

She was in a different league than women
like Sabine and Alyssa. She had goals and she worked for them. She
didn't sleep around. He, who was normally charming when it came to
women, was at a loss for words.

He shook his head and drained his beer in
one gulp. He really shouldn't care. Shouldn't put too much thought
into this situation. Victoria was off-limits and he had to keep it
that way.

§ §

The next morning he stood in the office he
rebuilt for her. The sounds of tools whirring and his men joking
around with each other drifted over him, but he ignored it. They
ignored him, noticing his surly mood when he'd walked through the
door.

He rubbed a hand down his face and groaned.
Victoria's scent had sunk into the bones of his truck. He'd gotten
in this morning, breathed, and been hit by a case of desire so hard
he thought he'd lose his mind. So naturally, his mood had darkened.
Turning down all those women hadn't been a great idea. He was
sexually frustrated, but none of them interested him. Only one
woman did and her disinterest baffled him. He never had to talk
women into his bed, and he always had several texts waiting for
him. So why did he care if Victoria wasn't interested?

Why did it feel like she was a challenge
he'd love to take on? He had time to win her over, but did he
really want to deal with what came after that? Something about
Victoria screamed long-time love and he just wasn't that type of
man. He was his father's son.

Damn if she didn't make him want to be
better than that. That's what terrified him the most.

Nick scanned the office. Wes worked hard for
his daughter, helping stain the new receptionist counter. For the
first time in Nick's life, he wondered how he would've turned out
if he'd had a father like Wes. He'd never focused on it before,
preferring not to worry about the bastard who'd abandoned them.
He'd only worried about his mother and Luke.

Wes clearly loved his daughters, and from
the few times Nick had seen him with his wife, he was clearly
devoted to her. If he'd had a father like that, he might be good
enough for Victoria.

He really needed to focus on something
else.

He focused on the work. He dripped sweat,
his muscles ached, and his mind numbed to anything other than
measurements and the feel of the tools in his hands. His crew
eventually teased him out of his funk, making him laugh over their
antics by the end of the day. After they'd rolled up all the
extension cords and turned everything off, Nick checked his phone.
When he saw the message icon, his heart skipped a beat. He opened
it, calling himself an idiot when he saw it was from Luke. Their
mom wanted them to come over for dinner.

He rushed home, showered, and headed to his
mom's condo on the other side of town. It overlooked the beach,
something he and Luke had fought her to accept. She loved the sound
of the ocean, looking at the waves and they wanted to give her
everything she loved. Even though she was in remission from breast
cancer, they both worried that she would get sick again. They
wanted her to have everything she wanted, whether she liked it or
not.

He headed up the stairs to her second floor
condo, knocked, then walked in. The smell of chicken marsala hit
him, and his stomach immediately growled. It'd been a while since
he'd eaten a good, home cooked meal.

His mother stood in the kitchen wearing a
bright pink apron over a navy blue dress, short gray hair pulled
away from her face with bobby pins. His gaze raked over her, making
sure she showed no signs of sickness. Her eyes sparkled when she
caught his scrutiny.