Offensive Behavior (Sidelined #1) (18 page)

He
liked this lesson, because he had the controls totally to himself and she
trusted him to make her feel good. He like it because he’d spent all week
thinking about her and what he wanted to do with her and he hadn’t come up with
this, an achingly slow delivery of pleasure so quietly passionate he thought he
might shake apart before she wrapped her legs around him and tightened up from
inside out. They went over together and she was asleep in minutes, rolling on
her side, pulling on his arm so he spooned up behind her.

She’d
lost her home tonight, but he’d share everything he owned and everything he
planned on winning back with her, if she’d let him. He’d spent all week
thinking about her and he’d never thought of that, but he did now and he went
to sleep with new dreams.

SIXTEEN

Zarley woke in Reid’s big bed in his darkened bedroom. No Reid and
no sign of him having been beside her recently. She rolled to get a look at his
clock and got a surprise to see it was eye level to the bed. He had bedside
tables and reading lamps.

She
flopped back down. She had a bad feeling about the fire. Even if they could get
back inside and found everything they owned wasn’t smoke or water damaged,
there’s no way they could move back in again. Short term, Cara could stay with
Gavin. But Zarley was homeless. She had tonight with Reid and then she’d have
to couch surf with Kathryn or Lizabeth, probably both of them in turn.

She
starfished her arms and legs. It might be a while till she had so much room to
move again. She needed to get up and get organized.

But it
would’ve been nice to start with a hug, with Reid’s enthusiastic arms, his big
wide chest, to burrow into.

“I
didn’t want to wake you.”

As though
she’d summoned him by longing, Reid lounged in the doorway in a pair of faded
blue jeans with the knees blown out and a well-washed and faded t-shirt with
the Plus logo and the words
Better Together
printed on it.

She
felt like she’d been caught out daydreaming when she had bigger issues. “I need
to get moving.”

“Not on
my account.”

“I have
things to do. I have a term paper to finish. I need to call Cara. I need.” A
hot shower, coffee, food, knowledge of what happened to people who got turfed
out of their apartment without it being their fault.

“Anything
you need that I can do, you got.”

Better
Together. They weren’t that, they were a thing. He had other words on his chest
about being alone and apart.
She
sat up, bringing the sheet with her. “You’re not responsible for me.”

The
sleepy-eyed look he gave her was anything but. “Not responsibility I’m feeling.”

She
shook her head. “Sorry, this is not—”

“Nothing
to be sorry about.”

“I’d
like to go past the apartment. Call the fire brigade. I do have to finish a
term paper. Maybe I should get myself together and go.”

“Why?”

“Because
despite the shirt, you didn’t sign up to be a white knight.”

He
glanced down, then pushed off the doorway. “Coffee is ready.”

“And
you don’t need a damsel in distress. You want a damsel who knows her way around
sex.”

“I
didn’t sign up for a warm body. I signed up for you, Zarley. And if you have
stuff to do then I’ll either help you do it or I’ll wait.” He turned his back
on her. He would’ve missed the way her mouth dropped open. Better together
indeed. He said, “Coffee is up,” from the hall in a distinctly pissed-off tone.

She got
herself upright, chose the least smoky smelling t-shirt and her jeans and went
to the kitchen. He had rugs. He had a new sofa.

A very
funky chunky glass dining table that looked like an elongated letter
C
had
landed in the room. She’d been aware of the apartment being different last night
but now she could focus on the details. It looked great. It looked like someone
lived here. Someone with money to set on fire. She stopped beside the dining
table, ran her hand over the cool surface. It had to be some name designer’s
piece. You only sat on the long sides, not at either end, because the thick
curve of the
C
met the floor in a waterfall of smooth, blue tinted
glass. This was the table he wanted to fuck her on. She heartily approved.

He
wasn’t in the kitchen, so she found a mug and poured her own coffee. All his tableware
looked like hers and Cara’s. Nothing matched, the plates were from different
settings, the mugs were old, clean but stained with cracked and faded glazing. They
made her feel better about being here. He had money now, but he’d once been
homeless too. She went in search of him and found him in the office. This room
had been full of boxes. Now he had file cabinets and a bookcase and bright red-leather
easy chair. His cables were still held by Lego men though.

He sat
at his desk, focused on his screen. She leaned in the doorway. A parallel to
what he’d done in the bedroom.

“Hi.”

He
didn’t look around. “There’s fruit and yogurt, cereal. There’s bread. Dev
brought more Indian.”

“Okay.”

“You
can help yourself. Whatever you need.”

“Are
you going to stay in here?”

“Yeah.”

Just,
yeah. No explanation. She didn’t even get a head turn out of him. “Could you
look at me, please?”

A
slight swivel of his chair, a quarter turn of his head, then he focused on his
screen again. “I’ll take you back to the apartment whenever you’re ready, or
wherever you want to go.”

“Are
you sulking?” He closed his eyes.

“I’m
giving you space to do what you need to do.”

“You
sulked at Lucky’s for a month. You’re sulking now because,” she flapped her
arm. “I don’t know why, but that’s what you’re doing. I shouldn’t want to kiss
you when you’re sulking but I do.” And what was that about? Possibly something
to do with how miserable he looked. “I’m not going to because it will reward the
behavior and you’re better than that.”

Now she
got his eyes. She got a despairing sigh. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do.
You’re upset and I’m not good with that. I’ll say the wrong thing, do the wrong
thing. Make whatever just happened worse.”

“Last
night you knew what to do. What’s changed?”

“Last
night you told me what to do.”

And in
bed he’d surprised and delighted her when she’d expected him to simply use her
body to please himself.

“That
was all you, last night, and it was pretty damn wonderful.”

A
grudging smile played at the corner of his mouth.

“And
you know it.”

“I know
it.”

No
smile to soften that. Arrogant. She still wanted to kiss him, because he wore
this uncertainty like it might smother him. “So what’s this about?”

“I
thought you might cry or, I don’t know. But you made it clear you don’t need
me.”

“I was
disappointed to wake up alone.”

His
head shot around. His frown deepened.

“I
don’t need you to save me, Reid, but you can be my friend as well as my lover.”

“Ah. So.”
He stood abruptly, his chair skating across the floor a little way. “You and
me, we’re all right.”

“I
could eat a horse, and I’m pissed off about the fire and not knowing what
happens next, but unless you keep sulking, you and me are totally fine.”

“I want
to kiss you.” He still looked like this whole thing was a problem he needed to
manage and didn’t have the skill for it.

She
bent down and put her empty mug on the floor. Then she ran, laughing at the
quick blink of disbelief she got before she heard him come after her. She
wasn’t going far and she intended to get caught, but not without a good show. When
he cornered her near the TV she used the back of his new sofa as a vault and
got around him. She earned a laugh for that, deep and warm, wiping out his
uncertainty, replacing it with the hunger she’d seen in his face when he’d been
parked outside Lucky’s. She like that look on him. She loved it was directed at
her. She stopped dodging him and let him nab her arm, drag her into his body
and drop his head so they could kiss.

He
rested his forehead on hers. “I’ve been known to sulk. Retreat. I get the hell
out of Dodge when things get tricky.”

“And by
tricky do you mean emotional?”

He
nodded. “I’m good at upsetting people. I’m not good at knowing what to do when
that happens.”

She
wound her arms around his neck. “You didn’t upset me.”

“But
the fire, what you lost and you don’t want me to help.”

“I
don’t need you to help. There’s a difference.”

He
sighed. “Too subtle for me.”

She
stood on her toes, walked onto his feet and pulled on his neck. She fastened
onto his lips in the most unsubtle way she knew how and made it clear she was
still into him.

She
felt a current run through his body; it tightened his hands on her ass, it got
her squeezed closer, it put more force in his kiss and a shudder through his frame.

This
thing they had was strong and it wasn’t near played out.

He was
the one to stop things overheating. He tore his mouth away. “You need to eat. You
have things to do. Tell me how to help.”

Words
that were as lovely as his kisses. Restraint she knew he didn’t want to
exercise. She called Cara while Reid got breakfast ready. And after they ate he
took her back to the apartment on the bike. The building was still cordoned off
with police tape and closer set barricades, but without the engines and the
army of fire fighters, cops and refugees, the devastation was easier to see.

Se
Jong’s was a burned-out shell emitting an acrid smell onto the street front. The
wall between the restaurant and the stairwell had collapsed in parts and water
dripped from the ceiling.

“We’re
not getting back in there anytime soon.”

He
reached for her hand. He had both their helmets in his other one. “You’re not
going to want back whatever you left inside either. It will be smoke and water
damaged.”

There
wasn’t much worth getting upset about. Her textbooks, which would hurt to
replace, more clothes and shoes, old photographs and keepsakes. Cara had lost
more. Her patterns, fabric and sewing machine. She’d been stoic on the call but
she’d been hopeful. Zarley was going to need to give it to her straight.

“Did
you have insurance?”

“No.” They’d
had dreams and now they had starting again. He wouldn’t understand. “Can we go
back to your place, please? I need to make some calls.”

They
got back on the bike. But he took a different route back to his apartment. She
wasn’t feeling a joyride and the streets he’d chosen weren’t exactly
picturesque. But when he pulled over in front of a nondescript apartment
building, it made sense.

He took
his helmet off and waited for her to do the same. He jerked his chin toward the
building. “That’s where I lived with Dev. Sixth floor. View of the back alley.
We moved in after college. I lived there until two years ago. I didn’t have
insurance either. Yeah, I have security now and more resources than I ever
expected, but you and I are not that different.”

They
were because he’d made it and could again, and she’d crashed out, and didn’t
know where the hell she was going, but she appreciated the sentiment. “You and
your mom were homeless once?”

“You
read that.”

She
propped her chin on his shoulder. “You give good Google.”

“You
give pretty good Google yourself. I was a dumb kid. It was summer. I thought we
were camping. I had no idea it was because we didn’t have an option. I thought
it was fun. Mom got a new job and found a place to rent and we were fine.”

But
he’d lived here when he could afford better and when he got better he lived
like he was camping. She held him tighter on the way back to the apartment and
thought about ditching her term paper for the pleasure of being eaten out on
his dining room table.

That
almost came off the agenda altogether because he tried to help. He took one
look at her business statistics paper and told her she was doing it wrong.

“Wrong?”

He
amended. “Inelegant.”

“You
think numbers are elegant.” Of course he did.

“I
think you’re elegant but your paper is a C at best.”

“If you
wrote it for me it’d be an A.”

“Hell,
yes.” He pulled her laptop around so he could access the keyboard.

“You’re
not doing my paper for me.”

He laughed.
“Okay, I get it.” He pushed the laptop back toward her. “Let me talk you
through where you went wrong.”

She’d
struggled with this subject. Gotten extra tutoring. Even had her essay outline
assessed because she’d been nervous about it. “I don’t think I’ve gotten it
wrong.”

“It
could be better.”

“I’m
happy with how it is.”

His
foot fell off the stool rung and slapped to the floor. “No, you see—”

He was
the one who needed to see. “Reid, are you trying to tell me what to think?”

“Yeah,
because you’re—”

“Doing
it my way.”

He
stood, hands going to his hair. “But that makes no sense. You’re a
perfectionist.”

She
shook her head. She was once a champion athlete, she knew she’d made it look
like perfection, but she’d rarely scored a ten and she’d learned chasing perfection
could get you stuck repeating the same skills and not learning new ones. “Does
my way get the job done?”