Sneaking a Peek (5 page)

Tina—Ethan’s last girlfriend.

She tried not to sob while the pain built tight in her chest, but it became hard to contain. She watched in horror as Tina stormed the driveway toward her car, turning at irregular intervals to throw clothes at Ethan. A blouse, a pair of jeans, and when they didn’t seem to have the effect she wanted, she toed off her shoes and threw them too.

“You cheating asshole.”

The woman’s scream echoed in Tarney’s mind, crystal clear. She couldn’t mistake the words even though she wanted to, and the shock hit her with a physical punch in the gut.

Ethan kept his voice quiet; too quiet for Tarney to hear while he placated Tina. Neither his words nor the arm gestures appeared to work. Every now and again, he would look toward her house, a pained expression on his face. She couldn’t be sure if he was afraid of being caught or worried about her reaction.

Tarney stayed in the darkness, fixated on the dispute. Her throat tightened with every thrown piece of clothing, and she wished she had the strength to look away. After fifteen minutes of live Springer action, Tina got in her car, slammed the door, and gave Ethan the bird while she started the engine.

Tarney couldn’t fight the tears filling her eyes as the woman reversed the car, spun her tires, and took off down the road.

This was all Tarney’s fault. If she hadn’t been perving on Ethan, this never would have happened. She never would have ruined their relationship. She wouldn’t have betrayed her best friend, and she wouldn’t feel worthless and dirty for being the other woman.

Damn him for making her the other woman!

Not sure whether she should laugh, cry, or scream, Tarney clutched at the wall hoping it would keep her upright. It wasn’t until Ethan looked directly at her that she realized her body was no longer hidden. Stepping back in a rush, she pulled the curtain closed and ran on her sore foot to her room. She reached the sanctuary of her bedroom and closed the door, counting slowly to ten so she didn’t hyperventilate.

Breathe in, hold, breathe out…and repeat
.

A loud knock sounded at her front door, startling her, although she’d expected it.

“Tarney, let me explain.”

She shook her head in the darkness, her throat too dry and constricted to talk.

The knocking pounded louder. “Tarney,
please
.”

Ethan continued to knock, and she heard muffled words she assumed were of the cursing variety. Holding her chin high, like the proud tramp she now was, Tarney opened her door and walked to the front of the house. She didn’t have the courage to stand close, so she stayed at the entrance of her living room, looking at where she anticipated Ethan to be.

“Just leave, Ethan.” She raised her voice so he could clearly hear her.

“Tarney.” Her name was a plea that echoed through her heart. “Please let me explain.”

“Go away,” she begged.

“You don’t understand. I just need a few minutes.” When she didn’t reply he kept speaking. “I know where the key is Tar, so you can either let me in and give me the chance to explain, or I’m coming in anyway.”

Her mouth fell open, and she blinked into the darkness. Her lips moved in protest, while she struggled to think of something appropriate to say. When she heard him lift the potted plant on her porch in search of her key, her brain kicked into gear.

“You open that door, Ethan, and I’ll gut you like a fish.” She screamed the words, sounding like a complete fool. She didn’t even know how to gut a fish. She’d never been fishing, but who the hell cared? He wasn’t coming into her house.

He swore—loud. She cringed at what the neighbors would think. Of course, they were probably all standing at their windows watching. The bored housewives and old grannies would all converge tomorrow as if the night’s entertainment had been the highlight of the year.

She heard the telltale sign of the plant being placed back into its tray and hoped he put the key back with it. His footsteps echoed into the living room, as if he paced the porch. Without a word, she fled to the safety of her room. If she stayed within hearing distance any longer, she would let him in. She would accept his excuses for being a cheating bastard and never forgive herself for helping him break someone else’s heart.

As she shut herself into her bedroom, she closed the door with more enthusiasm than necessary, needing Ethan to realize she was no longer listening. Before he tried to persuade her with any more heartfelt words, she took a pair of earplugs from her top drawer, placed them firmly in her ears, and cried herself to sleep.

Chapter Four

Tarney woke with a slight throbbing in her brain, and the sun’s rays already spilling around the edges of the curtains only aggravated the ache. Reality didn’t take long to sink in. The night had been long with barely a few hours of sleep. She hadn’t had the luxury of forgetting what happened. The tender skin around her eyes was swollen from crying, and she didn’t need a mirror to determine how horrible she looked.

She’d spent the night going over every detail, every word, every embrace, and nothing made sense. Ethan had been passionate and sincere. At least she thought he had been. Was he capable of faking something like that? How could he be so intense while making love to her when he already had a girlfriend? And how could he treat her so badly after all the years they’d been friends?

The situation was crazy enough to make her laugh. From high school crush to casually flirting adults, Tarney had always known Ethan would be around if she needed him. He never let her down, always had a shoulder to cry on, and went out of his way to help her with anything necessary. And now their friendship was over. In the blink of an eye—or in her case, a pop of a button—their close bond vanished.

She couldn’t imagine herself moving on from the unrelenting sense of betrayal. The intimate act may have been phenomenal, but that would never justify ruining a friendship or his romantic relationship with Tina either. Tarney had experienced the deceit of a cheating partner and resented being the cause of someone else’s misery. The anger over it made her sick.

Tarney slumped out of bed and showered, washing the memory of Ethan’s kisses from her mind, and changed into a pair of old shorts and a loose top. Too strung out to enjoy a normal breakfast, she grabbed an apple from the fridge to fill the hole in her belly. If only the hole in her heart could be fixed so easily.

She walked into the living room and was about to drop into one of her recliners when a knock at the door caught her halfway down. She froze, her heart sinking to the floor with her stomach following straight after. She contemplated not answering. It was too soon to see Ethan, let alone speak to him, and she hadn’t been expecting anyone else.

“Tarney, it’s me.”

Relief made her sag at the sound of the voice. Her best friend was exactly what she needed right now. Oh wait…shit. No! Her best friend definitely wasn’t the person to see right now. Did Jenna already know what happened last night? Surely he wouldn’t tell her.

“I know you’re there, Tarney.” She so needed to hire someone to insulate the house. “Come on, let me in.”

Yep, she knew.
Damn you karma!
If all this heartache was retribution for secretly watching the Ethan Happy Hour, then she would gladly sew her eyelids together and never look at another man again—hot as sin or not.

Tarney walked to the door, prodding the puffiness under her eyes, hoping the action would magically make it disappear. She reached for the door but couldn’t bring herself to turn the handle. She would burst into tears as soon as she saw Jenna. It didn’t matter if she was clueless about last night, angry as hell, or sympathetic. Tarney would start bawling uncontrollably and after already playing that scene on repeat throughout the night and into the early morning, she didn’t feel like doing it again.

“I’m not decent, Jen. Can I catch up with you later?”

Tarney crossed her fingers, but before they were set in place, Jenna pounded on the door, right in front of her face.

“Open the goddamn door, Tarney.”

Oh well, at least she tried. Gripping the handle, she turned the knob and opened the door a crack, hoping to hide her puffy face.

Jenna stood on her porch, arms hugging her waist, eyes filled with concern. “Oh babe, are you OK?”

Jenna started walking toward her, and Tarney opened the door wider on instinct, unable to resist the lure of her best friend’s arms. Without a word, Tarney fell into her embrace and squeezed her eyes shut, willing herself not to cry. “He told you?”

Jenna’s head nodded against hers. “Yeah, sweetheart, he called me last night and told me everything. He was pretty upset.”

“Do you hate me?” Tarney’s voice broke, the first tears spilling down her cheeks.

Jenna gripped her tighter. “Hate you? No babe, I don’t hate you. I could never hate you. I was just surprised. I didn’t realize you still had a thing for Ethan.”

A bitter laugh bubbled from her throat. Oh how she wished she didn’t feel anything at all for him. “I never stopped having a ‘thing’ for him. I just kept quiet because I didn’t want to upset you.”

She sniffed, fighting back sobs by pursing her lips while the tears continued to fall. “I’ve liked him for so long. Then in the space of a few hours I go from writhing in a blissful orgasm, feeling like I’m falling in love, to having my heart broken… I’m such an idiot.” She paused to suck in a ragged breath. “It felt so right, Jenna. I thought you’d be mad but I slept with him anyway.”

Tarney babbled, the words pouring out of their own volition. After years upon years of keeping her feelings from her best friend, she suddenly needed to purge everything. “He used me and turned me into one of those skanky women who sleeps with men that aren’t single.”

Jenna gripped her shoulders and shifted back to look Tarney in the eye. With the gentle fingers of a true friend, Jenna wiped at her tears and gave a sad smile. “Did you give him a chance to explain?”

Tarney frowned and shook her head, still adamant she made the right decision. “No.”

“Tar, you need to hear me out. I think you should give him a chance—”

“No.” Tarney wiped her tears away with the back of her hand. She couldn’t speak to him right now. She couldn’t even speak to Jenna without blubbering like a fool. What she needed was a little time first. “I can’t right now. Maybe I’ll change my mind when I stop feeling like such a dickhead, but not now.”

Jenna winced and took a step back as Ethan moved into view behind her. He’d been hiding the whole time, standing out of sight and spying on her. Jeez, karma really did know how to kick a girl in the balls.

Her first instinct was to shut the door, but he stepped forward stopping the action with his hand. Plan B involved a full-scale retreat. She turned and walked away as fast as her sore foot would allow.

Ethan cursed but didn’t take long to catch up, grabbing her by the hand before she could lock herself in her room. She stopped suddenly, his strong grip not allowing her to escape.

“I’m sorry.” His graveled apology made her eyes burn and she had to close them tight to fight the next wave. “I should have told you, I…
shit
. Look, I don’t know how to explain without seeming like a complete dumbass.”

Did he expect her to make the situation easier for him? She took a deep, shuddering breath, attempting to stop the flow of tears as she kept her face averted. His hand still gripped her like a lifeline, his touch making the longing in her chest more unbearable.

“Me and you have had this thing between us for a long time,” he continued, and although she couldn’t stand to see his beautiful eyes, she still listened with intent. “I lost my heart to you at your sixteenth birthday, but ever since there’s been one thing or another keeping me from making a move. First it was Jenna not wanting me anywhere near you. Then I went away to college, and when I returned you’d already left. I thought about waiting for you, or finding you, but I had no idea what was going on in your life. In the end, I decided to find someone else, thinking we were never meant to be.”

Tarney shook her head in disbelief. She wiped away her tears with her free hand, his words making them flow like a river.

“I thought I was in a great relationship when you moved home and bought the house beside me.” His other hand came to rest on her shoulder, squeezing lightly. “Everything changed the moment I saw you again. I couldn’t stop thinking about you. In the end, I broke up with my girlfriend because I wanted to know if my little sister’s best friend was really the one for me… I was too late. You were already with someone else.”

He tugged on her hand, pulling her to face him. His eyes were bloodshot with dark smudges underneath, and she wanted to kiss the misery away. He cupped her face with his palms, and her heart shattered, its beat now erratic.

She turned her head away, but he continued to hold her gently in his hands. “Don’t.”

“Every time I moved on, thinking the boyfriend you were with would be ‘the one,’ you would break up with him, and I’d be left in a relationship that suddenly didn’t satisfy me anymore. I wasn’t willing to let this opportunity go to waste.”

Tarney winced. He cheated on his girlfriend because he didn’t want to let the opportunity go to waste?

That sounded horribly sleazy, and although she found Ethan being a cheating bastard hard to comprehend, it was even harder to believe he’d hidden feelings for her for so long. He had always touched her affectionately with sweet kisses on the cheek for birthdays and special occasions, but she had believed it was in a big brother way.

Ethan tilted her face up again, immediately ensnaring her with his agonized gaze. She tried. She really tried, but she couldn’t continue to look at him while holding the hope and longing in her belly.

“Tina and I have been on a break for more than six weeks. We started having a rough patch a while ago. Neither of us was happy, but we continued to stay together for some reason. Then she was offered a short contract out of town that would last a little over a month. We both decided we needed time apart to see if it would change how we felt.” He shrugged. “It didn’t. Not for me anyway. We rarely spoke, and when we did there wasn’t anything to say.” He gripped her chin and held firm while tilting her face so she had no choice but to look him in the eye. “Tarney, she’s been back in town for over a week and hadn’t bothered to even call me.”