The Rebound Guy (4 page)

When he rose from the vinyl-upholstered booth, JR shoved a stack of twenties in his hand. “You pay. We’ll meet you outside.”

“Right.” Eric took the wad of cash, added his own share to the pile and headed for the cashier. With several people in line to pay, he’d probably get back to the office a little late and that would delay his call to Lauren. On a whim, he pulled out his cell phone to check his messages on the off chance she’d called while he was at lunch.

“Reynolds? Eric Reynolds?” The male voice registered as vaguely familiar, but Eric didn’t place it until he looked behind him. Mark Dalton stood in line next to him.

Something went tight in Eric’s chest. Whether it was jealousy or anger, he couldn’t tell. His jaw clenched and he greeted Mark with a curt nod.

“Hey, Eric. How’s it going?” Mark clapped him on the shoulder, seemingly oblivious to his cool reception. “I haven’t seen you since Tara’s Christmas Party.”

“Right.”

“You still working for that software security firm?”

“Yep.”

“Great! That’s good.” Mark nodded his overly large head in what, to Eric, seemed closely akin to the motion of those ludicrous bobble-headed dogs people used to keep in their cars. Had Mark always seemed so clownish and ungainly?

Eric moved up in line, wishing Lawyer Boy would just go away. No such luck.

“Hey, Eric, you’re still friends with Lauren, right?”

Eric drew in a slow breath to curb his rising annoyance.
Was
he still friends with Lauren? Had he irrevocably destroyed their friendship by agreeing to sleep with her when he should have taken the high road and made her talk about her problems with Mark?

“Yeah. Why?” How could Mark call himself Lauren’s boyfriend if he didn’t know she and Eric were still friends? They had lunch together at least once a week and she usually mentioned Mark, who was looking more and more like a droopy-eyed Bassett Hound every second. Maybe Lauren didn’t talk about Eric when she was with Mark.

“I was…I’m a little…” Mark shifted from one huge clown foot to the other, his red power tie swaying to and fro. He jerked his head sideways, gesturing Eric out of line.

I don’t have time for this, Bozo
, Eric thought as he reluctantly followed Mark toward the salad bar.

“Lauren and I had a
misunderstanding
. Have you talked to her since yesterday?”

Eric bit back a sarcastic reply that included full disclosure of the half-dozen orgasms he’d given Lauren last night. “Have you tried Tara or Roxy?” He forced innocence into his voice. Why was he so angry with Mark? He should be thanking him. If Lawyer Boy hadn’t screwed up big time, Lauren wouldn’t have showed up last night needing…

“I tried them, no answer. I don’t think they want to talk to me.”

“What did you do?” Eric’s fists clenched involuntarily. He wondered if Mark’s wide, doughy face would feel like an overstuffed pillow if he punched him right now.

“I…she saw something and she got the wrong impression. I was… A girl from my office came over to my apartment yesterday. Lauren never stops by in the middle of the day—I thought she was at work. How was I supposed to know her boss was sick and closed the office early? Anyway, this girl, she came over and sort of threw herself at me. She wanted me to—
you know
. I was trying to let her down easy, tell her I wasn’t interested but she started taking her clothes off, then she’s all over me and—” “And Lauren caught you.” Eric’s heart went cold, but anger blazed behind his eyes at the thought Mark would be so stupid as to cheat on Lauren and try to lie about it. Mark was as transparent as a quivering mass of Jell-O. On the off chance some poor girl from his law firm really had thrown herself at him, odds were he was more than willing to play catch.

“Lauren
thinks
she caught me. She saw what looked like, but wasn’t, me fucking this girl.”

“Uh huh.” Clench. Unclench. Clench. Unclench. Eric’s short fingernails dug into his palms. Of course Lauren had come to him wanting sex, not for comfort, not for love, but for revenge.

Could he blame her?

“You haven’t talked to her since then?” Eric forced himself to ask.

“I’ve been calling her cell. I guess she’s screening.”

Eric nodded. He’d do the same.

“You’ve talked to her, haven’t you?

This was his chance to deliver a blow to Lawyer Boy without even touching him. Good Eric wanted to feign ignorance, keep Lauren’s secrets and let her deal with Mark in her own way. Bad Eric had a different plan, an evil, wickedly satisfying plan that, even if it didn’t rip apart the shreds of Lauren’s relationship with Mark, would still make Eric feel damn good.

The name of Bad Eric’s plan was Brutal Honesty.

The words came out of his mouth before he could stop them and they fell like stones in the suddenly quiet restaurant. “She was with me last night. She was still in bed when I left for work. I could give her a call if you like.”

A collection of emotions played over Mark’s suddenly rubbery features as Eric’s words sank in. What appeared to be relief at locating Lauren quickly morphed into confusion, enlightenment, and finally anger. As if Mark had a right to be angry.

“She stayed at your place?” All the dopey, false friendliness drained from Mark’s voice.

Eric fixed a cold gaze on his brand new rival. “Yes.” There was no way Mark could mistake the challenge in his tone. He braced for the third degree, mentally climbing onto the witness stand so Lawyer Boy could drag a full confession from him.

And exactly how many times did you make her come, Mr. Reynolds?

he imagined Mark asking as he paced back and forth in front of a dozen captivated jurors.

At least six
, he’d reply.

At least? You mean you’re not sure?

You’d have to ask Ms. James herself, Counselor, but I will swear to six
orgasms, and that’s not counting the first time when I barely touched her.

Just sliding my hand over her hot, wet—

“She stayed over at your place?” The subtle difference in Mark’s tone told Eric Lawyer Boy was in denial.

“Yes. She did.”

“If I find out you took advantage of her, I’ll rip you a new one.”

Mark’s threat coaxed a satisfied grin from Eric. He felt eight feet tall.

“Can I get that in
writing
, Counselor?”

Mark’s lips contracted into a thin line and his colorless eyes blazed, but to his credit, he backed away from decking Eric right there at the salad bar. “I’m not kidding.”

“I hope you aren’t.”

“We’ll finish this conversation another time.”

“I’m sure we will.”

Mark spun on his heel and stalked away. He made it as far as the door before the cashier collared him with a sweet, slightly annoyed, “Um, your check, sir!”

Mark threw money at her and slammed through the pizzeria’s double doors, leaving the cashier shaking her head as she ironed out the crumpled twenties on the counter. “Jerk,” she muttered under her breath, and Eric couldn’t help but agree. Drunk with his own power and a primitive sense of possessiveness he’d never felt before, he slipped an extra twenty into the pile of bills in his hand and told her to keep the change.

The euphoria of staring down Mark and staking a public claim to Lauren gave him the strength to delay his phone call. By quarter to five, though, his willpower evaporated. Lauren still hadn’t called him, and the realization hit him that she might not forgive him for rubbing their impromptu sleepover in Mark’s face, no matter how angry she might be at her hopefully ex-boyfriend.

Work had been impossible. No project Lauren worked on during the two hours between her late arrival and her noon lunch hour seemed to take her mind off thoughts of Eric. Though she’d taken a shower at her place, after Roxy gave her a ride home, she still felt like she had Eric’s essence on her. She smelled his aftershave and the warm scent of sweat and sex each time she took a deep breath. Her heart lurched each time the phone rang, and she cursed her irrational desire to hear his voice.

Why was she suddenly so obsessed with Eric? He was still Eric, still her friend. She’d never spent an entire morning lost in contemplation of his deep blue eyes or the fascinating scar under his jaw, or the delectable hollow at the base of his throat that beckoned her tongue to lick there.

Lunch with Tara and Roxy had been torture. She hated to kiss and tell, but she was weak. She’d given in to their relentless inquisition halfway through her spinach quiche at Blue’s Diner and fed them tantalizing tidbits of her evening bite by bite, just to watch their eyes glow with astonishment.

“Is he bigger than Mark?” Roxy had asked, a forkful of radicchio paused halfway to her lips.

“Mark’s a horse, isn’t he?” Tara chimed in. “He’s so damn tall, I always figured his dick hung down to his knees. I mean, why else would our girl date Mr. Boring?”

Lauren had blushed and her friends giggled like schoolgirls. She stopped short of defending Mark who, she realized, never seemed to have much to talk about except his job. Thoughts of Mark dissolved quickly when Tara assaulted her with more questions about Eric’s prowess in bed. Finally, she begged off any more juicy details and asked the all-important question of her friends.

“What should I do about Eric? He was so…nonchalant this morning.

Not cold, but just so normal. I feel awful about using him.”

“Did you have a good time?” Roxy asked as she shoved her half-eaten salad aside.

God, yes!
“Sure. Yeah.” Lauren shrugged to throw the bloodhounds off the scent. Despite the sour pang of Mark’s betrayal, her night with Eric had been the best night of her life. She longed to repeat every sultry, sweaty minute, to taste him on her lips and feel his long, hard shaft inside her again. He’d been amazing in every way, and she hated the fact that now, in the harsh light of day, he probably regretted giving in to her desperate seduction.

She owed him a huge apology.

“Did
he
have a good time?” Roxy asked, her sculptured eyebrows disappearing under her platinum bangs.

“I assume so.” Lauren couldn’t help but grin. Roxy’s own brother, Todd, was fond of saying,
If you’re a guy, there’s no such thing as bad
sex.

Roxy clapped her hands. “There you go. I don’t see the problem.”

“The problem is, he just got up and left this morning,” Tara said after a long sip of her iced tea. “This is Eric we’re talking about. He’s sensitive.

What if he reads too much into the whole thing? What if he thinks it meant more than it did?”

Lauren’s heart plummeted. Tara had put her worst fear into words.

Eric was a good guy. He had real feelings, and Lauren never wanted to hurt him or make him think the wrong thing. She’d had the time of her life. She couldn’t stop thinking about him. Now, Mark seemed like a bad dream. In fact, when she pictured her now ex-boyfriend’s potato-white ass in the air and the look of stark terror on the blonde bimbette’s face when the door of his apartment flew open, she wanted to laugh. If only she’d thought to whip out her cell phone and snap a picture of Mark’s posterior for posterity. What a Christmas card it would make—a big snowy moon hung with dangling red balls…

She almost spit out her iced tea.

“Are you all right, hon?” Tara asked.

“Fine, just thinking about something funny.” It hadn’t been at all funny yesterday, though. She sobered. How could she have gotten over it so quickly? “Really. What should I do? Should I just have brunch with him on Sunday like nothing happened or should I call him up tonight and talk to him?”

“He said for you to call him, didn’t he?” Tara asked.

Lauren nodded. She’d tried twice from her office, but her stomach felt so knotted each time she’d picked up the phone, she’d ended up just scurrying off to the bathroom to splash water on her face.

“Then call him. Tell him he was phenomenal and any time he wants to do it again, you’re available. Why not take advantage? Mark’s history.

Eric’s not dating anyone right now. What have you got to lose?” Roxy’s words seemed so logical. It all made sense.

“What have I got to lose?” she asked her friends. They shrugged and smiled, but in her head Lauren heard the answer.

Eric.

•

She’d made the bed, Eric noted when he got home that evening. The navy spread was stretched so tight he considered trying to bounce a quarter off it.

The bathroom was spotless and he wondered if she’d taken a shower before she left. Had she stood naked before the full-length mirror on the back of the bathroom door? Had she wrapped her supple, magnificently responsive body in one of his towels?

Had she called? He gave the answering machine next to the bed a skeptical glance.

Two messages. He tried to maintain nonchalance as he hit the playback button. The first message was an automated sales call, followed by his sister Clarice’s cheery voice.

“Hi, Uncle Eric. I’m just calling to remind you that Jeremy’s birthday is Sunday at noon at Mr. Mouse’s Pizzeria on Route One. He’s looking forward to beating you at Whack-A-Mole, so take your vitamins! Love ya!”

Eric lowered himself to the bed and sighed. His nephew’s birthday party had completely skipped his mind. Thank goodness for Clarice, the paragon of efficiency. He would have hated himself for disappointing the tow-headed five-year-old who called him “Unca Eric”.

Brunch with Lauren. Sunday.

Under normal circumstances, he would have thought nothing of bringing her to the party. She loved Jeremy. His sister and bother-in-law, Andy, had asked him more than once why he wasn’t romantically involved with his best friend.

Now, after last night, what would she think of lunch with Mr. Mouse?

Would it be the same between them? He’d wanted to take her someplace fancy and romantic and suggest that perhaps they cap off a fine meal with an afternoon of hot sex, not a roll in the ball pit and a half-melted slice of ice cream cake.

Of course, that assumed she’d still speak to him, and that Lawyer Boy hadn’t hunted him down by then and flattened him.

Bad Eric said to hell with it.
Call the girl. Tell her you want her body.