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She looked at me after she’d stuffed her panties in her purse. “What do you mean?”
“You know. The ones that want to put their stamp on the guys and keep other girls from getting their fantasy. But that’s how they make their money.”
“It’s not even like that. I want him to see me, to know I’m there.”
“He will. Especially since you told him you’re coming. I think going tonight is a bad idea anyway.” The word bad kept flashing with neon blinkers behind my eyes—a kind of warning I would regret ignoring.
“How else will I be able to prove to him I can handle his job?”
“Go next week. This is too soon. It’s like calling the day you get his phone number. It’s desperate.”
“You’re weird, you know that, right?” April eyed me. “Why do you care so much about what other people think?”
It occurred to me that women like April didn’t have the same rules as the rest of us. She was so used to getting who and what she wanted, it would never enter her brain that there were rules to the hunt.
I shrugged. “Hey, I just live with the man.”
“Did he say anything about me?”
Aside from the part where he’d stop seeing you if I wanted him to? “No. We did our usual Saturday thing. We watched American Horror Story and took a nap.”
“Together?” Her eyes narrowed.
“Yeah, together. What about it?”
She bit her lip. “Why haven’t you guys fucked? You have all the hallmarks of a relationship. You do everything together.” I heard what sounded like defeat in her tone.
“Because we’re just friends.” The words tasted like poison, both because what had happened this afternoon had been something different and I was ready to throw away our honest friendship because I was suddenly obsessed with his dick.
And more than that, I realized. I was obsessed with the idea that a guy like him could want a girl like me.
Someone with a perfect body could be aroused by someone with an imperfect body. I wanted to prove it to myself, and everyone else.
“So says you until you fall into bed. You can’t say you’re not attracted to him. I mean, no sane, heterosexual woman could not want to ride Kieran Holt like a mechanical bull.”
“I have never denied he’s hot.” She was interrogating me and I was about to defend our relationship to her like her opinion had any bearing on the matter. So I clamped my mouth closed.
“You didn’t say you don’t want to sleep with him,” she whispered.
My blood was lava coursing through my veins. Why should I deny anything? What business was it of hers? “I already slept with him. This afternoon. In his bed. We napped.” I returned her hard appraisal. “And I don’t think it’s his job that you need to prove that you can handle. I think it’s me.”
I couldn’t believe I’d said that. But I’d already jumped off the cliff, there was no climbing back up to the ledge.
“I think you’re right. As long as you’re in the picture, no woman has a chance to really be with Kieran. You’re always there. Your friendship, your intimacies…no one can compete with that. He uses you like a shield so he can hide from any real connection.”
I threw up in my mouth a little bit. Just a little bit. She sounded like a bad Cosmo article about unavailable men. “Really? So is this the part where you’re convinced that he loves you, but he’s just too broken to see it?” I shook my head. “You have to take him the way he is, the same as he has to take you. Don’t make excuses for what he does. The way you are together right now? That’s the best it’s ever going to be.”
“You’re wrong. He’ll let me in when he sees he can trust me.”
“Let you in? Oh, for fuck’s sake.” I hated it when people did that. They’d make every excuse in the world for why someone didn’t call, or they didn’t connect, or whatever. It had to be because “he’s emotionally unavailable.” It could never just be because the guy wasn’t interested. It was pathetic.
“You know, you’re supposed to be his best friend and you act like you don’t know him at all.”
My mouth opened before I could stop myself. “And you think just because he put his cock in your pussy that you know everything about him. Newsflash: that’s just fucking. He didn’t make love to you, you didn’t have some deeper connection. You asked for the Finn McCool experience, and you got it. That wasn’t Kieran. Breakfast the next day? That was Kieran. And you know what’s worse? You asked for it like a present. Like something you can buy. And guess what else? It was. Finn McCool is for sale, Kieran isn’t.”
