King Stud Page 17

  Maeve took a hard swallow of her drink. “So I just need to get over myself then.”

  Those rapids opened up under Danielle, anxiety doing loop-de-loops in her gut.

  “I mean it’s not like this kind of thing hasn’t happened before.” Maeve drained the rest of her cocktail. “It’s just, you’ve been my friend forever.” Maeve clasped Danielle’s wrist, her cold fingers holding tight. “But Cherry’s my friend, too.”

  “I’m sorry if it puts you in a tough spot.”

  Maeve held on tighter. “Promise me you won’t tell her.”

  “I won’t. I’m going to be gone in February, anyway.” Danielle had to clear her throat to keep her voice from wobbling. “Then Ryan will do what he’s going to do, and Cherry will do what she’s going to do, and we can go back to being best friends by phone.”

  Maeve’s answer was cut off when Cherry tossed her tweed cape across the table and looped her purse over her shoulder, her plum-colored tunic over chartreuse leggings and ankle boots saying why yes, I do have more style than you without even making a sound.

  “I want one of those gin thingies,” Maeve said before Cherry could sit down.

  “The tall one?”

  “With three limes.” Maeve loosed her grip on Danielle’s wrist. “What do you want?”

  “I’ll have a glass of white wine.”

  Cherry wound her way through the crowd to the bar. The brittle silence between Danielle and Maeve got heavier and harder for Danielle to hold on to. Finally Maeve tapped the table like she was calling them both to order.

  “Are you still working too much?” she asked.

  “What’s in a gin thingy?” Danielle spoke over top of Maeve’s question.

  They both laughed, glanced at each other and away. Awkward. Ashamed.

  “A bunch of gin and some other stuff.” Maeve nudged Danielle with her knuckle, her wry half-smile offering a temporary moratorium on conflict. “You should try one.”

  Danielle wanted to lean over the table and give her friend a hug. She fiddled with her cuff instead. “I’ll stick with wine.”

  “Lightweight.”

  “Yep.”

  Cherry made a good show of juggling three cocktails and a clutch purse through the crowd. Midway through, Maeve jumped up to help. She snatched her glass and downed a good third of her cocktail before Danielle had her wine. Cherry lowered herself onto Maeve’s side of the booth, raised her glass in a wordless toast, and took a healthy swallow. Danielle pasted on a plastic grin and tried to stifle the nerves pinging around in her belly like bees in a glass jar.

  If Maeve needed her to make nice to Cherry, she’d do her level best.

  Cherry and Maeve giggled like high school girls, and Danielle tried to play along, with marginal success. They talked shopping and sales, since Cherry had spent all day working at Nordstrom’s, and they debated whether it was too early for a shot of schnapps to warm them up. Danielle sipped wine and smiled. She sent up gasping prayers to whoever was listening that they’d get around to talking about the party.

  About three sips into her wine, Chubb walked in, which turned the bees in her belly into a swarm of angry hornets. If Ryan came in behind him, things could get real ugly real fast. It was one thing for Maeve to deal with the idea of Danielle and Ryan as an abstract concept, but quite another to shove it in her face.

  Besides, Cherry would freak out.

  Danielle tried her best to steer the conversation toward New Year’s Eve with only minimal success. Cherry waved at the waitress for another round. Maeve laughed and ordered a round of gin thingies and shots and what was Danielle having? Something about their frantic energy helped Danielle connect the dots. Ryan broke up with Cherry because she drank too much and wouldn’t get help.

  Well, Maeve was in trouble, too. Both women were dangerously out of control.

  Danielle scowled at nothing in particular. A good friend would help. Once that good friend had time to process things. Danielle finished her wine and brought out her work face, taking charge and compelling the other two to focus on party planning. When she had as much of a to-do list as she could handle – and Maeve and Cherry were calling for another round – she made a polite excuse about a NICU project and some painting she needed to finish, and left them at the bar.

  On the way back to her grandmother’s house, she caught herself driving miles above the speed limit. Anger locked her jaw down tight and added extra weight to her foot on the gas pedal. She was upset with Cherry for being an idiot, and she was mad at Maeve because it was easier to be irate than to deal with the guilt and fear.

  Beyond every other emotion, she was furious at herself for getting into something so straight out of high school.

  That February 2nd flight couldn’t come soon enough.

  She headed down the hill onto Perkins Lane and took a deep, cleansing breath. Maeve and Cherry and all their insanity dropped away, as if nothing could really touch her down on this twisted road on the edge of the bluff. She made the last bend before the house. Ryan’s truck was in the driveway, and she felt the beginnings of a foolish smile.

  The fall-out might be making her crazy, but this young man sure made it worthwhile.

  The porch light was on, and so was the floor lamp in the living room, but otherwise the house was dark. It was quiet too, lacking the rattle and hum that went along with Ryan’s work. He’d talked about installing cabinet boxes in the kitchen, and that’s where she found him, holding a beer, staring out the window at Puget Sound.

  “What’s up?” she asked, pausing in the doorway, reluctant to interrupt his private space.

  He took a sip before answering her. “Didja have fun at The Pig?”

  “Not especially.” She rubbed her forehead, wondering how far to go. “Maeve and Cherry mostly wanted to drink instead of plan the party.”

  He snorted and crossed his arms. “The party.”

  There was just enough of an edge to his voice to send irritation zinging down the back of her neck. “The party.” Danielle raked her hair out of her face and stayed in the doorway, uncertain whether she had the emotional resources to deal with Ryan’s attitude.

  “You sure you want to go to this thing?”

  Danielle snuffed a laugh, almost quick enough. “No, not really.” She took a couple steps toward him, hands out because she needed to feel him under her palms. “But it’s important to Maeve, and…”

  “Maeve? Who showed up here with your boyfriend?”

  I need this attitude why? “I went out with him once, Ryan, and spent a good deal of time talking about you.”

  “Oh.”

  Danielle almost burst out laughing. With her focus on the game Maeve and Cherry were playing, it had never occurred to her that Ryan could be jealous of Christopher. She pressed her advantage right on into his body. “He’s a nice guy.” She stroked the rough shadow along his chin. “All he’s worried about is whether he’ll make money selling this house.”

  “You’d like to think so.” He jerked his chin up. “That’s not how he looks at you.”

  Deciding to pick her battles, Danielle pulled back a step. “If you say you don’t want to go, we won’t go.”

  “I really don’t want to go.”

  Don’t make promises you’re not willing to keep. “Okay. I’ll call Maeve.”

  Silence spread across the room. Danielle was doing her best to triage. If she had to tell Maeve she wasn’t coming to the party, there would definitely be consequences.

  “Except,” — Ryan heaved the word out on a sigh — “I know my sister and my ex make a huge flaming deal out of this New Year’s thing. If we don’t go, they’ll bitch about it for the rest of our natural lives.”

  She pinched the bridge of her nose. “It’s your call.”

  To her utter surprise, he burst out laughing. “Is that right?” He grabbed her by the waist and pulled her against his body. “I think you just gave me the winning answer.”

  “What?”

  Still
chuckling, he backed her up until her butt hit the dining room table. “We’ll go.”

  She eased back to let the antique cherry wood carry some of her weight. “We should take separate cars, because I don’t think you want to get there to help set up at seven.”

  “We’ll take separate cars,” he said, taking control by sliding his thigh between hers.

  “I’ll totally owe you one.”

  “Don’t leave, then.”

  His words knocked the breath right of her. “What?”

  “Nothing.” He pinned her to the table with his weight, no longer laughing. “Forget it.” His hips jammed against hers, anger tightening the set of his jaw. “I’ll go to this fucking party.” He planted one hand on the table. “I’ll fake it so Cherry doesn’t freak out.” He grabbed the back of her head with his other hand. “And you know why?”

  “No,” she whispered, wondering whether he was mad about the situation or whether it was personal.

  “Because that’s the only way I’ll know for sure who’s kissing you at midnight.”

  A little of both, maybe.

  He followed up his words with a brutal kiss that lit up the desire in her belly like a torch. Burning with emotions she didn’t want to examine, she gave it right back. She reached for his shirt, furiously ripping it off over his head and clawing at his muscular shoulders. She unbuttoned her own jeans, shoving them down over her thighs, then dragged his hand between her legs.

  She wailed against his mouth when he plunged two fingers in deep and rubbed rough circles over her clit with his thumb, making her come so fast she lost track of everything but his strength and his urgency.

  Ryan pushed through the door of The Park, a boxing gym in a strip mall on a cleaned-up stretch of Aurora Avenue up north of the city.

  The gym’s manager stood behind the dinged up old front counter. “Well shit, O’Connor. Long time no see.”

  “Hey, Jackson.” Ryan extended his hand to the green-eyed black man with blond hair and a scar across one cheekbone from a fight outside the ring.

  As they shook hands, Jackson looked Ryan up and down in a way that would have made him uncomfortable if it had come from anyone else. “Looks like you’ve been working out somewhere.”

  “Twenty-Four Hour Fitness.” Ryan snorted, a gust of frustration roiling him up. As crazy as things were between him and Dani, he needed more than his old gym could offer. “It’s been a while.”

  “That’s cool,” Jackson said, cracking his knuckles. “We’ll get you back in shape.”

  The cocky superiority in his tone made Ryan grin, and he reached for the clipboard to sign in.

  Jackson took the clipboard from him but refused his debit card. “No charge today, man. I’m just glad to see you back.”

  Ryan thanked him and headed for the locker.

  “Oh, and O’Connor?”

  Ryan paused at the door to the locker room.

  “Let me know when you’re ready, and I’ll hook you up with a sparring partner.”

  “Sure.” Ryan nodded, his mouth damn near watering with the need to hit and get hit. “I’ll be around a couple times a week.”

  “All right, man.”

  Ryan found an open locker and slung his bag in. He’d trained at The Park for years, from the time he was about fourteen until Cherry had talked him into working out with her at Twenty-Four Hour Fitness. She hated the ‘boxing thing’, as she called it. Yeah, a couple times he’d lost control, but not since he was a teenager.

  There was a period of about a year, when he was eighteen or nineteen, when the partying sometimes blurred the line between what should stay in the ring and what shouldn’t. Since then he’d learned to keep a lid on both the fighting and the drinking. It felt good to come back to the same bank of scratched and dented old lockers, the air in the room dense with layers of sweat, old blood, and musty showers. It felt like home.

  The kind of home where he could hit something. Dani was under his skin, and every time he closed his eyes, his senses tricked him into smelling roses and vanilla, into feeling the soft swell of her breast and the silky weight of her hair, into tasting the secret hollows of her body.

  Then reality would smack him like a slap to the back of the head.

  He had some serious shit to work out.

  In five minutes he was out on the main floor, dressed in baggy shorts and a worn tee shirt, like everybody else in the room. In ten minutes he was warming up on one of the bikes. In twenty minutes, he had his hands wrapped in cloth tape. Facing one of the bags, he started with a series of easy jabs.

  His first punch might have been aimed at the face of a certain handsome real estate agent, but soon he found his rhythm and his conscious mind let go.

  Chapter Fifteen

  For Danielle, dressing for the New Year’s Eve party was a losing proposition. If she dressed cute, Maeve would give her side-eye all night, worried about her hanging all over Ryan. If she dressed dowdy, Ryan would see her looking, well, dowdy.

  Lose-lose.

  She went for somewhere in-between, in a silver sleeveless mini dress with black tights, a beaded black cardigan, and the Heels from Hell. Festive, but not too short or too tight. Getting ready at the apartment, Maeve had insisted on twisting Danielle’s hair into an up-do, because that’s what best friends were for, and she lent her dangling rhinestone earrings when Danielle’s own pearls were deemed boring. Some mascara and a touch of deep rose lipstick and Danielle was ready to go.

  For once, Maeve was ready too. She fluttered around, lighting candles and setting out trays of snacks, her black sheath dress slit high on her thigh.

  Cherry hid in the bathroom, putting the finishing touches on her hair and make-up. “I got the hottest little black dress ever,” she said from behind the door. She leaned out, head and shoulders, like a burlesque dancer teasing her fans. “He’s going to lose his shit.”

  Danielle knew exactly who “he” was, and Maeve confirmed her guess, her expression balancing irritation and guilt. Maeve started to say something, but closed her mouth in a tight line. Danielle sat crossing and uncrossing her legs, wishing she’d stayed home.

  “I think we should do some shots!” Cherry called out through the open door.

  “Not yet.” Maeve lit the last candle, her perky tone at odds with her grimace. “It’s going to be a long night, sister.” She puffed her cheeks to blow out the match. “And I want to remember most of it.”

  Perched on the edge of the couch, Danielle tried to picture what the small living room would look like when it was full of people. Claustrophobic. She’d need to navigate without tripping over Maeve’s suspicion, Ryan’s anger, and Cherry’s desperation. “I shouldn’t drink yet, either.”

  “You guys are boring.” Cherry stepped through the bathroom doorway. Her little black dress had stretch lace sleeves, a full, short skirt, and a neckline that plunged almost to her belly button. Her hair was a perfect drape of glossy mahogany, and her eyes were rimmed with kohl. She looked sophisticated. And sexy. And beyond beautiful.

  Next to her, Danielle felt like a Sunday school teacher.

  She added a second wish to her list. In addition to don’t piss anybody off, she hoped time would go quickly. Because no one needed to deal with that much insecurity for long.

  Cherry was still trying to coax them into drinking tequila shots when the land line rang, announcing someone at the main entrance. Maeve buzzed them in and Danielle put on her best plastic smile, determined to greet Ryan as if they were acquaintances who happened to have an old house in common. Their plan was to play it cool until everyone – mostly Cherry – was drunk enough not to pay attention.

  A few of Maeve’s coworkers came in, their natural fibers and geek-chic glasses making them look like extras from the set of Portlandia.

  The land line rang three more times. Maeve opened the door three more times. Danielle flinched from the pinpricks of panic three more times. Some of Cherry’s friends came in, oozing Nordstrom’s polish. More of
Maeve’s funky design-world friends followed them.

  No Ryan.

  Danielle was forced off her perch on the couch since everyone else was standing and she didn’t want to be eye-level with a room full of people’s butts. Maeve did a pretty good job of introducing her around and didn’t force the issue when Danielle declined a glass of champagne.

  The phone rang again. This time it was Christopher and his friend Jason. Danielle was so relieved to see someone she’d met before that she got carried away and hugged him with excessive enthusiasm. Christopher kept an arm casually around her waist and drew her off to one side, his smile broad enough to make the creases on either side of his mouth show.

  “Where’s your boyfriend?” Christopher pitched his voice low enough so only she could have heard him.

  Still, Danielle’s heart pinged in her chest like coins in a clothes dryer. “Haven’t had one of those since high school.” She hoped she came across as cool and disinterested instead of three steps from a seizure.

  “Ah, I call bullshit on that.” Christopher’s hand traveled low enough on her hip to hit unsafe territory, and Danielle automatically eased away from him.

  “See?” he said. “I made my point.”

  She burst out laughing. “What? Just because I don’t want you groping me—”

  “Right, right.” He shifted his weight to open up space between them but kept a hand on the small of her back. “I thought Maeve’s little brother was going to challenge me to a couple rounds in the ring when we showed up the other day.”

  Busted. Reaching up to rub her eye, Danielle remembered at the last minute how much make-up she had on and scratched the back of her neck instead. “No, he wouldn’t…”

  “Hmm. I know when I’m stepping on another man’s territory.”

  Maeve stared at them from across the room, her expression unreadable, and Danielle Barbie-smiled back.

  Christopher nodded in Maeve’s direction. “She looks nice tonight.”

  Jason bounced up behind Maeve and wrapped his arms around her waist. Danielle would have had to have been a doorknob not to notice the tightening in Christopher’s jaw. She stood on tiptoe, ignoring the squeal from the balls of her feet, and spoke right into his ear. “Ask her out, then.”