So yes, I’m confused. Sue me.
“You were hurt, confused, and in pain. Of course I cared. You were my best friend’s—”
“Girlfriend,” I finish for him, when he bites off the rest of the sentence. “I was Jessie’s girlfriend, and we kissed. And then, you could barely look at me. Of course, that was after you pushed me off you like I had suddenly contracted a contagious disease. Like I disgusted you.”
My softly spoken words plummet between us like a verbal bomb, and the reverberations bounce off the walls, seeming to gain speed and volume with each pass.
There.
It’s out now.
No ignoring it no matter how much he might have preferred to. We both preferred to.
“You didn’t disgust me.” He slowly straightens, his arms crossing over his massive chest. “You could never… Fuck,” he growls, dragging a hand through his hair and fisting the strands at the crown before releasing them. “Where have you been?” he demands again.
I almost beg him to finish what he started. I want to know what would’ve come next. But I stopped being a masochist two years ago.
“Seattle.” A dull ache throbs in my temples, and I need this done, over with. And if that means giving him the information he wants so he can leave my office, then I’m willing to concede this battle. “I lived with a friend from college, taught at a school there and earned my EDS in leadership. When the position for assistant principal opened here, I applied. End of story.”
Except, not end of story. The explanation didn’t include the nights I spent on my friend’s plaid, worn couch, staring dry-eyed at the water-marked, popcorn ceiling because I’d cried so much my tear ducts were in a drought. Or how anger, grief, and guilt had moved in my chest like squatters who refused to be evicted. Or how for several months I’d gone on total self-destruct and became a serial one-night-stander who fucked random guys just to prove to myself that I was desirable, sexy… wanted.
Thank God that phase didn’t last long. Letting a man treat my body like his personal playground had not only been stupid as fuck, but it hadn’t affirmed me. It’d just made me feel cheap, used. Not knocking the women who indulge in and enjoy casual sex—I’m not shaming them, and hell, more power to them. But I’m not that woman. I was punishing myself for not being enough for Jessie.
And that was utter bullshit. Jessie cheating had to do with his character, loyalty, and heart. Not mine. Definitely not my worth.
It’d taken time, plenty of Come-to-Jesus talks, and lots of hours of Dr. Phil to come to that realization.
But I’m not sharing any of that with Asa. We’re not bosom buddies, and I don’t want or need his pity or judgement.
“Does Jessie know you’re back?”
His question ricochets through me, momentarily knocking me off balance. Not because I still have feelings for Jessie. Thanks to the men my mother dated, I had a front row seat to what cheating does to a woman. How it breaks her heart, demeans her, whittles away her self-esteem. That’s always been a deal breaker for me. Something Jessie knew. So, no. I’m over him.
Still, the thought of confronting my past after I ran from it for two years… It has a pang of fear ringing inside me.
“No,” I say, harsher than I intended. “Why would he?”
Asa is silent, just studies me with those eyes that have always been too sharp, too incisive… just “too.” Even when I’d been his best friend’s woman, that gaze had been both beautiful and a weight. One I’d wanted to analyze like one of my textbooks, and dodge like a child caught doing something naughty.
And didn’t that just sum up my every interaction with him.
“I’ll have to tell him.” He briefly glances away from me and out the window on the far wall of my office. “I can’t let him be blindsided.”
“Of course not.” I’m unable to keep my mouth from twisting into a bitter smile. “I expected nothing less of his ever loyal, devoted best friend.”
His head snaps back toward me. Though his face remains as stoic as ever, hurt flashes in his eyes before it, too, disappears behind shutters. My breath snares in my throat, snagging on the regret that immediately pierces me like razor-tipped thorns.
“We both know I’m not that loyal.” He pauses. “Or honest.”
If I’d harbored the slightest confusion about what he meant, his gaze dropping to my mouth would’ve cleared it up in a hurry.
Jesus. I freeze, but an inferno incinerates me from the inside out. Last time he looked at me like this, his tongue ended up in my mouth, making a mockery of every kiss I’d experienced until that moment. And I’d ended up damn near coming on his cock with layers of denim and cotton separating us. Just from his lips and a couple of strokes over my clit.
I should tell him to stop it. Tell him that he doesn’t have the right to stare at me like that. Like he wants me, when we both know he doesn’t.
Instead, I slick the tip of my tongue over my suddenly dry lips.
Smolder. That’s what his eyes do. They smolder. And I’m seared by that hooded inspection.