by Erin Rylie
Kelsey’s response stuck in her throat. Kyle looked so happy. He deserved someone who was actually capable of loving him, but it was harder than she’d expected to see him moving on. She swallowed down the bitterness, the cloying feeling burning her up inside, and pasted on a smile she hoped seemed genuine.
“You seem really happy, Kyle. I’d love to meet her, and if things are serious enough, I’m fine with her spending time with James, but I still want to meet her before they spend too much time together. If she’s going to be in his life, I need to know more about her.”
Her ex-husband slumped in his chair, his relief at her response evident. “Thank you, Kels. I’ve been seeing her for about four months now, and I know it’s still soon, but I feel like I could really fall for this girl, and I want her to be part of James’s life too.”
“Of course,” she murmured. She swirled the wine in her glass, steeling herself for the question she knew she needed to ask him while she had the chance. Before she could work up the courage to talk to Kyle about Carlos, however, their server stopped by the table to take their order. Kyle ordered for the both of them, years of eating together at this steakhouse ensuring he’d never forget her favorite dish on the menu. When the waiter had left the table, Kelsey cleared her throat and readied herself to dive in.
“What’s going on in that head of yours, Kels? You’ve always been so hard to read, but even I can tell you’re nervous about something.”
“Hard to read? What do you mean?”
Kyle shrugged and took a sip of his wine, carefully returning the glass to the table before responding. “You aren’t exactly the best at communicating with people. I didn’t even know you were unhappy until you left. I actually thought we had a pretty great marriage, honestly. Thinking back on things now I wonder if I ever made you happy or if you’re just really great at bottling up your emotions.”
The knowledge that someone she’d thought knew her better than anyone else didn’t feel as though he knew her at all shocked Kelsey. She knew she tended to bottle things up, but was she really so closed off? She’d just never been one to burden people with her issues. Growing up with only younger siblings and absentee parents had taught her to rely only on herself. How could she burden her brothers with her issues when she was working so hard to ensure they had happy, carefree childhoods?
She met Kyle’s familiar brown eyes before responding, wanting him to feel the sincerity in her words. “I was happy, Kyle. For years I was genuinely happy, but I’m just not capable of loving you the way you deserve to be loved.”
He laughed, “Bullshit, Kels. You’re more than capable of love; you just aren’t capable of letting yourself be vulnerable. You try so hard to hold yourself and everyone around you together. You need to let yourself lean on someone, depend on someone. That’s what a marriage is, what real partnership is. You and I never had it, and I really hope that you find it someday.”
“Co-dependency isn’t healthy though.”
“I’m not saying that you need to be entirely dependent on someone; you just need to learn to share the burden. Let someone help you sometimes. You have some pretty fantastic friends. Do they know what’s really going on with you though? Or do they only see the superficial aspects of your life? Hell, you didn’t even tell Sophie and Becky when you had the breast cancer scare last year. If you hadn’t needed someone to drive you to and from the biopsy, I don’t know that you would’ve told me about it.”
Kelsey didn’t know how to respond. Was he right? She’d thought she was pretty open and honest with her friends, but she hadn’t opened up to anyone about Carlos. She certainly hadn’t told Sophie about the fight they’d had after Becky’s birthday party last year. Maybe Kyle was right, maybe she could at least try opening up a little bit more. But Sophie had a newborn baby, and Becky was always busy, always out with friends or going to some club opening. She didn’t want to bother them with her issues. She pushed her thoughts to the back of her mind to toy with later. Right now, she needed to tell Kyle about Carlos. She had a feeling this conversation wouldn’t be pretty.
“I need to tell you something, actually.”
Kyle narrowed his eyes at the blatant change of subject but motioned with his hand that she should continue.
“So, you know Carlos was in an accident recently, but what you don’t know is that he shattered his femur and is going to require extensive physical therapy. He’ll need help getting around for a few months since he can’t put weight on his right leg, and his family isn’t around to help. Plus, Rafe and Sophie just had their baby, and can’t really take him in. I have that spare bedroom at my house though, so I’ll be picking him up from the hospital tomorrow and he’ll be staying with me while he recovers. I’m only telling you because that means he’ll also be around James, but they’ve met before so that shouldn’t be a problem. I mean, James really adores the big oaf; they’re pretty funny together—”
Kelsey cut herself off when she realized she’d been rambling. Across the table Kyle had gone silent. He didn’t look angry though. He actually looked...contemplative.
“Did you know that during World War I, there was an explosion on a battlefield in France that could be heard in England?”
Kyle rolled his eyes at her random fact spewing. It was something he’d always seemed to tolerate but not really find endearing. He sure as hell hadn’t found it endearing when she’d started spouting off history facts in the middle of their arguments.
“I did know that actually. It was one of the first random tidbits you ever shared with me. Stop worrying, Kels. I’m not mad. I actually have been wanting to apologize for the way I acted last night. I know things have been rough for us, but I want us to be friends. At the very least I’d like for us to be friendly co-parents. I would like to meet this guy if he’s going to be living under the same roof as our son, but I trust your judgment, so just set something up when he’s comfortable, okay?”
Kelsey blinked at his easy acquiescence, and nodded. The uncomfortable dinner she’d been expecting had gone pretty smoothly so far, and she started to hope that perhaps she and Kyle could be friends as well as co-parents. She might not be in love with him, but he was still a huge part of her past and the father of her child—the most important person in her life.
The remainder of their night passed comfortably, the two of them discussing the preschool options for James. At almost four years old, he would be starting preschool in the fall, and Houston had a lot of great options for them to mull over.
Chapter Five
“Carlos! Having an injured leg doesn’t make it okay for you to just leave shit all over this house!”
Carlos heard Kelsey’s shout from across the house where he was currently hiding out in his room. Well, his temporary room. This was a temporary situation—he needed to remind himself of that. As she continued to yell obscenities at him, he felt a grin form on his lips. He wasn’t messy by nature. In fact, his own home was immaculate because he believed in cleaning up after himself. But damn if he didn’t love getting her riled up.
He’d been staying here for a week now, and had learned pretty quickly that if she wasn’t mad at him, she was avoiding him. It seemed Kelsey was dead set on pretending the sexual attraction between the two of them didn’t exist. Hell, he even had a hard time getting her worked up when she helped him shower. Sure, he’d originally thought that requiring help in the shower was demeaning, but then he’d realized that Kelsey would have to run soapy hands over his body on a daily basis. He’d warmed up to the idea real quick.
Unfortunately, Kelsey made him shower in a damn bathing suit, and really once she’d helped him get into the bathtub, she only stayed in the room to make sure he didn’t fall off of the shower chair she’d placed in the guest bathroom for him. The moment he was in the shower and comfortably seated, she would close the curtain and stand with her arms crossed by the door. The first time she’d helped him, he’d tried to remove his bathing suit so that he could casually toss it on
to the bathroom floor, but he couldn’t get the damn thing off standing up. The pain had been excruciating when he’d tried.
Today though, he had a new plan. He’d already stripped off all of his clothes while sitting on his bed. When sitting, getting undressed was easy enough. Sure, pretty much any movement of his leg was still painful at this point, but it would be well worth it to see Kelsey’s face when he asked for her help today.
His small grin grew into a full-blown smile when he heard her footsteps stomping down the hallway. By the time Kelsey made it into his room, he was back in bed, lower body tucked beneath the covers, his best smile on his face. He made sure he smiled wide enough for his dimples to pop (he called this smile the panty-melter) and lay back against the headboard, his hands tucked behind his head.
The door to his room blew open, and just like that, he was as hard as granite. Kelsey was in her usual attire, form-fitting yoga pants and a flowy crop top that showed just a hint of toned, tan stomach. He could practically see the steam coming off of her, and his grin widened even further.
“Hey, roomie! How’s it going?”
Kelsey huffed and crossed her arms, but he didn’t miss the way her eyes explored his chest, took in his flexed biceps, and finally moved to his face. Her scowl deepened when she saw his dimples, and he knew he had her right where he wanted her.
She let out a humorless laugh, “How’s it going? Well, James’s stupid fucking lizard got out of its cage this morning, and when I went into his room to feed the damn thing, it scampered across my foot, half scaring me to death and making me drop an entire bag of crickets. So I just spent two hours rounding up crickets, and then I leave my son’s room to find a disaster in the living room. Your disaster. Seriously, who leaves empty water bottles all over the floor? I put a trash can next to the couch for this exact reason, Carlos. Oh, and don’t even get me started on the damn snack food wrappers. How you manage to eat so much junk and still look like that will never cease to amaze me.”
She sucked in a deep breath, having hardly taken any during her little rant. Her cheeks were red and flushed, and the look in her eyes was liquid fire. Carlos fucking loved it.
“Ah ha!” he exclaimed. “You’ve noticed this spectacular physique, huh? I knew I saw you checking these bad boys out in the shower.” He emphasized his statement with a light slap on his six-pack. Thankfully, a couple of weeks of little activity hadn’t erased his years of hard work in the gym.
Yep, he’d read enough romance novels to know that women valued what they called “the V.” After reading about it in three consecutive books, he’d added to his workout routine to make sure that he had one. Sure enough, the ladies ate that shit up. Literally—more women had licked “the V” than he could count. Kelsey though, she’d smeared his abs with whipped cream and licked it off like it was her new favorite dessert. The memory alone had precum leaking from the tip of his cock.
Down, boy.
Kelsey’s gaze narrowed at his statement, her eyes locked firmly on his. He wondered how much willpower she was exerting right now to keep herself from looking down. Just to piss her off, he threw in a wink.
In response, she shrugged. “I’ve seen better, honestly. Have you seen Game of Thrones? Khal Drogo? You’ve got nothing on him.” She brought her finger up to her lips, tapping on them as she pretended to think. “Oh, you know who else has you beat? Thor. That man is jacked. Maybe you should look up his workout routine.”
He couldn’t contain the growl that left his mouth; he’d worked hard on his body, dammit. Would it hurt her to show just a little appreciation? It was time to pull out the big guns. Well, the big gun—singular.
“I’m glad you’re here actually; I need help getting into the shower if you don’t mind.”
“Well, I have to get back to work soon, but—”
The rest of her sentence disappeared as Carlos removed the sheets from the lower half of his body and moved his legs to the side of the bed. He couldn’t contain his smirk as Kelsey stared at his still hard dick. Before he could come up with a smart comment, she licked her lips and he released the only sound he was capable of emitting in response to the blatant interest in her eyes. His loud groan filled the room, breaking the sudden silence and shattering the trance Kelsey had been in.
A blush washed over her cheeks, and she turned around quickly. “Put some damn swim trunks on, Carlos. You know the rules,” she growled.
“A guy’s gotta wash his junk, Kelsey. I’m sure you understand that. For a minute there, it actually looked like you wanted to help me.”
Kelsey scoffed, the sound weak and halfhearted. “You fucking wish.”
“I definitely do. The dirty nurse fantasy is one I’ve had for years. I bet we could find a costume for you on Amazon and everything.”
“You’re impossible. Just put some damn trunks on. James is home—you can’t walk through my house naked.”
Carlos heaved a heavy sigh. She had a point. But damn, he wanted to take a shower without swim trunks at some point. Having to wash himself under the trunks was damn inconvenient when he was sitting down.
“Fine, toss me a pair from my suitcase, please.”
After he’d donned the required shower-wear, Kelsey helped him to his feet, and he used his cane to hobble to the bathroom. He was sick of being so damn dependent on someone else to do such basic things. His physical therapy had just started, but he already felt as though it was progressing far too slowly. When they finally got to the bathroom, Kelsey turned on the water and helped Carlos into the tub when the spray was warm enough for him. Just as she closed the curtain, he heard James yell for her from the living room.
“I’ll be back in a few minutes to help you back out, okay?”
Carlos grunted in response, his mood plummeting with every reminder of how incapable he was of doing anything on his own. He’d only been out of the hospital for a week and he was already so fucking sick of it. He washed himself quickly, wanting to get out of the shower and back to his room to nurse his suddenly foul mood.
When he’d finished washing and Kelsey still hadn’t returned, he waited about five minutes before deciding that he could manage this on his own. It was just getting out of the shower; he could do this. Leaning forward on the shower chair, he turned off the spray of hot water and used one of the bars in the shower to stand carefully, wincing at the pressure of even the smallest amount of weight being placed on his right leg. Carefully, so as not to lose his balance, Carlos shifted his hold from the bar in the shower to the towel rack. He then lifted his right foot, keeping all of his weight on his left and gingerly placed it on the bathroom floor. When he was straddling the bathtub, he heaved a sigh of relief and got ready for the difficult part. He would need to put some weight on his right leg to get his left out of the tub. Steeling himself for the bite of pain, he put a considerable amount of his weight on the towel rack and lifted his left foot out of the tub. Before he could place it on the floor of the bathroom, however, the towel rack was ripped from the wall and his right leg crumpled beneath him.
Carlos crashed to the floor, the towel rack hitting the tile next to him with a loud clutter. He almost screamed at the sharp pain shooting through his right leg, biting down on his fist to keep the sound from escaping his mouth.
Kelsey must have heard the crash from his fall, because within moments of him hitting the tile, she was rushing through the door to see what happened. Unable to bear the embarrassment of her witnessing his shame, he snapped.
“GET OUT! GET THE FUCK OUT!”
“C-Carlos, let me help you—”
“I AM A GROWN FUCKING MAN. I CAN GET OUT OF THE BATHTUB ON MY OWN. GET. OUT. NOW!”
She hesitated for a moment, her urge to help him clearly battling with the need to obey his harshly spoken demand. When he heard the sound of the door quietly clicking shut, he eased himself into a sitting position against the wall of the bathroom and took a look around.
There were bits of plaster all around him on the fl
oor from the towel rack being pulled from the wall, and he’d managed to bring the shower curtain down with him as well. His right leg was still throbbing, and he gritted his teeth against the pain as he used the bathroom counter to get back to his feet. Unable to put even the slightest bit of weight on his right leg, he toweled off quickly with his free hand, the other gripping the bathroom counter as he balanced on one leg, and grabbed the cane he used to get around from its place next to the door.
Carlos exited the bathroom as quietly as possible and hobbled slowly, so slowly, down the hall to his room. Only once he was in his room did he collapse into bed and sob. He was pathetic. A pathetic fucking excuse for a man who was unable to even get out of the shower.
How could he be a police officer if he couldn’t even do something as simple as stepping out of the shower? If he were honest with himself, that was his real issue. He’d never been a particularly manly man, and he was comfortable as hell in his skin. Being unable to walk wasn’t so much a blow to his ego as a detriment to his career. His career meant everything to him.
Disgusted with himself, he stayed in bed for the remainder of the day, and the next day, and the day after that.
His only human interaction was with Kelsey when she brought him his meals. She tried to speak to him about his fall, but he was too embarrassed. He missed one of his physical therapy sessions, snapping at Kelsey when she’d tried to get him to go. Instead, he took a heavy dose of painkillers and slept the hours away, wallowing in his own self-pity.
Chapter Six
Carlos hadn’t left that damn room in a week. A week straight of Kelsey bringing his meals to him and receiving only a gruff “thank you” in response. She didn’t know how to help him, and it was frustrating the hell out of her. She’d tried to talk to him about his fall in the shower on more than one occasion and had gotten nothing in response. Whenever she brought it up, he silently tucked into his food and ignored her until she left. She’d also noticed that he had been taking more of his painkillers than the doctor had prescribed.