Friends Without Benefits

by Marci Bolden

  “You deserve it. I know I didn’t say it enough, but you deserve all the happiness you can get. I’m just sorry I didn’t realize sooner that I wasn’t giving it to you.”

  “I wasn’t giving it to you either, Mitch. We’re both to blame for not seeing how far we’d fallen.”

  “All the pain I caused you—”

  “Is over. It’s done. I have to forgive you so I can move on.”

  “Can you forgive me?”

  “You know what? I already have. As soon as I accepted things were over between us, I let it go. I just want to move forward.”

  He laughed softly. “Karma really is a bitch, huh? I tore you both apart, and now you’re together, and I’m the one sitting on the sidelines watching the one I love be happy with someone else.”

  “I don’t want to hurt you.”

  “I know that. This is my comeuppance. I hurt you. I betrayed you. And now you have someone who will appreciate you. I’m just so sorry that I put us here.” He looked down, but not before Dianna saw a shimmer of tears in his eyes.

  She put her hand to his cheek and waited for him to look at her. When he did, she let her hand fall. “You know, I started working on this healing process a lot sooner than you did. It takes a while. You’ll get there, and you’ll find a way to be happy. Happier than we had been for a long time.”

  “I miss you, Di. I miss the life we had. I was wrong. What we had was enough. I want you to know that.”

  “Thank you. That means a lot.”

  “I wanted to, um… With you working on commission, you need to be mindful of your finances. I can help with that. If you want. I can help you figure out where to invest so you have a cushion.”

  “I’d really appreciate that.”

  “Okay. So, we’ll talk about that once you get settled into the new house.”

  “Sure.”

  “I’ll grab the soda. Anything else?”

  “Nope. That’s all. Thank you.”

  She watched him head for the garage door before grabbing the potato salad and heading back outside. She put the container on the food table and sat back down beside Paul.

  “What did I miss?” she asked as laughter erupted from Paul, Matt, and Donna.

  “Nothing,” Annie stated firmly.

  “She slipped,” Paul said. “Annie slipped.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Apparently big sister hasn’t been spending as much time alone as she’s let on.”

  “That is not what I said.” Annie narrowed her eyes at Dianna. “You just stay out of this one.”

  Dianna grinned slowly. “Wait. You mean Marcus?”

  Annie looked across the table and tried to glare, but her lips curved up into a smile and she shook her head. “It’s your fault.” She tossed a potato chip at Paul.

  “Me? What did I do?”

  “All the flowers and candies you send to the office, all your gushing over Dianna. It made me feel lonely.”

  Dianna ran her hand over Paul’s back. “You are kinda gushy.”

  “I thought you liked that.”

  She crinkled her nose as she kissed him lightly. “I love that.”

  Dianna stood in her living room, bare of any traces of her life there. No, that wasn’t true. There was still a stain in the carpet, barely noticeable to anyone except those who knew she spilled a glass of wine there while celebrating the start of 2008. And there was the dent in the wall from one of Sam and Jason’s wrestling sessions. But the photos were gone. The books and mementos had been packed away. Her furniture had been carried out and the paintings on the walls removed. As she prepared to leave this house for the last time, it felt like she was losing a part of her soul.

  Mitch stepped beside her. “You okay?”

  She swallowed before looking up at him. “No.” She sighed and looked to the big window, the one where they’d set up their Christmas tree for the last twenty years. “How are you?”

  “I just spent the last fifteen minutes staring up at the tree where I built their tree house. There are still nails sticking out.”

  Her lip trembled as memories of her boys climbing up the tree to the few pieces of wood that Mitch had put there. It hadn’t been fancy, but they’d used it until she had finally insisted it was too old and dangerous and Mitch took it down. By then they’d pretty much outgrown climbing trees and he didn’t build another one.

  “I bet the new owners will put one up,” she said. “They have two boys, too. Four and eight.”

  Mitch smiled. “Good ages.”

  “We spent so much time in this room. So many good times.”

  She swallowed as Sam and Jason stepped into the doorway. They glanced around the bare living room, looking as sad as Dianna felt. Jason lowered his head and stuffed his hands into his pockets, as he often did when he was feeling emotional. Sam’s face was tight. Mitch was quiet, hands in his pockets as well, and as Dianna looked at the three men who had made this house her home, she choked out a sob.

  Mitch put his hand on her shoulder. Jason kicked at the floor, and Sam looked away and sniffed.

  “Come here, guys.” Mitch gestured toward his sons. They crossed the room, and he put one arm around Dianna’s shoulders and the other around Jason’s. Jason did the same—an arm around Mitch and one around Sam—while Dianna put hers around Sam’s and Mitch’s waists.

  “A lot has happened in this house,” Mitch said. “Good and bad. I was sitting in this room when Mom told me she was pregnant with you, Sammy. Jason, you lost your first tooth here. Di, you got drunk and spilled a glass of wine and never let me live down the fact that I didn’t clean it up well enough.”

  She laughed.

  “A lot of bad things, too. We were sitting in this room when we found out Dad died. We lost family and friends and pets. But the good times always outweighed the bad. I know Mom and I are divorced now, but we’re still family, and we still have each other. And that’s what’s important.”

  Jason sniffed and Sam let out a muffled sound, but Dianna let her tears run down her face. She pulled away and hugged Sam and then Jason and then Mitch—for the first time in a very long time, and she was glad it wasn’t as awkward as it could have been. A few minutes later, they left, the three of them huddled close together. She watched them, and when they were gone, she looked around the room again. Taking one more deep breath, she put her fingers to her lips and blew a kiss into the room before she headed for the front door for the last time.

  She was the last one to arrive at her new house, and by the time she did, it was already filled with furniture and people were unpacking her belongings.

  “Don’t mind if you don’t like where we put things,” Donna said as soon as Dianna walked in. “You can always move it, but at least it will be clean, unpacked, and out of the way.”

  Kara shut a drawer and tossed a box aside. “We put everything as close to how it was at the other house as we could.”

  Paul and Jason shifted her sofa one way and then the other. She was surrounded by insanity. She’d spent most of the day mourning at the old house, only to walk in to the best kind of crazy at her new house. The place was cramped, loud, and everyone was stepping over each other trying to move around.

  Her heart filled with love for all the people there, each and every one of them. Paul, Matt, and Harry, Kara’s husband, debating which piece of furniture to bring in next, and Kara, Annie, and Donna debating over where her pans should go. Sam and Jason bickering over who got the loft and who got the second downstairs bedroom. Even Mitch, who was carrying in boxes and setting them out of the way.

  The moment was madness. Sheer and utter and perfect madness.

  Paul opened his eyes as he drifted from sleep. It took a few seconds to register the strange room he was in. He and Dianna had been exhausted after moving boxes and furniture and unpacking all day. He’d stayed later than anyone, and when they’d finally stopped, it was late and he was tired. She’d pulled him with her into her new bedroom, and without a
word of protest he’d curled up into her bed.

  They’d fallen asleep within minutes, and now he was wrapped around her, surrounded by her warmth and sweet scent.

  The day—hell, the last month—had been so hectic they hadn’t had time to breathe. But this morning, in her new house with her sleeping next to him, he inhaled and exhaled slowly as he let life sink in. Everything was perfect. As perfect as he could expect anyway.

  He kissed her head before slipping from her bed. As a pot of coffee brewed, he looked out the back door at the yard. It was the beginning of June and the air was still cool in the mornings, but he opened the door and stepped out onto the patio. He smiled as he imagined the life they were going to have there. Thoughts of family barbeques and mornings of sipping coffee at the table filled his mind and brought peace to his heart.

  He startled when a cup was slid in front of his face. He didn’t know how long he’d been standing there making plans in his mind, but it was long enough that Dianna had poured him a cup of coffee.

  He took the mug from her. “Thank you.”

  Her arm went around his waist, and she rested her head to his chest. “What are you thinking?”

  “I’m happy,” he whispered so he didn’t jinx it.

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Me, too.”

  He kissed her head. “I was watching you sleep last night.”

  “Was I drooling?”

  He chuckled. “No. You looked beautiful and so peaceful. It made me think about something.”

  “Hmm. You do a lot of thinking while I sleep.”

  “I get my best thinking done when you aren’t nervously rambling about something.”

  She gasped, causing him to laugh.

  “I’m teasing.” He hugged her gently and pressed his lips to her head. “You know how I like to jump into things feet first?”

  “I do.”

  “Well, I was thinking that I really love this house, and I’m probably going to be spending an awful lot of time here.”

  She grinned. “That’s my plan.”

  He was quiet for a moment, debating just how much he wanted to say in that moment. “I know this is your house, but I feel like this is our place, our fresh start, our new beginning. So, I was thinking, maybe we should sell my house and look into investing the money in a vacation home. Something lakefront. Then we could have a romantic getaway whenever we wanted. I think we’ve earned some time away, don’t you?”

  A smile slowly spread across her face. “Yes, I think we have.”

  “We would each have our own house, but we’d only visit mine for long weekends and vacations.”

  Excitement lit her eyes. “I like your new house already.”

  “We should get something with at least three bedrooms, don’t you think? Something big enough for our friends and family to visit us sometimes.” He laughed softly as the idea warmed his soul. “Can you imagine us and all our boys crammed into a three-bedroom house on the beach? It would be insanity.”

  Her smile widened. “It would be the best kind of insanity. And I would love it. I would love it so much.”

  “But first things first,” he said.

  She lifted her brows.

  “We can’t even consider living together until I’ve heard you play that piano.”

  Dianna laughed but then took his hand and led him into her new living room. She set her coffee on the end table and sat at the piano. He squeezed onto the bench next to her. She looked over at him and smiled.

  And then she played for him.

  Continue the Stonehill Series

  The Forgotten Path: Stonehill Series: Book Three

  Stonehill Series Book Three

  The Forgotten Path

  “So,” Mallory drawled as she stepped next to her mother, “still mad I invited Marcus to my graduation?”

  Annie cocked a brow, silently telling her daughter where she could go. She’d called before she’d even gotten home the night before, wanting to know why Mallory had invited Marcus—or more to the point, why she hadn’t told Annie about it. Mallory had casually said about the same thing Marcus had—besides her uncles, he was the closest thing she had to a father figure. He was the only man who had been steady in her life. Marcus Callison had worked for Annie for five years, and from day one he and Mallory had hit it off.

  Sure, Annie had developed a good friendship with Marcus, and because of that he and Mallory had spent some time together, but a father figure? That seemed over the top.

  “I ask,” Mallory said lightly, “because you’ve barely stopped staring at him all afternoon. I wasn’t sure if that was because you were offended by his presence or because he looks so darned cute in that suit.”

  Before she actually could tell Mallory to go to hell, her daughter laughed and walked off.

  “Why do I get the impression she just bested you?” a deep timbre asked from behind Annie.

  She closed her eyes as Marcus’s voice rolled through her. Heat burned up from low in her gut and settled in her face. She had no doubt that her cheeks were deep red, but short of being rude, she had no choice other than to face Marcus.

  Mallory was right. He did look darned cute in his suit. The business casual dress code at the office meant they didn’t dress to the nines often. Marcus’s red tie and perfectly tailored black pants and coat had caught her attention. His salt-and-pepper hair was combed to the side, a perfect cut and style for his strong jawline and blue eyes.

  Damn it. She was staring at him.

  She tilted her head, pursed her lips, and narrowed her eyes in an attempt to get him to back off…and to get her mind off how good he looked.

  Instead of slinking away, he laughed with the same enjoyment at her expense that Mallory just had. “Damn. Whatever she said must have been good. I’m sorry I missed it.”

  Annie started to brush past him, but he put his hand to her upper arm and stopped her retreat. She jolted a bit—not from his touch, but from the way she felt the skin-on-skin contact all the way down to her toes. What the hell?

  “Come on,” he pleaded, “you have to share.”

  “She thinks she’s smart.”

  “Well, she did just graduate college cum laude.”

  Annie’s irritation faded and pride filled her. She couldn’t help but smile. “Yes, she did.”

  He toasted her. “Congratulations.”

  “Oh, I can’t take credit for that. She did it all on her own.”

  “She has your brains.”

  Annie shook her head. “I didn’t even go to college, remember?”

  His face softened, and he looked at her in that way that made her breath catch. “You would have if you hadn’t been saddled with other obligations.”

  She didn’t open up about her past often, but something about Marcus made her drop her defenses. She hadn’t intended to, but she’d opened her mouth and spewed her emotional mess all over him. Who cared if she hadn’t gone to college? Who cared if she’d had a rough go of it? Paul and Matt were grown and successful, and Mallory had just taken one more step along that path. But that hadn’t stopped Annie from dwelling on things she shouldn’t, and leave it to Marcus to dig in and make her feel all those…feelings.

  She shrugged just the slightest bit. “It all worked out.”

  “Yes, it did,” he said with quiet sincerity. “You’ve done amazingly well for yourself. And your family.”

  He tightened his fingers on her arm and ran this thumb over her bicep, as if to reassure her. Instead, it set her on edge, and she felt as if she were about to fall over. Damn it. What kind of voodoo was this man doing to her?

  Annie’s focus shifted to her daughter in an attempt to undo whatever it was that had made breathing nearly impossible. Her smile returned as Mallory squealed and hugged a friend who had just arrived at the party.

  “I can’t believe it,” he said. “Our girl just graduated college.”

  Annie’s attention snapped back to him. “Our girl?�
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  “I know I didn’t have any part in raising her, but we’ve gotten close over the years. Like I said last night, she’s the closest thing I’ll ever have to a daughter.”

  Marcus smiled and, as tended to happen these days, her chest tightened and warmth spread through her. His gaze softened as he stared at her, and she sighed.

  She actually freaking sighed.

  His deep blue eyes were like an abyss that she fell into every time he looked at her like that. Like that meant with a tenderness he shouldn’t have for his boss.

  She didn’t need anyone to tell her how inappropriate that was. She’d told herself a thousand times. That didn’t stop her breath from catching whenever he touched her or their gazes stayed locked a few seconds too long—like they were right now.

  Thankfully, an obnoxious round of laughter pulled her from his gaze. Annie glanced at her brothers. “I was, um, on my way to the kitchen. Excuse me.”

  She forced her feet to move her away from the tall drink of temptation in her living room. Alone in the kitchen, she shook her head and leaned against the island, where the extra chips and platters were piled. She closed her eyes and let her head drop forward like it weighed a hundred pounds.

  “Get a grip,” she muttered.

  The door behind her opened, and she nearly laughed. She didn’t have to turn around to know Marcus had followed her.

  “Need help with anything?” he asked.

  “No. I was just…”

  Her words faded when he moved to her side, much too close, and she couldn’t stop herself from looking at his clean-shaven face. She was tempted to run her fingers along his oval jaw to see if his skin was as soft as it looked. Her self-control was fading quickly. She’d used up damn near all her resolve during the graduation ceremony. He’d sat next to her, his arm resting along the back of her chair during most of the commencement. For nearly two hours, she’d sat stiffly, her hands clutched as she silently reminded herself not to lean into him. Not to put her hand on his knee. Not to smile up at him. Not to rest her head on his shoulder. And to breathe—just breathe, damn it.