Foes & Cons

by Carrie Aarons

  He sweeps his hand around to acknowledge the party that’s about to turn up a notch, you can feel it.

  “Was it really that bad?” I whisper into my girl’s ear.

  She shrugs, then smiles. “For a time. But it had a hell of an ending.”

  “We found our way back to each other. That’s what matters.” I kiss her earlobe and feel a shiver run across her skin.

  “You keep doing that and we will have to leave this party.” But she leans in closer.

  I’m growing hard where her ass connects with my groin, and I think she might be right.

  “Stop eye-fucking each other and dance with me.” Laura pulls Blair up by the arms as a DJ Khaled and Drake song bumps through the speakers.

  They throw their arms above their heads, Blair’s hips swaying to the music. My eyes track her movements and I feel all the blood in my body rush south of my waist. God damn, she’s so sexy. Since we got together, I have my hands or mouth on her in some form every day and it’s never enough.

  I’m about to stalk her like she’s the prey to my predator, when my best friend jumps up on the couch a la Tom Cruise.

  “Let’s play seven minutes in heaven!” Glav cries out, and a couple people wander over out of curiosity.

  “If you wanted to kiss me that bad, you could have just asked,” Nate jokes with my best friend, and Glavin just wiggles his eyebrows at him.

  “Ugh, I hate this game,” Laura whines, though she’s staring daggers at Matt.

  Those two might not be exclusive, but I see a drunken argument in our future if either one of them goes into the closet with another person.

  I, however, just glance across the rapidly forming circle at the most beautiful girl in the room. Blair catches my eye and shrugs her shoulders, a flirty smile playing at her lips. It’s almost three years ago now that we found ourselves in this exact same position, and the outcome was catastrophic. That moment set us on a course that ended up changing our relationship and both of our lives. But we’re solid now, completely in love. The only thing that could come from us going into that closet would be a very R-rated show.

  “You’re up first,” Glavin tells me as we all sit down in a circle and he places a Coors Light bottle in the middle.

  “You’re too predictable.” I roll my eyes, knowing what he’s trying to do.

  Even so, I spin, and the bottle whirls around and around as everyone in the circle holds their breath. It slows to a stop and lands on … Nate.

  “Aw, cute, lover boy, but you’re not my type.” He flutters his eyelashes at me and then redirects the bottle, pointing it right at Blair. “There, I think that was the result you were looking for.”

  Blair chuckles quietly, and I offer her my hand, just like I had three years ago.

  “I’m having such a bad case of déjà vu.” I hear Laura laugh as we head for the closet in Matt’s basement.

  “I promise I don’t bite,” I whisper to Blair, taking her by the hips as she walks in front of me.

  She presses back, her curves whispering over all of the places that only she knows how to turn on. “In your dreams.”

  We’re echoing our words of seven minutes in heaven-past, and the foreplay is only making the anticipation stronger.

  Our desired destination looms closer, and I’m having flashbacks. I hope that inside her own overactive mind, Blair isn’t associating this with any bad memories.

  So I tell her the truth, the one thing that I know for certain. “I love you. I’ll love you forever.”

  She squeezes my hands where they firmly hold at her middle. “I love you, too.”

  As soon as the closet door closes, my palms are cupping Blair’s cheeks and my mouth moves on hers.

  I made the mistake of not doing this once before. That won’t happen ever again.

  Any chance I have to love her, I’m taking it.

  Epilogue

  Sawyer

  Four Years Later

  The graduation march plays over the loudspeaker in the football stadium, and thousands of students donning black robes and maroon caps file into the rows and rows of white chairs below.

  My eyes scan the heads, looking for the cap decorated in glittery gold letters. Blair put a Ruth Bader Ginsburg quote on her cap, to honor her late hero before she tries to take Washington the same way the former Supreme Court justice did. I’m searching, searching, until I finally spot her amongst the crowd. She’s walking next to two of her political science major friends, and her smile is so wide that I can make it out from my seat in the bleachers high above.

  On my right, Todd is trying not to weep like a baby about his daughter graduating college. His girlfriend, Cecily, holds his hand and smiles knowingly. They’ve been together for almost two years now, and she knows how Blair is practically his whole world. She respects that, and she and Blair have developed a really nice friendship.

  To my left, my parents sit waiting for Blair’s name to be called and her degree to be put in her hands. Mom has her cell phone held up to shoot a million pictures already as Dad leans over to me.

  “Next year, that’ll be you.” He pats me on the shoulder.

  I’m not down on that field today because I’m in a five-year program, one that won’t see me graduating until next May. That’s right, I got into the architecture program after all. Three months into our freshman year, I finally came off the wait-list and was granted a spot in the major. I’d already made peace with the fact that it might not happen, and was enjoying my first semester, but that was just the cherry on top.

  Since that day, I’ve excelled at my courses. I’ve worked harder than anyone in the program and even landed an internship in New York City last summer. It didn’t change my decision to work at the family firm, but the experience opened my eyes up to so much possibility in the way I design and plan.

  Meanwhile, Blair had been a four-hour ride away in Washington, DC. She interned for one of the New Jersey senators in her office, and each night when we talked on the phone she’d chat my ear off excitedly about policy and laws. My woman is going to change the world someday.

  The past four years have gone by in a blur of late nights, difficult exams, making new friends, drunken strolls home from the bars, and moving into our first apartment together. Blair wouldn’t live with me until junior year, when she said we’d established a strong friend group and wouldn’t miss out on the independent joys of college. I was kind of glad she enforced it, though we still slept in each other’s tiny dorm beds almost every night.

  Throughout our college years, our love has only grown stronger. We’ve laughed a lot, cried some, supported each other through wrong decisions and amazing triumphs. Blair, as she’s always been, is my best friend and the woman I’ll be in awe of forever.

  “I can’t believe she’s graduating college.” Todd’s voice is pure fatherhood pride. “I remember like yesterday when she was a little girl, begging me for a popsicle after dinner.”

  “I’m pretty sure we snuck them even when you said we couldn’t have one.” I laugh.

  “You crazy kids. I can’t believe we watched you grow from little babies to these … adults.” My mom wipes away a tear.

  “Aw, come on, Mom, no tears yet.” I reach over to pat her hand.

  She should save those for later. She doesn’t know it now, but she’s going to need them.

  “And you have your whole futures ahead of you.” Todd looks my way, winking discreetly.

  Of course, he is the only one who knows what’s happening tonight. After all, I had to ask his permission.

  Tonight, during our celebratory graduation dinner at the fanciest seafood spot Brockden has to boast, I’m going to ask Blair to marry me.

  She doesn’t know it, but I’ve got a ring in my pocket. It might be too soon, we might be too young, but I feel like I’ve been waiting a lifetime already to ask her to be my wife. I would have done it sooner, if I didn’t know that Blair would shoot me down and tell me she needs to finish college first. Well
, jokes on her, I waited until the very minute she graduates.

  Blair Oden has been my destiny from the minute I laid eyes on her. I’m not sure what the future will bring us, with my dream to join the family firm and hers to go off and be a political dynamo, but I know one thing for sure. She’ll be my wife, and we’ll figure the rest out together.

  Okay, fine, I guess three people technically know about my proposal, but I had to lure Laura and Nate here somehow. Blair doesn’t know they’re coming in to surprise her and the two of them freaked out so much when I told them what was happening that there was no way they were missing it. The three of them are still thick as thieves, and we make bi-monthly trips to visit both of them in their separate cities. Glav, Matt, and I also make it a point to get together every few months, whether that’s for a division one football game or a night of stupid bro moments on a bar crawl. They’re going to start plotting the bachelor party the minute I tell them I put a ring on her finger.

  One person who won’t be privy to our great news is Blair’s mother. After the final Christmas she showed up for, Blair decided it was time to cut the cancer out. She no longer returns her phone calls, not that they come anymore after the first year her daughter ignored her. We haven’t seen or heard from her in a long time, and it rarely affects Blair. She knows how much love she has in her life.

  I watch as she searches the bleachers, looking for our little group. I stand, stick my fingers in my mouth and whistle loudly. Immediately, her gaze darts to me, even with the crash of noise and people all around. We just have that deep of a connection.

  Blair’s mouth breaks into an even bigger smile as she shakes her head at my method of grabbing her attention. She waves, one hand over her head, at the five of us who are here for her. I wave back like a goofy fan, because technically that’s what I am.

  My other hand ghosts along my pocket, where a small velvet box is waiting for her.

  Along with the ring, in my pocket sits a folded up piece of notebook paper. Scribbled on it is a pros and cons list. On the pros side, I’ve written just one sentence:

  Spend the rest of your life with me, feel my love every day, grow old together.

  And on the cons side, I’ve written just one sentence:

  You have to plan a wedding.

  Over the years, Blair has informed me how much she doesn’t want the whole white dress, table assignment, big to-do shindig. But I know once we get engaged, our parents will be so over the moon that they’ll insist on a big, traditional wedding. I personally can’t wait, and I smirk each time I think about her having to sit through an appointment about florals, guest lists or napkin colors. I know it’ll all be worth it on that day, though, and she’ll see that, too.

  Asking her to marry me is the nerve-wracking part, but the pros and cons list is just my personal touch. A do-over. One thing I should have made right a long time ago.

  I’m doing it now, though, and I can’t wait to see the look on her face when she reads it, before I drop to one knee.

  For the rest of my life, I’m going to show her that there are no drawbacks to loving her. She only makes me a better man. With her, my life is infinitely greater.

  I hope I can do the same for her until we’re old and gray.

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  Also by Carrie Aarons

  All of my books are currently enrolled in Kindle Unlimited.

  Standalones:

  Love at First Fight

  Nerdy Little Secret

  That’s the Way I Loved You

  Fool Me Twice

  Hometown Heartless

  The Tenth Girl

  You’re the One I Don’t Want

  Privileged

  Elite

  Red Card

  Down We’ll Come, Baby

  As Long As You Hate Me

  All the Frogs in Manhattan

  Save the Date

  Melt

  When Stars Burn Out

  Ghost in His Eyes

  On Thin Ice

  Kissed by Reality

  The Callahan Family Series:

  Warning Track

  Stealing Home

  Check Swing

  Control Artist

  The Rogue Academy Series:

  The Second Coming

  The Lion Heart

  The Mighty Anchor

  The Nash Brothers Series:

  Fleeting

  Forgiven

  Flutter

  Falter

  The Flipped Series:

  Blind Landing

  Grasping Air

  The Captive Heart Duet:

  Lost

  Found

  The Over the Fence Series:

  Pitching to Win

  Hitting to Win

  Catching to Win

  About the Author

  Author of romance novels such as The Tenth Girl and Privileged, Carrie Aarons writes books that are just as swoon-worthy as they are sarcastic. A former journalist, she prefers the love stories of her imagination, and the athleisure dress code, much better.

  When she isn't writing, Carrie is busy binging reality TV, having a love/hate relationship with cardio, and trying not to burn dinner. She’s a Jersey girl living in Texas with her husband, daughter, son and Great Dane/Lab rescue.

  Please join her readers group, Carrie’s Charmers, to get the latest on new books, as well as talk about reality TV, wine and home decor.

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