Well. She couldn’t argue with him there.
#
When Owen rolled off her for the second time night, they lay there in relative silence for a moment as their breathing slowed. He was exhausted in the best way possible. He’d given a hundred and ten percent, the half-threat, half-joke she’d made earlier about tricking him into a one-night stand making him determined to give his debut performance everything he had.
He got up to go dispose of the condom and then walked around the bed, running a hand through his hair and looking for his pants.
Marci looked over her shoulder at him and murmured sleepily in a sexy low voice, “What are you doing?”
“Looking for my pants,” he answered.
“Why are you doing that?”
“Isn’t it time for you to kick me out?” Ah. Found them. He grabbed them from under the edge of the bed as they’d somehow gotten kicked under there.
She seemed to consider this for a moment, watched him holding his pants and standing at the foot of the bed. Then she said, “You can stay if you want to.”
Surprised, he dropped his pants. Jumping back into the bed before she changed her mind, he slid under the covers and toward her until her back was pressed to his chest.
“I’m not used to this,” she said. “Sleeping with someone all wrapped around me.”
This didn’t surprise him. “I can give you space if you want.”
“No,” she said. “It’s okay.”
This was progress. And way more progress than he’d expected to make in one night.
“Can I use your arm for a pillow?” she asked.
“Sure,” he said, shock making him answer her slowly. He slid his arm under her head, and she nestled against it and snuggled closer to his back. His arm was probably going to fall asleep, but he didn’t care. Hell, it could fall off and that would matter little to him right now.
If Owen had known that night that his phone, which was in the pants he’d abandoned at the foot of Marci’s bed, was blowing up the way it was with missed calls, it might’ve made a difference to him. But it probably wouldn’t have. He was so far gone in what he and Marci had finally gotten going, he could think of little else.
Chapter Eighteen
Owen smiled to himself and hummed all the way home the next morning. Marci had snuck him out of the apartment. Tyler had an audition in New York that weekend and wasn’t getting home until late Sunday evening. Ronnie was the only obstacle. While they waited for Ronnie to leave for work, they had some really good breakfast sex. Marci muffled her shouts into a pillow so she wouldn’t give herself away to Ronnie. After Ronnie left, Owen left, too. Marci had walked him to his Jeep with no one around to see and even allowed him to give her a kiss goodbye. And she’d asked if he’d be at the writing center Monday. All this was progress indeed.
Owen abruptly stopped humming when he got to the outer door of his apartment building and saw Brynn pacing in front of it.
“Hi, Brynn,” Owen said, confused. “You can’t get in? Is Dante not here?”
Brynn hugged her arms tightly, and Owen noticed that there was a chill in the air for the first time. He’d been oblivious to everything about his surroundings since leaving Marci’s place. It was unseasonably cold for early November. The temperature had to be in the high forties, and it was a little after noon. He zipped up his black fleece.
Brynn stopped pacing. “I’m not sure. I’m not here to see Dante, so I didn’t check. I was just standing out here, thinking.”
“Thinking about what?” Owen asked.
She picked at the front of her orange fleece vest with a gloved hand. “Something that’s been driving me crazy for the past few weeks.”
“And that is?”
“Whether or not to give you a second chance.” She shook her head and laughed. “Getting attention from guys has never been a problem for me. Until you. And I don’t know whether that’s what got under my skin or if something else did, but I can’t stop thinking about you. Maybe I can get this out of my system or find out if there’s more than just a passing attraction if we give this another shot.” She looked up at him with her light blue eyes as she adjusted her brown scarf. “I think we should give this another chance. That is, if you want to.”
Owen was speechless. Her timing couldn’t be worse if she tried. Brynn was a beautiful girl. And Dante had made it clear that he’d made a huge mistake blowing Brynn off at The Hops. She was brilliant—had graduated magna cum laude last spring and was taking some time off to build her credentials before applying to graduate business schools. She was apparently very funny, according to Dante. And the deal he’d struck with Marci—was almost positive he’d struck with her anyway—didn’t have any restriction against dating other people.
Besides, with a girl like Marci, it’d be just plain foolish not to have a backup plan. Marci would walk away from whatever they had when the mood struck her. Maybe even tomorrow. He certainly hoped not, but he knew better than to put it past her. And being completely single was not in the least enjoyable for him. In fact, he’d recently learned it could be quite dangerous.
“Owen.” She gave a small, fluttery laugh. “You’re so quiet. You’re making me nervous.”
“Sorry.” He smiled. “Sure. I’d like that a lot, Brynn.”
“So we’re starting over?” Brynn asked.
“Yep.”
“Good. What are you doing tonight?” she asked. Clearly, Brynn was not a time waster.
“Nothing, I don’t think.” Owen took his phone out so he could double-check his calendar. When he did, he saw that he had a lewd text from Marci that made him grin. He also realized he had 26 missed calls. His grin faded when he saw who they were from. Kristin. Shit. 26?
“Everything okay?” Brynn asked.
“Yeah.” Owen forced a smile and stuck his phone back into his pocket. “Tonight’s fine. I’m completely free.”
Brynn’s face lit up with a smile. “Great. Where should we go?”
“I feel like The Hops would be fitting.”
Brynn laughed, a pretty, tinkling sound. “I think so too. Pick me up at seven?”
“Sure. If you give me your address.”
“Okay. If you give me something to write with.”
Owen had his backpack because he’d had it yesterday when he went straight from class to Marci’s place. Slipping the straps off his shoulders, he opened it up and grabbed a notebook and a pen. Brynn recited her address to him, and he scribbled it down.
“I better get going,” Brynn said. “I need to finish my run.” She was dressed in black running tights and wore a long-sleeved T-shirt under her fleece vest.
Tapping his notebook against his open palm, he nodded. “I’ll see you this evening.”
“Looking forward to it.” Brynn jogged off.
It was a good thing she hadn’t wanted to come up. He needed a shower much more than he needed to make awkward small talk with Brynn while trying to get his head together after all that’d happened last night—and that morning.
#
Marci sat on the couch all day and graded papers. Her students had been asked to write a reaction paper to a few excerpts from a film the professor had made them watch in class the previous week. Most of them had done a piss poor job on it. Most of them had probably dashed the paper off the night before it was due or a few hours before coming to class even. She grinned to herself. Sounded like something she’d do—had done—as an undergrad. Especially this close to Thanksgiving break and finals. There were a few diamonds in the rough and no surprises among them. Her go-getters had turned in the best papers as always.
Marci looked up when Ronnie walked into the apartment. She shrugged off her black pea coat, revealing her black Schaffer’s polo shirt sporting the restaurant’s logo. Her apron was still tied around her waist.
“Hey,” Marci said, her eyes drifting back to the paper on her lap.
Ronnie didn’t answer right away. After a pregnant pause, she said,
“What’s up?”
“Just grading papers.” Marci held up a paper as a visual.
Ronnie nodded. “Okay.”
“You’ve been awfully distracted lately.” Marci knew there had to be something going on. Whenever Ronnie was around these days, which wasn’t often, she was quiet and mostly stayed in her room, which wasn’t Ronnie.
Ronnie freed her dark brown hair from the knot she usually wore it up in at work and slipped the rubber band she’d been using as a hair tie around her wrist. “I’m fine.”
“Are you sure everything’s okay?”
“What about you? That boy didn’t go home last night.” Ronnie was famous for turning the tables when she didn’t want to talk about herself.
“He went home,” Marci said. Just not last night.
“Uh-huh,” Ronnie said in a tone that connoted she wasn’t buying it, not even for a second. “Right.”
“We worked on his paper until late, and then he went home. After you went to bed.” Marci picked up her brown earthenware mug to take a sip of tea.
“He was putting in work all right.” Ronnie snorted. Are you doing Jeremy’s brother?”
Marci nearly dropped her mug. Placing it on the coffee table, she tried to play it off. “That’s ridiculous. Really. He’s a terrible writer. That paper needed a lot of work. I mean seriously. Did you see him when you left this morning?” Marci gave the window a worried glance. She hoped she wouldn’t get struck down by lightning for all the lies she’d just told in a row.
“Nope,” Ronnie said simply. “And I didn’t see you, either.”
Marci picked up her mug and took her time sipping her tea, considering how to answer this. “I was up late. You know I like to sleep in on Saturdays.” At least she’d said one true thing. Well, technically two true things. She had been up late after all. Just not alone.
“Girl, you can be a vault when you wanna be,” Ronnie said.
“So can you,” Marci said. “Apparently.” Marci’s phone chimed. She looked down and saw an alert for the reminder she’d set for herself. “Ah yeah. I meant to remind you that I’m going to mail the rent checks tomorrow. You have yours ready?”
Ronnie’s face blanched. She grabbed the front pockets of her apron like her tips were still in there—even though she always dumped them into her purse right after her shift—and like Marci was going to reach in there and try to take them away from her. Biting her lower lip, she took a seat in the armchair diagonally across from the sofa where Marci sat. Well, more like she stumbled into it.
“Are you still going to try to tell me nothing’s wrong?” Marci asked.
Ronnie stared down in the direction of her hands, which were still in her apron pockets, for a long time before saying anything. Still looking down, she said, “I’ve been meaning to talk to you about this.” Not only had Ronnie’s tone changed, but Ronnie was using a tone Marci rarely heard her use. It was so foreign coming out of Ronnie. Way too small to sound like any tone Ronnie would use.
“What is it?” Marci asked.
“I’m going to have a little trouble coming up with rent this month.”
“Is that all?” Marci laughed. “Don’t worry. I’ll spot you.”
Ronnie jumped up from the couch. “I hate talking about money with you. You always treat it like it’s not a big deal.”
“Because it’s not.”
“To some of us, it is,” Ronnie snapped.
“Oh, Ronnie. You have to know I didn’t mean it that way.”
“I just wish you’d stop rubbing it in our faces, throwing your mom’s cash around all the time. Tyler and I didn’t happen to come into the world with silver spoons in our mouths. A lot of us didn’t.”
“I don’t—at least I’ve never meant to throw it around,” Marci said. Had she been a jerk about money? If she had, she’d never realized it. She’d always thought of money as mattering to Glenda King too much, but she’d never dreamed she was anything like that woman. Was she? Had she become just like her mother while trying to be the exact opposite of her? If so, how the hell had that happened?
“Well, you do. You’re always trying to treat us like money is nothing. You’re always offering to pay for things. Like we can’t handle our own.”
“I know you can handle your own, Ronnie,” Marci said quietly. “In fact, you’re always so good with money,” she added carefully because it was true and because she was trying to find a way to calm Ronnie down enough to have a rational conversation with her. “What happened?”
Ronnie waved off Marci’s words and crossed her arms over her chest.
“I’m sorry, Ronnie. If I’ve hurt you in any way, it was unintentional. I could give less of a crap about money. But I do care about my friends. A lot,” she said. “I love you, Ronnie. And whatever’s wrong, I want to help if you’ll give me that chance.”
Ronnie crossed the living room and stopped in front of the balcony doors. Staring out at the downtown Richmond skyline and facing away from Marci, she said, “I’ve been trying to help someone out. Financially.”
“A friend?”
Ronnie shrugged.
“Is it…Jeremy?” Marci was almost afraid to ask.
Ronnie looked over her shoulder and gave Marci a death glare. Marci held her hands up to show that she came in peace. Marci let Ronnie stand at the window and fume in silence. If Ronnie wanted to talk about this, she would talk. Marci didn’t think words would be helpful any longer at this point. In the meantime, Marci went into the kitchen, made Ronnie a cup of tea the way she liked it—far too much cream and sugar—and brought the tea out to her. After handing Ronnie the mug without saying a word, Marci made her way back to the sofa.
Eventually, Ronnie came and sat next to her on the sofa.
“My uncle has a gambling problem.” Ronnie stared into her mug as she spoke. Ronnie’s uncle had raised her from the time she was three years old because her mother hadn’t been able to take care of her kids after a bout of post-partum depression pretty much destroyed her. Her mother’s brothers and sisters—Ronnie’s aunt and uncles—had taken Ronnie and her brothers and sisters into their homes and raised them. Ronnie’s uncle meant a lot to her. For all intents and purposes, he was a father to her.
Ronnie let the whole story about her uncle’s addiction tumble out. When she was done telling it, Marci asked her if she thought she should try to get her uncle some help.
“I know you think I’m being an enabler,” Ronnie said.
“I’m not saying anything except that you shouldn’t be trying to take on this huge burden all by yourself.” Marci twirled her dad’s class ring between her index finger and thumb, barely aware she was doing it. “Sometimes…you have to realize there’s nothing…nothing else you can do. And that the bad things happening to the people you love are not your fault.”
“I’m not by myself. The family knows about it,” she said. “And my uncle is in trouble with some pretty bad people, Marci. They aren’t the type who are going to go away if he goes to gamblers anonymous or whatever recovering gambling addicts do and files bankruptcy or something.” Ronnie put her mug down and wrapped her arms around herself. “I just don’t know what to do anymore, Marci. I don’t know.”
“Oh, Ronnie. You’ve been carrying this around and not telling anybody? You should know you can tell me anything.” Marci hugged Ronnie to her.
“You know the full extent of my family’s trashiness now, huh?”
“How could you even dream I’d think that?” Marci squeezed her tighter.
“My brothers have a plan, but it’s one I’m trying to stop them from putting into action. They’re going to get themselves killed.” Ronnie pulled back from the hug a little. She laughed, wiping tears from the corners of her eyes. “Still want to come up for Thanksgiving?”
“Of course I do,” Marci said, smoothing Ronnie’s hair back from her forehead.
Ronnie sighed and shook her head. “I think I need a drink. Mudslides?”
“Only for
you,” Marci said.
Ronnie laughed. “We have really different opinions of liquor, huh?”
Marci laughed back. “I guess so.” Marci liked her whiskey straight over rocks. Or downed in a shot. Ronnie couldn’t stand the taste of any liquor and had to drown it all in sugar. “I can’t take all that sugar in my liquor. I don’t see the point. Those things you call mixed drinks are milkshakes with a splash of liquor in them.”
Ronnie raised an eyebrow. “And what’s wrong with that?”
Marci grinned and shook her head. “Plenty. Now are we going to make your alcoholic milkshakes or not?” Marci got to her feet and offered her hands to Ronnie.
“Yep.” Ronnie put her hands in Marci’s and allowed Marci to pull her up from the couch.
Chapter Nineteen
Owen had a serious problem, and the problem was named Marci. She was all he could think of all the way through his date with Brynn. He could barely stop himself from counting the minutes until he’d see her at the writing center. The one good thing about it was he hadn’t even been so much as tempted to call Kristin back. She kept trying to call him. Not like that first night when she’d tried twenty-six times, but she tried several times since then to reach him.
Monday, Owen was already smiling as he walked down the hallway to the writing center. When he saw Marci, he was pleased to see that he wasn’t the only one who couldn’t wipe the smile off his face.
“Am I your last appointment today?” he asked.
“You are,” she said. “Actually, you’re my last appointment before we shut down for the semester.”
“I have good news,” he said.
“What’s that?” she asked, crossing to the middle of the room.
He met her there. “No more paper. Turned it in this morning.”
“A whole day early. Look at you.”
He breathed in the rose scent of her neck before murmuring against it. “I wonder what we’ll find to do to fill up all that time.” He couldn’t get enough of the way she felt beneath his fingers.
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