by LJ Evans
PJ didn’t know what to say. She really wasn’t upset as much as restless.
“Locke says that dipshit artist of his assaulted you last night,” Justice said with arms crossed. “Do I need to bring the boys over and pound some manners into the schmuck?”
PJ sighed. She should have known Locke would say something to Justice. He was Justice’s best friend after all. They’d been friends since their own college days. For the almost ten years since she’d been with Justice, Locke had been there just as much. They’d all shared a house together for most of her high school years.
So, she shouldn’t have been surprised that Locke had taken it personally when she’d told him what had happened with Seth. And maybe she’d used the word assaulted because she was ticked off at the Neanderthal artist, and she was certain that that was why he’d forced Seth to meet her and apologize that morning. It certainly wasn’t because he was worried about the blog post she’d written.
PJ sighed again. “He didn’t assault me.”
“That’s what you told Locke.”
“I was really angry.”
Justice frowned, his usually happy and easy-going manner leaving him. “So, you lied?”
“No,” PJ rubbed a towel over her sweaty face trying to get her bearings. “He did kiss me.”
Justice let out a big air of something close to relief. “Shit, S&M. That’s all? Did you stomp his navicular like I taught you?”
“Nah, I just pushed his manubrium with my metacarpals, and he let up,” she smiled and tried to smack him with her towel. Their old habit of naming bones went back to his sports medicine days and her struggle with Biology 101.
He grabbed the towel, and they proceeded to struggle over it until she’d wrapped it around his wrist and twisted his fingers back. He grimaced and let go.
“I should know better than worry about you. You’d beat the crap out of anyone who thought twice about attacking you.”
And at the time, she’d believed him.
They headed towards the locker rooms. “What did Locke want?” PJ asked belatedly.
“Said something about you agreeing to see the guy’s studio and that he’d called and asked where you were at?”
That stopped PJ in her tracks.
“What?” Justice asked.
“I only agreed to that about five hours ago. And I told him I couldn’t do it today.”
Justice grinned widely. “Hmm. Sounds like someone’s got it bad for my little S&M.”
“Puhlease. I don’t need to hear this from you too.”
“What? Claire giving you a hard time about him?”
“Ever since she saw the picture of him on his bio.”
“So?”
“So, what?” PJ said as she looked back at her brother at the edge of the woman’s locker room.
“You going to go see him?”
“Not today.”
Justice continued to stare at her.
“Why are you staring at me?”
“Just getting a read on how over the heels you are for this guy.”
“Ugh! I’m totally not anything over this guy. He’s a total man-whore, egotistical artist type who thinks his shit doesn’t stink and that any female should automatically drop her panties when he raises his pinky.”
“So, you really like him, huh?” he continued grinning at her.
She threw her towel at him and stormed into the locker room to shower.
* * *
It was eight o’clock that night by the time PJ wrapped up her last Little Heroes training, grabbed her gear, and headed for the front office. Justice was behind the counter with his wife, Liv. Liv’s tall, athletic frame looked as if it was ready to burst due to the large baby bump she’d grown. It was their first baby, and they were both over the moon excited.
PJ smiled happily at the sight of them. Justice had his arms wrapped around her, hands on her belly, chin resting on her shoulder where her dark hair teased his face. He was going to be a great dad. He’d already been a great one to PJ.
“Peej!” Liv called out a happy greeting.
“Hey sis!” PJ said and went around the counter to hug her. “How’s the baby bun?”
“Still cookin’,” Liv said with a tired smile. Then her eyes lit up. “So tell me about this smokin’ artist you’re in love with.”
“Ugh!” PJ pounded her fist against Justice’s shoulder. “I am so not in love! I barely met the jerk.”
“So how was the kiss?”
“Does no one respect anyone’s privacy anymore?”
“Well, now, when have we ever respected your privacy?” Locke said coming in from the side room.
“What happened to the old Locke who told me I could tell him anything even if it was something I didn’t want my brother to know?”
“I lied,” Locke said with a smile and a shrug. “You know I told him everything, right?”
“No!” PJ declared mouth agape.
“It was hard being dad and brother,” Justice said with a weak smile that made PJ want to run because if Locke had told him everything, it was amazing that Justice could even look her in the eye.
“I’m leaving now,” PJ said heading for the door. “You all can continue to talk about me after I’ve left, as it seems you’ve been doing it for years!”
“Wait! For the love of all that is holy, please call Seth back before I have to force you in the car and drive you there myself,” Locke hollered out in exasperation.
This stopped her. She looked back at him as he pushed his hand through his thick hair that had turned gray in spite of his being in his mid-thirties.
“He’s called again?” she asked.
“Only about five times since four o’clock.”
“Oooooh. PJ has a boyfriend, PJ has a boyfriend,” Justice started singing with a goofy smile.
“I want details. Hard details,” Liv said, “When these thugs aren’t around. I have to live vicariously through someone.”
“Damn woman, you know how to break a man’s heart,” Justice said. But, he was already kissing Liv’s neck, and she was already swooning at the knees.
“I’m outta here,” PJ said opening the door to be hit with the cool spring air.
She heard Locke call out, “Call him tonight, please, before I have to shoot him or me or both of…”
The door muffled the rest of his phrase as she headed to her beat up Bug, praying it would start. It did, with its typical cough and huff, and she headed back to the apartment in as much traffic as she’d arrived in. She hardly remembered the drive though. Instead she was thinking about blue eyes and demanding lips and wondering why in the world Seth Carmen had called asking about her so many times in just a few hours.
* * *
She knew now, months later, why he’d called so much. Seth couldn’t help himself. Once he wanted something, he wouldn’t let go. It was what had tempted her and driven her away at the same time. It was why he couldn’t just let her be even though that’s what she said she needed. But she also knew he was trying. Like he’d said, it was why he was writing instead of showing up on her doorstep in New York City. For Seth, that was a huge step.
She was part of the problem though because she half wanted him to show up. Then she could blame everything on him. His possessive nature. The crap that had gone down with the unknown caller. But she wouldn’t give in to her desire to have him back. She had to straighten out her own head first. She had to figure out her own plan before she was drawn back into a world where nothing existed but Seth.
In These Arms
Letter Three
“I’d love you, I’d please you, I’d tell you that I’d never leave you. And love you ‘til the end of time, if you were in these arms tonight.
-Bon Jovi, Bryan, & Sambora
DEAR BELLA,
Where did I leave off last? I think it was you, leaving me at The Green Room? And I’d had all those images floating in my head. Images you’d created. I went immediately to my studio. The drive home had given m
e lots of time to see the most recent image unfold in my mind. The silk on metal that I hadn’t been able to escape since I’d kissed you the night before, since I’d thought about rubbing your flushed cheeks this morning.
In my studio, I got caught up pounding out the thin sheet of metal. Heating it, bending it, twisting it so that it lay shiny and smooth as if it was a piece of silk cloth draping and pooling around the metal chair I was going to make.
I worked nonstop for several hours until the light changing on the silky metal made me think of the light flashing in your eyes as you’d stormed at me in the restaurant, and it snapped me out of my art in a way very few things can.
As you can attest, I’m like most artists. I can lose myself for hours at a time in my work. Before I met you though, there were times when I worked for twenty hours straight before I realized my body was screaming for food and rest. After you, I could never last that long before the need to be with you, touching you, listening to you, would draw me back to our life. You were good for me in that way. You are good for me in that way. I have more in my life than just art.
At that time, I wasn’t used to the idea of you causing my hands to stop so dead still. I found myself scratching absentmindedly at a cut on my neck that I’d received while working with the metal and heat and tools. I looked up at the rooster clock that hung above the window in my shop as a reminder of people who once had loved me. It was how, before you, I used to remember that there was more to life than my studio.
I didn’t bring many things with me from my grandparent’s ranch when I’d sold it after their deaths. As much as I loved my grandparents, I also loved that they knew I’d never survive living in the depths of Tennessee. I love that they’d told me in their will to sell, to use it to start my own life.
The clock read four-thirty. I’d been working only about five hours, but I was hungry. And my brain was now thinking about my inspiration instead of my work. And I realized, you hadn’t shown up. Not that I really expected you to run over to my studio after you’d told me you couldn’t right away. But, damn it, I really wanted to see you again. Needed to see you again. Fucking Bon Jovi wouldn’t get out of my brain. “Like the roses want the rain… like the poet needs the pain.” From day one, you were already in my blood. But I needed you in my arms.
I cleaned up in the half bath attached to the studio and headed into the main house with its soothing beach wood and warm tones that meant home to me as nothing ever had before. In the kitchen with its steel and glass that was the place that I usually worked at my other hobby, cooking, I just fixed myself a sandwich and ate it leaning against the frame of the French doors, staring out at the beach and the waves. Which made me think of those eyes of yours. The colors changing so rapidly.
I reached into my pocket and, almost without thinking, called Locke’s number. Locke answered on the second ring, “What now?”
I’d growled back, “She’s not here.”
“Who?”
“PJ.”
“Was she supposed to be there?” Locke said confused.
“She said she’d come see the studio.”
Silence on Locke’s end for a whole thirty seconds. “She did?”
It was my turn to be silent. He sounded surprised, and that pissed me off and made me worry all at the same time. As you know, pissed always wins with me.
“What do you want me to do about it?” Locke groused.
“Give me her number.”
“If she wanted you to have it, she would have given it to you.” And he sounded so protective that, not for the first time, I wondered what the deal was with the two of you. It made my stomach knot, and I found myself wanting to punch Locke’s smooth face till his gray head swung about uselessly. It wasn’t the kind of sudden violent impulse I’d had in a long time. It made me frown, angrier than before.
“Have her call me,” I stormed at him before pushing the off button and tossing the phone to the sofa.
I decided to go for a swim before I really did break something or headed down the street to the bar on the corner. I changed, headed out to the breakers, and pushed through them till the houses and the beach faded away into a smaller perspective. Then I turned back the way I’d come.
I was exhausted and cold which helped with my anger and frustration. When I made it to the porch, I hosed off at the outside shower, rubbed myself dry, and padded back into the house.
The first thing I did was grab my phone. And the frustration came rushing back when I saw there was no call. Does it surprise you at all that I called Locke’s number back?
“Seth?” Locke was clearly surprised.
“She hasn’t called.”
“Jesus H Christ. I just called her. She’s at work.”
“That was an hour ago.”
Locke sighed. “What the hell is going on?”
And the truth was, I wasn’t normally this needy. It wasn’t me. I was the one who usually didn’t call. In fact, I didn’t ever call even after I’d slept with them. But I also never promised I would. Only one girl had ever gotten a promise or a call back, and that had been a lifetime ago.
“She said she’d come over. You know how I feel about people not following through,” I said, which was really a half-truth because I did have a violent reaction to people not holding up their end of a bargain. Even if it’s a half-ass meant one. But, I also wasn’t going to admit to Locke just how much I needed to see you.
“Look, Seth. PJ. She’s… You can’t treat her like your slam bunnies.” There was anger in Locke’s voice that brought me right back to the pissed off feeling I’d had before the swim.
“Because she’s your slam bunny?” My voice was barely controlled rage. I had to force the image from my head of your silky skin and Locke’s gray hair tangled together.
“It’s not like that.”
“What is it like?”
Silence again on Locke’s end. “It really isn’t any of your business. If PJ wants to tell you, she can. It’s her business more than mine.”
This made no sense to me at the time. I didn’t get it. If Locke was sleeping with you, it made it damn well his business as much as yours. Neither of us said anything for a long moment. I was trying to breathe. Trying to focus on the waves I could hear outside my window and less on the image that was tearing a hole in me.
“I’ll try to call her again,” Locke said with a sigh.
I hung up without a response.
I needed to fucking get a grip.
I headed into the bedroom and changed into my flannel pajama bottoms that looked ridiculous on me, but I didn’t care. They were damn comfortable. And the pajamas were really Cam’s fault. She used to slide the flannel on over her swim suit as she’d leave the dive school when I picked her up. The flannel was so soft, and she’d tease me about getting my own pair whenever I tried to let my hands wander over and under and into the soft cloth. And I had. And, maybe at first it was to remember her, but now it was simply because they were what I could relax in.
I grabbed a water, trying not to crave a beer, and slouched down on the couch in front of the TV. I flipped through the channels, not really seeing anything, and landed on some sports game that I didn’t give a shit about.
Before I knew it, I was dialing Locke again. “This is ridiculous, Seth. She’ll call when she calls, man,” Locke said instead of hello.
“She’s not coming tonight,” I said trying to keep my voice firm, but even to myself it sounded needy, and of course that just ticked me off.
“Probably not. I know she’s at work until at least eight.”
“Where the hell does she work?”
Flashes of bars and strip clubs raced through my head even though I knew it was unreasonable because it would be much, much later than eight if you worked at any of those places. I told myself to get a grip. I really didn’t get why this was bothering me so much, but all I could see was pale blue-gray eyes and cheeks full of color. I was almost shaking just thinking about touching thos
e cheeks and kissing those soft lips.
I cleared my head about the same time Locke cleared his throat and said in a tone that was soft, serious and almost as lethal as my own can get, “Seth. You can’t mess around with her. I’m serious.”
I rubbed a hand over my face wishing for a beer. Again. Wishing for something that would put my brain at rest.
“I’m going out to the shop. Have her call me,” I said and hung up again. I walked barefoot back out to the studio, grabbed my gear and started up again on the metal that I needed to have pour like silk.
* * *
I had small cuts all over my chest and feet from working shirtless and barefoot with the metal. I knew better. But that night I hadn’t cared. That night, the pain had been a good pain. It had kept me focused on things besides those soft, color changing eyes and a pint at a mahogany bar.
The phone in the pocket of my flannel pajama bottoms vibrated. I dropped everything and pulled it out. It was a number that wasn’t one of the three fucking numbers in my contact list. I couldn’t help the hope that soared into my chest that it might be you.
“About goddamn time,” I said instead of hello. Maybe now you can understand why I sounded that way. At the time, you must have thought I was off my rocker.
I was met with silence.
“PJ?” I growled out.
“Is this Mr. Carmen?” I heard your melodious voice with a huge sigh of relief. I hadn’t realized until then that I’d been afraid I’d never hear it again. I was afraid that you wouldn’t call or come over, and that Locke would keep you all to himself.
“Not Mr. Carmen. Seth. Why aren’t you here?”
Silence.
“Mr. Carmen.”
“Seth,” I said with a growl. I wanted to jump through the phone and shake you or kiss you until you agreed to stop calling me by my asshole dad’s name.
After another silence you finally relented, “Seth… Was there something you wanted?”
“You told me you were going to come by and see the studio.”
“I told you I couldn’t do it today.” I could hear the prickly tone in your voice, and it was a painful relief. So much better than the emotionless professionalism you had been trying for before.