Parker Security Complete Series

by Camilla Blake

  After dinner, we went inside, talked for a while, and played a couple of rounds of rummy. Teagan didn’t look at her phone once.

  “So, you can sleep in the bedroom,” I said, when we were done playing and both smothering yawns behind our hands. “We’ve got a pull-out couch out here and... oh, shit.” I frowned. We didn’t actually have the pull-out couch anymore; we used to have one but Camille had gotten rid of it and replaced it with a regular couch that didn’t also convert into a bed.

  “What?” Teagan asked. “And I’ll sleep on the couch; I don’t mind at all.”

  “That’s just the thing—I completely forgot that we don’t actually have that couch anymore. This one’s new. Well, newer. I don’t really use the couch much when I’m up here, to be honest.” It sounded a bit implausible, even to me, who knew it was actually the truth. I could only imagine what Teagan was thinking—that this had been my plan all along. “It’s fine, though,” I said. “The couch is comfortable.”

  “Absolutely not!” Teagan shook her head. “You’re not going to sleep on the couch.”

  “It’s no trouble at all—I really don’t mind. I want you to be comfortable, so please, take the bed.”

  “We could both sleep in there,” she said after a moment. “I mean, it’s big enough that we could easily stay on our own sides. I’m not one of those people who sleeps diagonally or anything like that. I just... I would feel really bad if I knew that you were sleeping out there on the couch because of me.”

  Were we entering dangerous territory here? Or were we just being mature adults who could sleep in the same bed together without sleeping together? The thing was, I didn’t want to say good night to her and then go out and sleep on the couch, knowing that she was in the bedroom. I wanted to lie next to her, because I enjoyed being around her and I didn’t want that to end just because it was time to go to bed.

  The smart thing to do would be to retreat to the couch. We would wake up tomorrow and have all day to spend together.

  But...

  “Okay,” I said. “No funny business, though—I promise.”

  She laughed. “No funny business.”

  While she went into the bathroom to change, I stripped down to my boxer shorts and a T-shirt. I usually slept naked but obviously would not be doing that tonight. I listened as the water turned on, then off, then I could hear the faint sound of her brushing her teeth. When she came out, I saw she was also wearing boxer shorts and a T-shirt, her long hair tumbling down over her shoulders.

  “Does it matter which side I sleep on?” she asked.

  “Whichever side you want.” I had taken to sleeping in the middle of the bed after Camille and I had broken up.

  I took my turn in the bathroom, brushing my teeth, splashing a little water on my face. I looked at my reflection in the mirror for a second before I turned the light off. I looked different, I thought. It was a subtle difference, and it took me a second to realize what it was: I was happy.

  I left the bathroom and went and got into bed. It was strange to feel someone else’s presence in this bed again, yet at the same time, it wasn’t strange at all, because it felt exactly right. It was a king-sized bed, so even though we were both lying there, there was still an expanse of mattress between us.

  “Good night, Teagan,” I said.

  She yawned, a content, gentle sound. “Good night,” she said.

  And though it usually took me a little while to calm my thoughts down and eventually nudge myself to sleep, tonight, for whatever reason, sleep came for me a few seconds after I closed my eyes.

  ***

  I woke up the next morning and turned to see Teagan still asleep, on her side, just a few inches away. Her lips were parted slightly and her face was completely relaxed, angelic. I felt as though I could have stayed there and watched her sleep all morning, but my fear that she would wake up and find me doing just that spurred me to get up, to get out of bed. Not to mention the fact that I had an erection that I didn’t want her to see, either.

  I took a cold shower. Cliché, I know, but it helped. Teagan was just starting to stir when I got out.

  I went into the kitchen and made coffee, then started in on breakfast—poached eggs on sliced beefsteak tomatoes with some melted cheese and English muffins.

  “That smells delicious,” Teagan said when she came out of the bedroom.

  “Did you sleep okay?”

  “That was probably one of the best night’s sleep I’ve had in a long time,” she said. “I wasn’t sure if the quiet would make it harder to fall asleep, but it didn’t. It was so peaceful—I didn’t realize how used to the sirens and the dump trucks and the horns honking I had gotten.”

  We ate breakfast out on the deck. I asked Teagan what she felt like doing for the rest of the day and she said she’d be happy to do whatever it was that I usually did. A hike, then, because that was one thing I always did when I was up here. I told Teagan she should put her bathing suit on under her clothes, in case she decided she wanted to go for a dip, though the water would be quite cold.

  “God,” she said, “I can’t remember the last time I went swimming.”

  I threw some stuff into my small day pack—a couple of water bottles, some granola bars, a towel we could share if we went swimming. I took her on a mellow hike, probably half the length of what I normally would’ve done if I was by myself, but I was fine with that. It was invigorating to be out here with someone who wasn’t used to it, who was really seeing a lot of this stuff for the first time.

  It was late afternoon when we got back to the house, and we were both famished, so we drove into town and went to a cafe that specialized in gourmet cheeseburgers, which hit the spot perfectly after a long hike. When we got back to the cabin, Teagan wanted to sit out back.

  “My legs are totally sore,” she said, “but I still want to be outside.”

  She made herself comfortable in one of the Adirondack chairs while I got two glasses of lemonade. I came out with them but stopped a few steps onto the deck.

  The light was perfect, the angle of it, coming from behind, alighting her hair, making it appear as if it were on fire. The sun radiated out from behind her and I stood there, just watching, unable to move, to say anything. She had both literally and figuratively let her hair down, so to speak, and it was one of the most beautiful things I had ever witnessed. This gorgeous woman, in one of my most favorite settings: the backyard of my cabin, as the sun’s warm, golden light cast her in an ethereal glow.

  She must’ve sensed me watching her, because she turned her head and saw me, lifted her hand, waved. I walked over, then handed her the glass of lemonade.

  “It’s so amazing out here,” she said as she took the glass from me, our fingertips brushing. I watched as she brought the glass to her lips, tilted it back, her eyes closing as she drank. I tried to ignore the feeling down below; Camille was the last person I’d had sex with, and the coupling at the end of our relationship hadn’t been that great. What I really wanted right then, though, was to take Teagan into my arms, just feel the length of her body against my own. I wanted that intimate physical connection—but more than that, I wanted an emotional one, because it felt like it had been so long since I’d last experienced that. Sure, I could have gone out to some bar or asked Cole if he had a friend to set me up with, but it would’ve just been purely physical, an energetic exchange solely engineered to relieve some primitive building of pressure. Which was a rather detached way of looking at it, and certainly not how I felt about Teagan. Of course, those feelings for Teagan could never be acted upon, no matter how wonderful I thought the actual act of being close to her would be. What was nice, though, was to realize that it was still possible for me to feel such things, an ability I wasn’t sure whether I had lost, after everything with Camille.

  I sat down next to her.

  “I really can’t ever remember being this... awe-inspired by nature,” she said, her voice still filled with a sort of wonder that I truly did fin
d refreshing. “Sitting out here like this, no noise from the city, no other people, just the trees and whatever animals are out there... It’s so peaceful. I had no idea.” She smiled. “I realize how ridiculously out of touch that makes me sound, but I guess it has been a long time since I last left the city. And these chairs.” She leaned her head back, rested both of her arms on the wide armrests. “I’ve always loved Adirondack chairs.”

  “They were my first foray into chair-making,” I said, feeling a sense of pride well up in me. It had been an informal workshop that this guy Camille and I knew taught; it had actually been Camille’s idea to go but she decided only an hour into it that she didn’t really want to build a chair after all and would instead leave the task up to me.

  “I was wondering if you made them. They’re really great.”

  We sat there in amicable silence for a few moments, and I was completely enveloped in a feeling of contentment. It had been a long time since I’d last felt like this, and I wanted to soak up every moment while I could.

  “Thanks for coming up here with me,” I said. “I know it probably seemed completely out of the blue, but it’s nice to have someone else up here. I usually come up alone.”

  “I’m glad it worked out the way it did,” Teagan said. “And I like that... I like that we can do this and it’s not weird. If that makes any sense. I mean, I know that this is probably not the normal thing for people to be doing in our situation, but I think it’s really cool that we can.”

  “I know exactly what you’re saying. And I agree.”

  We stayed out there on those chairs as the sun started to set, and then the sun did set, and night fell around us. Fireflies appeared, crickets trilled. Teagan and I kept talking, and I felt like I could have stayed in that moment forever.

  Chapter 14

  Teagan

  I had assumed I’d feel relieved once we were on the road and heading back to San Francisco, but as we drove, I realized that I was already missing the cabin, the quiet, the outdoors. There was something special about this whole past weekend, something I couldn’t quite put a name to. It had been different from what I was used to doing, so there was the novelty of it, but it was something deeper than that. I had felt a sort of peace, contentment, that I had never felt before, and I didn’t know what it was—being out in nature? Being with Ben? Just getting out of my comfort zone? Maybe some sort of combination of all three. And the other thing was: I hadn’t taken a single picture. I had barely even looked at my phone, and hadn’t even really had the desire to do so. And it felt good, not to be tethered to it like that, even if it was just for a few days.

  So it was a bit of a letdown when we finally pulled up to my apartment building. Ben walked me up to the front door. “Well, Teagan,” he said. “I had a very nice time with you this weekend. Thank you for taking me up on my impulsive offer. I think I might have to try and do something like that again.”

  There was an ache in my chest, because I so badly wanted to ask him to come up into my apartment with me. Now that he was about to leave, I suddenly found myself overcome with the desire to not be alone. I didn’t want him to go; I didn’t want our weekend to be over. The thought of going up, alone, into my apartment was completely repellent. But the words were lodged in my throat; there was no way I would be able to get them to come out.

  “That sounds great,” was all I could manage.

  I waited until he drove off before going inside. I stopped in the lobby first and got the mail, then continued up to my apartment. It felt stuffy inside and I set my bag down and the mail on the table and went around opening windows. Once that was done and a nice breeze starting to circulate, I turned my attention to the pile of mail, which was mostly circulars and a couple of bills. There was one card, though, that had been sandwiched between a page of coupons and an ad for new car insurance.

  I was about to open the card when my phone rang. It was Aoife, who I had missed several calls from already, so I picked it up.

  “Teagan!” she said. “I’ve been calling you. And so has Mom. Why haven’t you been responding? Is everything okay?”

  “I was out of town for the weekend. I wasn’t on my phone much.” I slid my finger underneath the flap of the envelope, opening it. I wouldn’t take the card out to read it, though, until I got off the phone; I just needed something to fidget with. Already, I could feel my stress levels starting to rise.

  “Oh. Where’d you go?”

  “Up to Guerneville.”

  “I love it up there! But wait—what were you doing up there?”

  “I went to a cabin.”

  “Like an Airbnb? You should’ve told me—I would’ve joined!”

  “No, not an Airbnb.” There was a pause, and I realized I shouldn’t have corrected her; I should have just let her assume that. Because now I’d have to come clean, or make up some story, which I didn’t want to do. “I went with someone who has a cabin up there.”

  “I see.” I could hear her smile. There was another lengthy pause, and then she sighed loudly. “Come on, Tea, you shouldn’t make me have to beg to hear the details.”

  “I’m not sure what details you want.”

  “Hmm, let’s see: Who’d you go with, what’d you do, did you get laid... That’s a good start.”

  When it came to talking about our love lives, Aoife and I had a bit of an unbalanced relationship—meaning she was more than happy to divulge any and all details like we were on an episode of Sex and the City, while I preferred to keep things vague. Not because I was trying to be superior or smug about it, but because I really hated the idea of Elliott or some other boyfriend talking to their friends about me, or at least about me in the bedroom. Sex had always been somewhat challenging for me, for a number of reasons: I wasn’t entirely comfortable in my own body, being naked around someone else; I was constantly questioning whether the other person was really enjoying what was happening, or if I was doing something wrong; and I had never had an orgasm from sex. Which was apparently rather common for quite a few women. I’d had orgasms from foreplay, but that required an attentive partner, and sometimes my past partners couldn’t be bothered. Regardless, this was not the sort of information that I would share with anyone, even my sister.

  “I went with Ben,” I said finally. “He owns a cabin up there and he asked me if I’d like to go for the weekend.”

  “Holy shit,” Aoife said. “Ben as in the guy who’s supposed to be your security guard?”

  “Um, yes. But you don’t have to put it like that. Nothing happened.”

  “What do you mean, nothing happened? Of course something happened—you went up there with him in the first place!”

  “I know that you’re probably not able to wrap your head around the notion of going somewhere with a guy and not sleeping with him, but that is, I assure you, exactly what happened.”

  “Are you trying to say that I’m a slut?”

  “No, of course not,” I said, even though she kind of was. Not that I was judging her. Hell, if I had the confidence in my body that Aoife did, or the ability to orgasm pretty much whenever—which I only knew about because she had described several occasions to me, in graphic detail—then I would probably be eager to sleep with as many guys as I could, too. “I’m just saying... you seem to be having a difficult time accepting the fact that nothing would happen. Physically, anyway. Plenty of stuff happened—I actually had a really nice time. I was out in the wilderness, and I enjoyed it.”

  Aoife let out a low whistle. “I’m impressed. Glad to hear you’re actually going out into nature!”

  I chose to ignore the mildly condescending tone in her voice; she probably wasn’t even aware that she was talking like that. “It was great,” I said. “I mean, there were definitely a few moments when I felt sort of out of place and wondered what the hell I was doing, but overall, it was awesome. I barely even looked at my phone.”

  “I noticed. You haven’t posted anything in almost a week.”

  I was no
t the sort of person who posted something every day; at most it was three or four times a week. Generally, though, usually two. But that didn’t mean I wasn’t on Instagram almost every day, corresponding with people, replying to comments, a few of the DMs. It would be impossible to respond to every single comment, every single DM, but I did my best, and I made sure that I at least read every single thing. If people took the time to write, I could at least take the time to read what they had written, even if I wasn’t able to respond.

  “It was nice not to be attached to the phone,” I said. “Who knows? Maybe I’ll retire from it all.”

  “Shut up. You wouldn’t.”

  “I don’t know. I don’t see myself doing this forever. I don’t think people are going to be interested in looking at my pictures forever.”

  “That’s entirely untrue. I think you’d be a fool to stop doing it right now. You haven’t even reached your peak yet. And when you do, who’s to say you can’t stay there as long as you want? Tea, you’re in a position that almost everyone with an Instagram account would like to be in, yet so few ever get to. And you’re talking about just stopping. Why? It doesn’t make any sense.”

  “It was just a thought,” I said. “Geez. I didn’t realize you were going to get so upset about it. And, you know, there are people dying. People on Instagram getting shot by some psycho. That might be a good reason to stop, at least until this person is caught.”

  “I thought that’s what you hired Ben for.”

  “It is. But he’s not with me twenty-four hours a day.”

  “It sounds like he was this past weekend.”

  I opened my mouth to respond, but didn’t say anything. Aoife was clearly annoyed, though I wasn’t quite sure what had transpired to make her feel this way.

  “We’ve kind of gotten off track,” I said, trying to backpedal a little. I didn’t want this to devolve into an argument. “I’m not trying to fight with you.”