“I always forget you’re so old,” I said, knowing it would get under his skin.
Nick was so vain he’d already asked me once to guess his age and was disappointed I didn’t guess him younger.
“That’s it,” he said, shoving me off the sofa. “No pizza for you.”
NICK
“You don’t go out much either,” I pointed out after loading up my plate with three slices of meat-lovers pizza. I took a big bite and chewed, while Edie shot me a surprised look.
“Have you been thinking about that all this time? That conversation was like half an hour ago.”
I shrugged. So maybe it bothered me a little. But I couldn’t decide if it bothered me more that she thought I had no life, or that she expected me to be some sort of man slut. Even before the Elana fiasco, I’d never really slept around. Sure, I had girlfriends, but always one at a time and for more than one night.
“Of course, I don’t go out,” Edie said, responding to my point. “I’m working as many hours as possible and I was never that popular, so Lil is like my only friend. …” She trailed off and shook her head. “I am so lame.”
“Nah.”
She glanced at me, a smile tugging at her lips. “Nah? That’s your argument.”
I slumped deeper into the couch. “Eh. I don’t have a lot of energy to convince you. This grease is going straight to my arteries.” She started laughing and shoved my arm. “But,” I raised my voice a little to be heard over her giggles, “nah.”
She doubled over, laughing even harder, and I started laughing, too. Edie was a cool chick, really. And she thought I was funny … that’s always a plus, right? Those crappy women’s magazines are always saying women want a guy who makes them laugh.
I swallowed down my laughs, when I realized the direction my thoughts were going. See, this was my problem. I never knew how to just be friends with a girl. I always ended up dating her, even when there were no sparks. I glanced sidelong at Edie. A smile still stretched across her face, but she had gone back to eating, unaware of my turbulent thoughts.
Yeah, definitely no sparks. Edie was way too young to be sparking with me. She was like … a kid sister. I’d never had one of those, but that was totally it. My pal, Edie.
“I’m glad you don’t hate me anymore.”
She glanced at me, an eyebrow raised. I could see the teasing glint in her eye as she replied, “Who says I don’t?”
I grinned. “Me. And trust me, I’m never wrong when it comes to women.”
Her eyes rolled so far back I thought she might pass out. She slapped a hand to her forehead. “Why do I even bother?”
I just grinned and shoved another bite in my mouth. Edie was playing exasperated, but that’s all it was. She thought I was funny, and probably charming. She definitely thought I was hot.
Not that it mattered. Because she was totally like my kid sister.
CHAPTER 7
EDIE
I woke to the sound of the shower running.
Nick was getting ready for work, as usual. I turned to look at the clock. My alarm wasn’t set to go off for another hour. Usually, I slept in to skip the awkward juggling act required for two adults of the opposite sex to get ready in a tiny apartment at the same time. I did not want to walk in on Nick naked, or vice versa. I had a close enough call the first morning I was here. It was strange enough living in this guy’s house, sleeping in his bed, without adding nudity to the mix.
I frowned at the clock, wondering what woke me, when I heard a knock at the door. Who in the world—
The gentle tapping turned to more forceful pounding.
“Nick!” I yelled from bed. “Someone’s at the door!”
He didn’t respond. He probably couldn’t hear me over the running water. I threw off the blankets and ran to the living room.
Nick had folded up the sofa bed already. The only sign someone slept out here was the pillow tossed in a corner of the sofa.
Shivering away from the warmth of my bed, dressed in just shorts and a tank top, I opened the door an inch to peer through. I was hyperaware of my bedhead and crusty eyes, and felt even more frazzled when I spotted the gorgeous, exotic looking woman standing in the hall.
Black, wavy hair cascaded over her shoulders. Dark, smoky eyes and full pouty lips gave her a total sex kitten appeal. And even from here she smelled like a bouquet of fresh flowers. I was fairly certain I gave off a much less pleasant scent, even when I was showered and dressed.
She could only be someone Nick was seeing. I figured he got around, especially after his teasing comments about finding somewhere warm to sleep away from home (even if he’d never actually done it), but this woman was almost out of his league.
And that was saying something.
“Um, hi?” I managed, ever so eloquently. Her eyes widened, and she stared at me speechlessly.
She turned to look at the door behind her, then glanced down the hall, as if wondering if she were in the right place. She turned her gaze back to me.
“I’m sorry, I’m looking for Nick Espinoza, but he must have moved.”
Her accent sounded foreign, but I couldn’t place it. Something from South of the border, but I didn’t think it was Mexican. Colombian, maybe, or some other Latin country.
Even with the accent, I heard the disappointment in her voice.
“This is his place. Do you want me to let him know you’re here?”
She stepped forward, and I moved aside to let her enter and closed the door behind her. When I turned around, she was staring at me.
Probably trying to figure out what Nick would see in me.
She didn’t look happy to see me. If she was a love interest, Nick would probably want me to explain I was only a roommate and invite her to wait. But was if she was an ex? What then?
At a loss, I settled for being vague. “I’m Edie. If you tell me your name, I could go let Nick know you’re here.”
“E.D.,” she said slowly. “Why do you go by initials?”
“No,” I said. “Not E.D. Edie. You know, like the ice cream … Edy’s?” I waited for recognition to click. “No?” I said as she stared at me blankly.
“Well, E.D.,” she said, enunciating so clearly I could tell she was saying two distinct initials, “just who are you to Nick anyway? Why are you here?”
I was surprised by her bluntness, but Nick saved me from answering.
“Elana, what are you doing here?”
He stepped into the living room, a wary look on his face. Dressed in the pair of basketball shorts he slept in and nothing else, he’d obviously been in a hurry once he heard our voices. He looked ridiculously good with his damp hair curling against his neck and drops of waters still rolling down his chest.
My eyes tracked a bead of water over his abs, down to his waistband. Realizing I was staring, I jerked my gaze over to Elana. She looked like she wanted to eat him up.
Gross. I didn’t want to know what these two got up to together.
“Do I need to leave?” I wondered out loud.
They answered at the same time. “Yes,” Elana said, while Nick gave a firm “No!” and hurried over to my side.
“Nick, we should talk,” Elana said. “There are things to say.”
Nick tensed at my side. We weren’t touching, but I could sense the stillness of him and the vibrations of discomfort.
“Edie, this is Elana,” he said reluctantly. He didn’t call her an ex-girlfriend, but it was easy to read their body language.
He didn’t explain who I was, either. Instead, he put his arm around me and pulled me close against his side. I felt the warm, still moist flesh of his ribs against my bare arm and goosebumps raced over my skin.
Nick kissed my cheek, and I inhaled sharply. Between his lips on my cheek and the scent of mingled soap and skin, I felt lightheaded.
I looked up to him, confused, and he gave me a pleading look in return. He hadn’t said the words, but he obviously wanted to portray me as something more than a platonic roo
mmate.
Seriously? Do I look like a teen book cliché? I wondered. Playing the pretend girlfriend seemed like the recipe for a rom-com, but nothing good would come of it in real life.
I frowned and shook my head no. This kind of dishonesty didn’t sit well with me.
His eyes widened in response, silently pleading with me, and my resolve weakened.
“You haven’t told her about me?” I said finally, and Nick sighed in relief.
“I haven’t had a chance,” he said. “We haven’t seen each other in a while.”
Somehow, I thought that second part was a message for me, not that it should matter how recently he’d hooked up with this beautiful woman. He didn’t owe me any explanations.
The fact either of them would consider me plausible in the role of Nick’s girlfriend was baffling, but Elana seemed to buy our story.
She smiled sadly.
“I’m happy for you.” The words were pained but sincere. “I still think we should talk—“
“Not now,” Nick said shortly.
He stepped away from me, and I immediately missed the press of his warm body. Opening the door, he waited for Elana to take her cue.
“Nick. …”
He shook his head, his eyes downcast. “There’s nothing to say.”
His voice was rough with emotion, and my heart hurt just to look at him. For the first time since I’d met Nick, I realized I wasn’t the only one in this apartment with problems.
Elana’s shoulders fell, and she walked to the doorway. She paused next to him, one hand squeezing his forearm.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “It’s my fault.”
He shook his head. “Don’t.”
“He would have forgiven—“
“Not now, Elana,” he said angrily, nudging her out the door.
The second she crossed the threshold, he slammed the door.
“Don’t ask me to lie like that again. You’re just going to have to deal with it if—”
Nick turned, and I faltered at his defeated expression. He nodded his head without meeting my eyes.
“Right. I won’t.” He scrubbed a hand down his face and sighed. “Sorry.”
“Do you want to talk about it?” I asked hesitantly.
He glanced up, his eyes bleak. “Not even a little.”
I was a little surprised by how depressed Elana’s visit left him, and more than a little curious about the story behind it. But his tone made it pretty clear Nick wasn’t in a sharing kind of mood. Still, I wanted to help him. I could hardly believe it myself, but I missed that cocky grin of his.
Even though Nick wasn’t talking, I had a pretty good idea of what kind of history he shared with Elana. Obviously, it wasn’t a happy love story.
I clapped my hands together.
“Okay, then. Nick, you need to call in at work. You’re sick today. Then get dressed in something comfortable.”
He stared at me, nonplussed. I just smiled at him, and hurried into the bedroom to throw on some clothes. If ever someone was in need of bounce therapy, it was Nick. He needed a pick-me-up after that horrible interlude.
When I returned, he was ending his call to the newspaper and took his turn in the bedroom to dress. He came out wearing jeans and a T-shirt — my favorite look for him, even if it did remind me of the night we’d met — and had his keys in his hands.
“So, where are we going?” he asked, still sounding a little too grim. He wasn’t quite himself yet, but he would be.
I smiled. “You’ll see. Let’s head downtown.”
NICK
I pulled up in front of Jumpin’ for Joy, and looked over at Edie, confused. “Isn’t this where you work?”
She grinned at me, something mischievous in her smile. Curious. She got out without answering me, and I followed her to the door.
“It’s closed,” I pointed out.
According to the sign, the place opened at 10. It was only 9 a.m. Right now, I should be settling in at my desk to check emails and send story ideas to my editor. I felt a little niggle of guilt for skipping out, but I pushed it down. I was curious what Edie had up her sleeve, and with the cloud Elana left hanging over me, I needed a distraction.
Edie jangled a set of keys in front of me. “I know.”
She inserted the key into the lock, twisted it, and pushed open the glass door. I followed her inside, wondering why we were here.
She flipped a breaker, and the overhead lights flickered on while fans whirred to life. Inflatables in different colors began to fill with air, taking shape along the edges of the main room.
A large yellow one with Disney princesses along the top was halfway inflated now, and another one, shaped like a pirate ship with a giant slide, wasn’t far behind.
Through a doorway, I could make out tables and streamers. The party room.
“Well, what are you waiting for?” Edie said.
I turned to her. “What?”
“Take off your shoes.”
Edie bent to take off her sandals, and I finally got it. Kicking off my shoes, I followed her into a fire-engine red bouncy house with a domed ceiling. It was a fairly simple bounce house — just a square with a bouncy floor and walls — and childhood memories rushed back to me along with the smell of sweat and vinyl.
I raised a brow at her. “This is why I called in sick?”
She jumped, and I stumbled against a wall. Immediately, I ricocheted back into the center of the bounce house.
“Bounce therapy,” she said between jumps, already gasping for breath. “It works. I can vouch for it.”
She bounced onto her butt and back onto her feet, and I grinned. I could do this. It was a hell of a lot better than the explaining I was sure she was going to demand from me.
I did a couple of test bounces, and then I jumped close enough to Edie to knock her off balance and send her flying to the floor.
“Ahh!”
She squealed as she flopped awkwardly. I laughed as she bounced across the floor like a rock skipping over the surface of a pond. She came to a stop by the wall, and scrambled to her feet, as I continued to jump.
Each jump made me feel a little lighter, a little less burdened by my past.
“My boss, Joy, makes me do this if I come to work too depressed,” she told me as we hopped our way from wall to wall.
“Does that happen a lot?”
She shrugged, as much as someone can shrug while bouncing. “Once in a while.”
I was about to respond, having gotten into the rhythm of this bouncing while talking thing, when Edie launched herself at me. The girl took me down hard, and I fell flat on my back. Our limbs got all tangled up, and the sound of my own laughter surprised the hell out of me.
For the first time in years, a girl was wrapped around me and nothing about it was sexual. It was a little like rediscovering a piece of my innocence. Edie had probably never lost hers.
When she finally got free enough to stumble to her feet, I grabbed her wrist and yanked her back down. She fell beside me with a startled sound, and we both lay there, side-by-side, breathing hard and riding out the the last of the ripples moving through the floor.
“Thanks,” I said, breaking the silence finally. I turned to look at her, and was met with sympathetic brown eyes. “I don’t know why you’re being so nice to me.”
“Gotta keep my landlord happy somehow,” she said.
I could think of a few less innocent ways she could keep the landlord happy, but I kept my mouth shut. Though the urge to flirt was strong, I didn’t want to ruin this moment.
Edie got to her feet and reached for my hand. “Come on. We’re not done bouncing yet. You haven’t gotten the full experience until you try the giant slide.”
I let her pull me to my feet, and darted after her.
For an hour, at least, I could forget my problems with Elana, and just have fun. I felt like a kid again, and I didn’t think Edie knew how precious the gift was that she shared with me. But I did, and I w
ouldn’t forget it.
***
After Edie’s pick-me-up, my guilty conscience kicked in and I decided to go in to work despite calling in sick earlier.
I bluffed my way through questions with stories of a doctor’s visit and sat down to go through notes for this week’s column. I was nearly ready to roll out the article about the councilwoman who’d been abusing taxpayer funds, but I needed to be careful with this one. Hell hath no fury like a councilwoman scorned. If I messed up, she’d made Edie’s reaction look like child’s play.
After verifying a few of my facts, I took a breather and checked my Facebook status. Mama had posted yet another picture of baby Alexander, my second cousin … or was it third? We really needed more kids in the family. She was desperate, and starting to pressure me about finding a nice girl to marry.
That wasn’t happening, so I hit “like” on Alex’s baby pic and hoped it could satisfy her yearning to become a grandmother.
My brother Gabe’s death had devastated Mama, but sometimes I thought the loss of the babies he would have fathered hurt her just as much.
I closed the Facebook window, now depressed. Gabe wouldn’t have been fathering little bambinos with Elana. They were headed for splitsville, and I was a big part of the reason. I hoped Mama would never know.
My office line rang, and I picked it up without glancing at the caller ID.
“Nick Espinoza with The Sentinel. How can I help ya?”
“You can get your ass in my office.”
Shit. Tanya had not sounded pleased. Had they decided on a layoff? Was I about to get the boot?
“Okay.”
She hung up without another word. I sucked in a deep breath, bracing for the old heave-ho, and made my way across the newsroom. As I passed, fellow staffers stopped talking to watch me, making me feel a little like I was on the final march on death row.
Cat watched me smugly, and a feeling of unease unfurled in my stomach. Gritting my teeth against the anxiety of what put that expression on my enemy’s face, I gave myself a silent pep talk on the way to Tanya’s office.
You don’t know that she’s going to sack you. Maybe she just wants to let you know not to worry.
Earning Edie (Espinoza Boys #1) Page 7