One Night with her Roommate
Noelle Adams
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the
author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons,
living or dead, is coincidental.
Copyright © 2015 by Noelle Adams. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute,
or transmit in any form or by any means.
Content Editing, Kristin Anders,
Proofreading: Vanessa Bridges,
One
Meg woke up exactly two minutes before her alarm was set to go off and mentally waged a fierce
battle.
She blinked blurrily at the time until the numbers registered as 5:58 in the morning. She was
tempted to hit snooze and roll over to sleep a little longer, but then she remembered she had an eight
o’clock meeting with her boss.
Her mind told her to get up, so she’d be into work early enough to prepare, but all the rest of
her was screaming not to get out of bed yet.
Her mind won the internal battle. It usually did.
Groaning, she turned off the alarm and hauled herself out of bed, stumbling slightly on the cold
floor as she made her way groggily for the bathroom.
Her mind might be satisfied that she’d done the right thing, but the rest of her—body and
feelings—were miserable.
She’d lived in this little house for just over six months, and she actually really liked it—even
though it was old, cramped, and only had one bathroom. Living in Malibu, she couldn’t afford
anything nice or large, and this old place had a lot of character and lovely, worn hardwood floors and
wood trim. If you went to the roof deck and stood on tip-toes, you could even catch a glimpse of the
Pacific.
She would have liked the house better if parts of it weren’t always a mess and if she had a
roommate who didn’t always drive her crazy.
His bedroom door was opened on the opposite end of the hall, so she assumed he hadn’t come
home again last night.
For the last month, he’d been spending more and more nights away. It must be getting serious
with his girlfriend.
She scowled at the thought and told herself that the sick feeling in her gut was because East
shouldn’t be in a serious relationship. He couldn’t even rouse himself enough to get a steady job.
She kept the light on in the bathroom all night so she could see in the hall if she woke up in the
wee hours, so she pushed open the partly closed door to get in.
The door connected with something unexpected.
Something that made a low grunt.
“What—“ Her heart surged into her throat as she processed the fact that there was a man in the
bathroom. A man, when there definitely shouldn’t have been.
“Shit,” the man said, lowering the towel from where he’d been rubbing his wet hair. “Good
morning to you too.”
“What are you doing here?” she asked, finally realizing the unexpected man in her bathroom
was actually her very own roommate, who went by the ludicrous appellation “East” by everyone who
knew him and refused to tell anyone his real name.
Even his infrequent mail came addressed to East Covington.
“Last I checked, I lived here. If that’s changed, just let me know so I can find alternate
accommodations.” He flashed her a grin with his normal laidback good-nature and continued to
towel-dry his hair.
He’d evidently just stepped out of the shower. This was clear from his wet hair and from the
sheen of moisture still on his tanned skin.
Also from the fact that he was completely naked.
Meg had good reason to notice this, since her eyes kept slipping below the level of his face.
No man had the right to such a fine body. The broad shoulders, toned chest, and well-developed
arms were no strangers to her, since he only occasionally bothered to put on a shirt. And she’d seen
more than her share of his strong legs and firm thighs in the months she’d lived with him.
She’d never actually seen him without underwear before, though, and her gaze simply wasn’t
disciplined enough to not look.
She should have known his body would be impressive in every way.
Forcing her eyes back up, she found her voice again. “I thought you weren’t here,” she
explained, a little coolly, since his hazel eyes—an ever-changing mingling of green, gray, and brown
—were resting on her face with faint amusement, as if she was making a fool of herself. “I thought
you spent the night out again.”
“You missed me, didn’t you?”
She ignored his teasing tone, since she was used to it. He’d flirted with her from the first day
they met, and it had only gotten stronger as the months passed. “Did your girlfriend finally get sick of
you and kick you out?”
“Women don’t kick me out of bed.” His voice went a little lower, a little throatier, as if he
were thinking of sex. “I would have thought you’d realize that.”
When his voice went like that, it made her think of sex too. Plus, he wasn’t wearing any clothes,
and she really wanted to reach out and touch him.
It was brutally unfair to be attracted to East like this when most of the time she just wanted to
smack him.
“If she knows you, she’s going to want to kick you out of bed occasionally. Believe me.”
His smile changed slightly—becoming almost predatory—and he took a step closer to her. “Is
that a challenge?”
She gulped, her pulse throbbing in her throat, her ears, her groin. “No. It’s a statement of fact. I
don’t care if you have a few skills in the bedroom. It’s not going to be enough to make up for your
personality. Not for long, anyway.”
She knew he wouldn’t be offended by the words. They played this verbal game all the time.
He chuckled and gave his hair a rough rubdown with the towel, so vigorously that his whole
body shook.
Her naughty eyes went too low again as she watched a certain part of him get jostled by the
motion.
He was partly erect and didn’t seem remotely conscious of the fact.
He was the least self-conscious person she’d ever known.
As far as she was concerned, he was unnaturally un-self-conscious.
She couldn’t ever imagine displaying her body that way, without even a thought for how the
other person might be responding to it.
But East was as different from her as was possible for a person to be.
Meg’s brain had always guided her whole self. East’s brain was happy to go on permanent
vacation and let the rest of him lead the way.
“Did you need to use the bathroom?” he asked, lowering the towel from his head again.
“No, I just came in here for a little exercise.” She made sure the light sarcasm was clear in her
tone. “Why are you getting up so early, anyway?”
He usually slept through most of morning. He didn’t have a job to get to like she did. Like most
adult people did.
“Do you really think I’ve just gotten up?” He flashed her another one of those grins.
She realized then her question had been stupid. Of course, he hadn’t just gotten up. He’d just
gotten home.
“You didn’t shower at her house?”
He twitched his eyebrows. “You’re really hung up on this girlfriend of mine, aren’t you?”
She felt her cheeks warming as she realized it was true—and he’d evidently noticed it.
She was dying to know who his girlfriend was, how serious they were, what the woman saw in
him—other than his gorgeous body, of course. Any question she asked him about the girlfriend went
unanswered, and he’d never brought her home with him. Occasionally a woman would call him and
he’d always walk away from her to take the call. Meg didn’t know why he’d keep it a secret from her,
so she kept concocting explanations—like he was having an affair with a married woman or was
dating a call girl or something.
When she’d first moved in, East had sometimes brought women home with him to spend the
night. Meg vividly remembered hearing far more than she’d wanted of how good a time the women
had been having with him. But he’d stopped bringing women home a few months ago, and then he’d
started spending his nights somewhere else. He deflected when she asked, but it wasn’t hard to put the
pieces together.
Some woman had him wrapped around her finger. Which meant pretty soon, Meg was going to
get kicked out of his house and have to find a new place to live.
It also meant everything would change with East, and that was something she didn’t really want.
“What’s the matter?” East asked in a different tone. He was still studying her face, and he
seemed to see a lot more than he should, despite his lazy insouciance.
“Nothing,” she said, annoyed mostly at herself for being bothered so much at the thought of
moving out. Her eyes dipped down again to discover that he was a little more erect than he’d been
before. In response to the hot flash she felt, she added, “Would you mind putting that thing away?”
She waved in the general direction of his groin, carefully keeping her gaze from settling there again.
He glanced down, as if surprised. Then he gave her a hot grin. “Where would you like me to put
it?”
“Put it behind a towel or something.”
“And have a little respect. He’s not an ‘it’, you know.”
She had to choke back a laugh at his exaggeratedly aggrieved tone. “It’s a ‘he,’ is it? Does he
have a name?”
“Of course.” East glanced down at himself and then back up to her face. “His name is South.”
There was no way Meg could hide the ripple of laughter at this ironic tone. She could see that
East was smiling, as if he was pleased he’d amused her so much.
“Well, would you please put South away? Normal people don’t parade around naked, you
know.”
“You’re the one who barged in here.” He was still smiling, but he wrapped his towel around
his waist, hiding the part in question.
“And I don’t even want to know what you were doing in here on your own with a hard-on.” To
hide her embarrassment as it hit home that she was with East naked, she made her voice even dryer
than normal.
He chuckled again. “I was thinking about you, of course. And then you came in wearing nothing
but my t-shirt and messy hair, looking like a wet dream, so it’s like my fantasies came to life.”
She was wearing his t-shirt. He’d thrown it into her laundry a couple of weeks ago, so she’d
kept it to teach him a lesson. It was way too big for her, of course, since she was about half his size,
but it was perfectly good to sleep in.
She made a sound of frustration, since she really liked the way the words sounded, even as her
mind told her how wrong they were. “What would your girlfriend say to you talking that way to me?”
“What do you think she’d say?”
“I think she’d say you’re a horn dog who can’t keep from coming on to anyone of the female
persuasion who happens to cross paths with you. But, if you want to keep her, you better start
suppressing that particular instinct.”
“What makes you think I want to keep her?”
“Well, you haven’t slept in your own bed all week, so I assume you have some interest in her.
What’s her name anyway?”
“What do you think her name is?”
She bit back another groan. East was without doubt the most frustrating man she’d ever met, and
it was too early in the morning to deal with him anyway. “Never mind. Are you done in here?”
He leaned down to pick up his clothes on the floor, and for the first time she noticed what they
were.
She blinked. “Did you have a fancy date last night or something?” she asked.
He narrowed his eyes in an uncharacteristically cool look. “Why do you ask that?”
“Well, you seemed to have dressed nicer than normal.” The clothes looked to be black trousers
and a gray dress shirt—a sharp contrast to his normal ratty shorts and t-shirt.
“You should have seen me when the clothes were on.” His tone had returned to the normal
teasing flirtation.
“Oh, get out of here.” She gave him a little push until he was out of the bathroom, and then she
closed the door with a click.
Seven months ago, she’d been happily sharing an apartment with her two best friends. Then
Anne had gotten together with Jake, and they’d moved in together. Meg and Raney hadn’t been able to
afford the apartment with just the two of them, so Raney had moved back in with her parents.
Which left Meg without a living situation, until Jake had mentioned he knew a guy with a room
in a house to rent at a very reasonable price.
With no other options, Meg had moved in with East, and her life hadn’t been the same since.
***
A half-hour later, Meg was putting on her earrings as she hurried into the kitchen, mostly dressed in a
slim skirt and green top.
To her surprise, East hadn’t gone to bed. Instead, he was riffing on his piano, which filled the
small dining area connected to the kitchen instead of a table and chairs.
He was a very talented musician. He played guitar and drums and saxophone, and he had a
damned good singing voice—but the piano was his real thing.
He sometimes played with a band, when they could get gigs at beach bars, but otherwise he
seemed to live on her rent and the house, which she assumed must have been his parents’, although he
never talked about them.
She’d asked him all kinds of questions over the months they’d lived together—about his family,
his childhood, his history—but he always managed to answer without telling her anything concrete.
She still didn’t know very much about his background at all.
He could have done something really worthwhile with his talent for the piano, but he evidently
didn’t even want to try.
A few months ago, she’d gotten it into her head to help him get a job, so she’d scoured the job
ads for anything that East was capable of doing and tried to get him excited about one or another of
the possibilities. He’d listened to her description of all the jobs she’d found for him but had refused
to try for a single one. He’d refused to even debate the topic with her.
It worried her—that he wouldn’t apply himself even that far. He was far from being a teenager
now, but he still wanted to act like one. He had so many good qualities, when he bothered to let them
show, and she wanted so much more for him than he had.
It was bothering her more now than it ever had before.
It wasn’t like everyone had to be ambitious or career-driven. Meg basically enjoyed her job as
in retail management for a department store chain, but it certainly wasn’t the center of her life. She
didn’t care whether East ever had an impressive career. She just wanted him to take his life seriously,
to take the world seriously, to think important things were important.
For some reason her reflections made Meg feel more poignant than usual as she headed for the
coffee he had made.
She had to get a mug out of the sink and wash it before she poured the coffee. Nearly all of the
dishes in the kitchen were dirty and in the sink.
Last week, she’d gotten so annoyed with East’s refusal to clean up after himself that she’d
resolved not to do the dishes for him, as she normally did. So they’d started to collect. When she
needed one, she would wash it, use it, and then return it to the sink.
Surely eventually he would get the point and wash them himself.
Evidently, not yet.
She watched him for a minute as she sipped her coffee. He never played from music, and right
now he seemed to be just making it up, but the melody was pleasant, and his body swayed as his
fingers ran over the keys.
What a waste. Such talent. Used for pretty much nothing.
“What’s the matter?” he asked out of the blue.
She gave a little jerk, realizing his eyes had landed on her face and he must have read her
expression. “Nothing.”
“You look like you have something to say.” He was still playing, but his eyes continued holding
hers.
“Nothing important. Just that you could do something professionally with the piano if you could
be bothered to.”
He shook his head and rolled his eyes slightly. “Any fantasy you have of me as a concert pianist
needs to be tossed out the window immediately.”
“I’m not thinking concert pianist.”
“Good. Because I was never that good.”
She studied him, wondering suddenly if, at one point, he’d wanted to be that good. It was a side
of him she’d never imagined, and it spoke to her somehow.
Maybe as a boy, he’d dreamed of being genuinely great in music and had faced a crushing
disappointment. Maybe that was why he didn’t even try anymore.
Then she figured she’d just made up the idea when he gave her an impudent wink.
“I’m that good in other ways, though,” he added.
She blew out a breath and shook her head resignedly. “Sure you are. I have no doubt you’re a
stallion in the sack. But we were talking about the piano. And I just meant there are ways to use your
talent at the piano that would give you some purpose and even make you some money. Even just
playing in a nightclub or something would be a start.”
“I’ve got what I need.”
“Yeah. And I guess you’re fine with drifting through life aimlessly too.” Her tone was a little
bitter, but she didn’t know why.
She didn’t know why she felt so disappointed, since she’d known not to expect anything else
from East.
He didn’t want to work. He didn’t want to take anything in life seriously.
He didn’t even want to do the damned dishes.
“What are you all dressed up for?” he asked in a different tone, his eyes running up and down
her body.
“I’m not dressed up. These are normal work clothes.” Her heels were a little higher than
normal, and she’d made an effort with her jewelry, since she was going to be in a meeting with her
supervisor’s supervisor. She wouldn’t have thought East would recognize minor details like that,
though.
“You look gorgeous. You should wear those shoes more often.”
She sighed at his flirtatious tone.
It would be nice if he’d really thought she was gorgeous, but she didn’t believe it for a minute.
He was just this way with women. He’d always been that way with her.
She figured she was pretty enough with auburn hair, big brown eyes, freckles, and a slender
body, but that wasn’t why East acted this way with her.
He would probably act like this with any available woman.
“Don’t forget we’re having lunch with Jake and Anne today,” she said, pulling herself out of her
distraction and putting her coffee mug in the sink. “You’re not going to go to bed and sleep through it,
are you?”
“I haven’t forgotten. Although why they want to have lunch with us is beyond me.”
“Yeah, I don’t know either, but they made a point of it, so please try to manage to get there on
time.” Schedules and appointment times for East were sometimes more like suggestions—something
to do if he felt like it.
Although, to be fair, he’d never agreed to do something with or for her and then not followed
through. She could depend on him if she needed him. That was definitely one of his good qualities,
and something that gave her hope that he could do more if he just tried.
“I’ll be there. You don’t have to worry about me.”
She did worry about him sometimes—when she wasn’t wanting to strangle him or rip his
clothes off. It was such a strange combination of responses that she’d given up trying to figure it out.
East was part of her life now, whether she wanted him to be or not. She couldn’t actually
imagine life without him, although it would sure be a lot easier.
But he was her roommate now, and she was stuck with him.
She said on her way out of the door, because she simply couldn’t help it, “And it wouldn’t kill
you to do the dishes.”
Two
Meg arrived at the trendy sandwich shop two minutes after noon.
She almost never ran late for lunch dates or appointments, but her boss had held her up in her
office, just before she was planning to leave for lunch, so she had to rush to get here to meet the others
as they’d arranged.
Anne and Jake had already gotten a table when she came hurrying in, but East, as expected,
hadn’t shown up yet.
She only hoped he hadn’t gone back to bed and forgotten all about it.
He’d told her he’d be here today, though, and she’d never known him to not follow through on
his word to her.
Anne grinned and waved, and Jake stood up as Meg approached.
Jake was a good guy—considerate, reserved, and professional—and Anne had been crazy
about him for ages before they’d finally gotten together. It was Jake who had introduced Meg to East,
since the guys knew each other from the surfing circuit.
East was a pretty good surfer, but he hadn’t worked at it hard enough to do anything significant
with his ability. Meg knew that was true because East had told her so himself.
“I can’t believe we beat you here,” Anne said with another smile. “You’re always early.”
“I know. I got trapped by my boss.”
“Everything okay with work?”
“Oh, yeah. It’s fine. She’s just been uptight lately.” Meg shifted her smile over to Jake’s
handsome face. “It’s good to see you, Jake. Have you been surfing lately?”
“Every now and then.” He gave her a lazy smile. “Have you heard from East?”
“Not since this morning.” Meg glanced toward the door in the hopes of her roommate making an
appearance. She felt strangely torn between embarrassment and responsibility—as if East’s arrival
here on time was somehow her duty to ensure. It was a silly, irrational feeling, so she tried to stamp it
out, but it wouldn’t go away. “He’ll probably be here soon.”
She hoped he’d be here soon. While it might not be a big deal to miss a lunch date now and
then, Anne and Jake had invited them particularly, and it would be really inconsiderate for East to just
forget.
East wasn’t inconsiderate. Not really. Not at all. And she hated for anyone to think that about
him, just because he let a lot of things slide.
She wanted other people to see how great he was, underneath the slacker persona.
“How are things going with the living situation?” Anne asked, looking like she was trying to
hide a smile. She was pretty in an understated way, and she was never one to put herself out there in
any way. It was a wonder she and Jake managed to finally get together. It had taken them a really long
time.
Meg felt like Anne might be secretly laughing at her, and she could hardly blame her friend for
it. A reasonable, no-nonsense person like her should never have been in any sort of living situation
with a guy like East. It was sit-com material. “About the same. The rent is good, and he’s not a first-
class asshole or anything, so I’m not about to complain.”
Jake chuckled. “That sounds like damning with faint praise.”
Meg suddenly felt guilty and ungrateful. “He’s a great guy, of course. I really like him. We’re
just nothing alike, which makes things…tricky.”
“Last I talked to him, he seemed to really like having you for a roommate,” Jake said.
When she felt a faint flush of pleasure at this piece of information, Meg immediately raised her
sensible defenses. “Well, sure. The rent comes in handy when one doesn’t have a real job.”
“No,” Jake said with an easy smile—looking as discreetly amused as Anne had earlier, “It
sounded like he really liked having you around. He said something about how you keep him in order.”
Meg sniffed, irrationally disappointed that this was the extent of East’s appreciation for her.
“Yeah, well, someone has to. The man is a mess.”
Anne giggled, and Jake’s smile broadened. Feeling self-conscious for no good reason, Meg
glanced back at the door in hopes of East’s appearance.
No such luck.
“I’m sorry he’s late. He didn’t get in until morning, so he probably went back to bed.”
“What was he doing out all night?” Anne asked, her eyes widening.
Meg gave a diffident little shrug. “With his girlfriend, I assume.”
Anne stiffened visibly, and even Jake put down his glass of water. “What girlfriend?” Anne
demanded. “What are you talking about?”
“He’s got a girlfriend.” Meg was rattled by their obvious surprise. “For at least the last couple
of months.”
“I didn’t know he had a girlfriend.” Anne looked strangely upset as she swung her gaze over to
Jake.
“He doesn’t have a girlfriend,” Jake murmured, obviously answering something in Anne’s look.
“Yes, he does,” Meg insisted, almost choking by this bland denial of what she absolutely knew
to be true. “Believe me. He has a girlfriend, and it must be getting serious. He spends the night with
her all the time.”
She made sure her voice was casual and indifferent, but it hurt in a strange way to say it out
loud. Like it made it real.
She hated that reaction, since it shouldn’t matter in the least to her whether it was real or not.
“Have you met her?” Jake asked.
Meg shook her head. “No. He always goes to her place. But I ask about her all the time, and he
answers. She calls, and he always takes her calls in private. She definitely exists.”
Anne was frowning and looking down at the table in front of her. Then she raised worried eyes
back up to Jake.
He obviously read her expression again, and his face softened. He shook his head, murmuring
under his breath, “There’s no girlfriend.”
Meg practically sputtered at this outright untruth. “There is too! You can ask him yourself when
he gets here.”
“Ask me what?” came a pleasant male voice from behind her.
Meg almost jumped in surprise, which was annoying and embarrassing. The man was as
contrary as he could get. Never coming when she was watching for him, but springing up out of
nowhere when she wasn’t expecting him.
East took the empty seat at the table, grinning at her in a way that made her feel like she was the
only one in the room. His hazel eyes were warm and questioning and strangely soft.
She met his eyes and promptly forgot what they’d just been talking about. “You’re late,” she
murmured, striving desperately for the return of her sensible perspective. It had never failed her
before.
“I know. Traffic.” He smiled over at Anne and reached to shake Jake’s hand before he settled
back in his seat. “Ask me what?”
“About your girlfriend,” Meg explained, clearing her throat and hoping she wasn’t blushing
visibly. “I was telling them about her because they didn’t think you had one.”
“Ah,” East said, his grin widening as he leaned back in his seat. “Well, you’d know best about
my girlfriend, wouldn’t you?”
Meg nodded, trying to feel vindicated but instead feeling kind of heavy. “Exactly. See, I told
you.”
East slanted a look over to Anne and Jake. “She told you.” He was clearly hiding a smile.
Jake coughed and turned away, covering his mouth as he did so, and Anne looked strangely torn
between confusion and hope.
Meg wondered if they’d had the ridiculous idea that she might get together with East, since they
were in such close quarters in sharing the house. She could have told them any time over the last six
months that such a scenario would never happen in the world as they knew it.
Sure, a few months ago, she and East had stayed up all night talking on their roof deck—about
everything from favorite foods to the crushes they’d had in middle-school. For some reason, she’d
told him things she’d never told anyone—about how she’d never felt smart enough in school, about
how she’d felt pressured into having sex for the first time by her boyfriend when she was fifteen.
When the sun came up, they were sitting in silence together, and she’d felt closer to him than
anyone she could remember. She might have even had a few silly thoughts about something more
intimate developing between them.
But she knew better now.
He’d gone back to his normal, lazy flirting with her, as if the night hadn’t even happened.
So her mind had learned to be firmer with her heart and body ever since, never letting herself
believe that any moment they shared meant more than it really did.
The server came over to take their orders, and by the time he left, conversation had returned to
an even keel. They talked some about work—everyone except East, of course—and then East and
Jake talked about surfing while Meg and Anne had a private conversation about how Raney was
doing, since they hadn’t heard much from their friend in the last couple of weeks.
When the food came, they settled into quiet as they began to eat, until East said out of the blue.
“So what’s up?”
They all looked over at him questioningly.
He gave a half-shrug. “What’s up? Why make a point of this lunch?”
“East,” Meg murmured, giving him a poke. “Maybe they were just being nice.”
“They weren’t just being nice. They have something to tell us.” He sounded confident, and Meg
instinctively believed him.
When they turned back to Anne and Jake, the truth was obvious from their expressions.
“We do have something to tell you,” Jake confirmed.
Anne was visibly brimming with joy as she pulled her left hand out from beneath the table. On
her finger was a lovely, expensive diamond solitaire on a gold band.
Meg’s heart lurched at the sight—in a strangely surreal moment.
“We’re engaged,” Anne said, stating the obvious.
Meg was frozen for a moment as the news processed, as did a slow sinking of her stomach. For
no good reason, she was conscious of East’s eyes on her face.
Then her brain caught up, and she knew this was wonderful news. Anne was obviously thrilled,
and so was Jake beneath his relaxed reserve.
Meg was thrilled for them. Anne was one of her two best friends, and she wanted nothing but
happiness for her.
Jake made Anne happy.
So she squealed in excitement and got up to hug Anne, and she was able to give the appropriate
congratulations and questions about when and where.
The rest of the lunch was all about the wedding. Meg kept feeling like East was discreetly
watching her the whole time, but every time she turned to look, his eyes were on something else.
***
Fifty minutes later, they said goodbye to Anne and Jake with more congratulations, and Meg started
back toward her car, which was parked two blocks away.
East must have been parked in the same direction, since he fell into step with her.
She wasn’t sure what to say, so she didn’t say anything. It felt okay—not awkward or anything
—and East didn’t start talking about anything annoying. He just walked with her in silence until they
reached her car.
She started to dig into her purse for her keys, but she looked up to check his expression. He
looked uncharacteristically quiet. And his tone was uncharacteristically gentle as he asked, “You
okay?”
“Of course,” she replied, trying to sound natural and peppy. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
“I don’t know. You tell me.”
“I’ve got nothing to tell you,” she said with a frown, feeling a familiar impatience return, since
he was acting like he knew something of what she was feeling. “I’m happy for them. It’s great news.”
“Of course, it is. But that doesn’t mean happy is all you feel at hearing the news.”
She frowned, but her heart was starting to beat quickly, as if something important was about to
happen. “Why would I be anything but happy for them?”
He stepped into her in a way that pressed her back against the door to her car. He braced a hand
on the car beside her shoulder so he was nearly trapping her in place. But his expression wasn’t sexy
or flirtatious. It was knowing and intimate somehow. “Maybe you’re kind of disappointed it’s not
you.”
She gasped. “I’ve never had the slightest interest in Jake. Not the slightest!”
“I know that,” he murmured with a smile, his eyes almost caressing her face. “I meant maybe
you’re disappointed that the engagement, the wedding, the marriage, the whole rosy fairytale isn’t
happening to you.”
“Well, I’m not. I’m perfectly happy not being married.” It was the truth, so she could say it with
wide eyes and no dissemblance.
His expression shifted, got a little warmer in a way she was very familiar with. “So you don’t
secretly have daydreams about settling down in domestic bliss with me?”
Her pulse was throbbing wildly from his closeness and from the continued intimacy of his gaze,
but she couldn’t keep a giggle from bubbling up. “You’re the last guy I’d daydream about domestic
bliss with.”
“Ah, it must be other kinds of bliss I’m giving you in your daydreams.”
She flushed hot as his eyes were suddenly all about sex. All. About. Sex.
It took a minute for her recover, but her voice was mostly even when she said, “You don’t star
in any of my daydreams. That’s your overinflated ego talking.” She clutched at the strap of her purse
with both hands, since she desperately wanted to touch East’s chest.
It was only a couple of inches away.
They smiled at each other—a shared look that only made her want to touch him more—but then
his expression altered. “So what was up at lunch then?”
She let out her breath in a whoosh. “Nothing. Why do you assume something was up?”
“Because I know you. I know you really well.” He reached up and cupped her cheek, his hand
warm and big and gentle. “And I know when there’s that war going on between what you feel and
what you think is smart to feel.”
She tried very hard not to lean into his hand. “What war?”
“That mental war that’s always going on inside you. The part of you that tries to be smart all the
time is always trying to talk yourself out of feeling things you don’t think are smart. But it doesn’t
make the feelings go away.”
She lost her breath for a moment, staring up at his face. She couldn’t believe East knew her so
well—that anyone knew her so well—but he was absolutely right.
It was the internal war between her mind and the rest of her that she spent her whole life
fighting.
“It’s not wrong to want to be smart,” she managed to say, since he was obviously waiting for a
response.
His hand moved slightly, but only to stroke her cheek with his knuckle. It felt more intimate than
any sexual touch, and it left her far more vulnerable. “But everything you feel doesn’t have to be
wrong either. Maybe your head and your heart can sometimes work together.”
She had no idea what to say to that. Her heart was screaming at her right now—big time—but
her brain knew too well that those feelings were nothing but stupid.
This was East. Who never took anything seriously. Who would never take her seriously.
“So what were you feeling at lunch then, that your brain didn’t like?” East asked.
“Nothing.” Before he could object to her lie, she went on, admitting, “It’s nothing big. Really.
And it’s not that I’m jealous or anything. It’s just that…it’s just that I’m a little sad. About how it will
change things. With our friendship, I mean.” She dropped her eyes as she continued. “We’ve been
such good friends for so long, and now things are going to be different. They have to be. I’m happy for
her. I really am. But it also feels a little like a…like a loss.”
“It is a loss.” His voice was so tender that her eyes shot up to his face again. “A little one. So I
think it’s okay to feel a little sad about it.”
“But it’s wrong. I should be happy for her.”
“Can’t you be both? Tell your brain to take a step back for a minute. Can’t you feel both of
those things at the same time?
She stared at him, realizing he was right. He was absolutely right. She suddenly felt so much
better about the whole thing, about her wrong response, about what she hadn’t wanted anyone to see
when she’d heard the news at lunch.
“Maybe,” she managed to say.
“Maybe what?” His hand had moved now, combing into her hair to cup the back of her head. It
was utterly wrong for him to be touching her that way, but it felt so good that she didn’t want it to
stop.
“Maybe you’re kind of smart about some things.”
His lips widened into a warm smile, and he was suddenly leaning into her all the way. “Glad
you’re finally recognizing it.”
Before she could respond—before she could even think about responding—he was kissing her.
And, even though it was wrong in every way—the stupidest thing she could do—she was
kissing him back.
His lips brushed against hers gently at first, his lip sliding along the line between her lips until
she opened for him. And then he was pressing against her with his strong, warm body, and she was
wrapping her arms around his neck, her purse banging against his shoulder since it was still hooked
on her arm.
Pleasure and feeling pulsed through her as his tongue delved more deeply into her mouth. It felt
like he knew her—completely. It felt like he treasured her—completely. It felt like he wanted to
swallow her whole, be with her fully—completely.
And for some reason, for no good reason, she wanted all of that. From him. Completely.
He broke away from her lips briefly, murmured, “Fuck, Meg. Oh, fuck.” His voice was rough
and hoarse, and he claimed her lips again before she could even think about responding.
Her heart was pounding with her head and her blood and the arousal building up between her
legs. It felt like the whole world was pounding with everything she was feeling. It terrified her, but
she didn’t want it to end.
She didn’t want it to end at all.
She tried to press her chest against his so she could feel him more completely, and she
responded to his kiss shamelessly, eagerly, tangling her fingers in his thick hair.
If they’d been somewhere else—not on the curb next to her parked car in the middle of the city
—she didn’t know how long it would have taken for her brain to catch up.
But she heard someone laugh from down the block—just a random sound on a sidewalk during
the day—and it hit her like a freight train, her brain barreling into the trance her heart and body had
lodged in.
East was making a throaty sound against her mouth as she yanked herself out of his arms
abruptly.
She stumbled to the side, since the car was directly behind her, and she gasped as she wiped at
her mouth with the back of her hand. Her lips felt swollen, too large for her face.
Sort of her like her heart felt in her chest.
“What the hell?” she choked. “What are we doing?”
Something strange and intense twisted on East’s face. “Meg, it’s not what—“
“I know what it is!” She backed away from him, hunting blindly for her keys in her purse. “It’s
wrong. It’s just wrong. We can’t ever do that again.”
East looked slightly flushed and slightly stiff, as if he’d gotten too into the kiss to pull himself
back together immediately. She took advantage of his distraction to yank open the driver’s side door
of her car.
“Meg, wait. Don’t just—“
She didn’t let him finish. She practically fell into the car, mumbling about how she needed to
get to work. Then she started the car and pulled away, just as East was starting to reach for her door
handle.
On the whole drive and for the rest of the afternoon, she brooded over just how stupid she’d
been, when she’d spent all of her life trying desperately to be smart.
Three
Meg stayed late at work that day—not because she had work to do but because she was so reluctant to
go back home.
She was terrified of talking to East. She was terrified of even seeing him.
She wanted to pretend the whole thing had never happened.
It was after seven when she ran out of excuses and arrived back home. With a silly instinct of
concealment, she slipped in the front door quietly and made sure her keys didn’t clatter when she laid
them on the table next to the door.
The first thing she heard was the piano.
It wasn’t East’s normal, casual riffing so she paused in the entrance to listen. She couldn’t see
the piano from where she stood, since the wall of the dining area blocked her view.
The music wasn’t anything she was familiar with, but it was strangely compelling. Complex and
emotional—with a kind of passionate intensity she just never associated with East.
If she hadn’t known better, she would have said it wasn’t even him playing, but there was no
one else it could be.
The music spoke to her strangely, as she stood in the entryway with her purse still hooked over
her shoulder. She could feel the music—feel it—in her chest and her gut.
The feeling in the rippling notes was deep, genuine, almost aching.
It was East, after all—as she’d always wanted to know him, taking the world seriously, as
she’d always known he never would.
This was the East her heart kept responding to, when her brain knew very well he didn’t exist.
She was almost in tears—for no good reason—when the music broke abruptly.
He then tried out several bars, each slightly different, until she heard him mutter, “Damn it.”
And suddenly she realized something. It surprised her so much she dropped her purse and
walked into the dining area so she could see him. “Did you write that?” she demanded, something
oddly excited beating with her heart.
East’s response was so dramatic it was almost comical. He jerked visibly and whirled around
—obviously completely shocked by her presence. His lips parted slightly as he stared at her.
“Did you write that?” she asked again, walking even closer. “Did you write that beautiful
music?”
He glanced down at the keys—uncharacteristically diffident. “I’m working on it. Nothing to
make a big deal about.”
“Not a big deal? It was amazing.” She was almost awed as she gazed at him, a whole new side
of him opening up before her. “Why didn’t you tell me you could write music?”
“It’s just something I play around with. It’s not a route to an impressive career, if that’s what
you’re hoping for.”
He sounded faintly bitter, and she didn’t know why. She didn’t like it, though, especially since
a career hadn’t even crossed her mind as she’d been listening to the music.
It was East. Just East. The music was all him.
“I’m not talking about a career. It’s just amazing music.” She smiled at him, pleased when his
features relaxed to their normal laidback leisure. “Can I hear the whole thing?”
“It’s not finished yet.”
“Well, let me hear what you’ve got.”
He cleared his throat and looked like he might object, so she plopped herself down on the piano
bench beside him, making it clear she wasn’t taking no for an answer.
He gave her a mild eye-roll, but settled his long fingers on the keys, pausing a moment to take a
visible breath before he began to play.
It was the song she’d been listening to before—intense, heartfelt, passionate, authentic in a way
she couldn’t articulate.
She could feel his body beside her as he moved, and his arm would brush against hers as he
reached for the far side of the keyboard.
The music, his presence, the strange emotional atmosphere evoked by the haunting notes filled
her, overwhelmed her.
It felt like she was really with him. It felt like he was playing for her. It felt like all the deep
feeling in the music was somehow resting on her chest.
And she wanted it. So much. All of it.
She wanted it from East.
And it was impossible to keep that final realization from crystalizing in her mind.
It didn’t matter how smart she’d always tried to be. She’d been unforgivably stupid after all.
Because she’d fallen for her roommate, who didn’t want a serious relationship with her, who
would always be impossibly distant, who would never give himself in any real way to her.
The realization was so crushing she jerked away from him slightly, her whole body starting to
tremble.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, abruptly ending his playing. He turned hazel eyes on her that
seemed befuddled, almost groggy, like he’d dived into something too deep and hadn’t quite swum out
of it yet.
She shook her head, not trusting herself to speak.
He’d kissed her earlier today, and she’d responded with shameless passion.
And he already had a girlfriend. Even if he hadn’t, he could never be hers.
“What’s wrong?” he asked again, lifting a hand to cup her face the way he had by the car after
lunch.
She eased her head away from his palm. “Nothing,” she managed to say. “That was beautiful.
It’s amazing. I hope you finish it.”
Keeping her head ducked, she got up and hurried away from the piano, to her bedroom, where
she shut the door with a click.
She listened for a moment, but he didn’t start playing again.
And he didn’t come after her.
***
It took a little while, but Meg pulled herself together and emerged from her room to get something for
dinner.
East’s bedroom door was opened, but she didn’t see him anywhere, so she assumed he’d left.
She sighed, telling herself to get a grip on these ridiculous feelings and act like a mature,
rational person.
Sometimes you wanted things you could never get. It wasn’t the end of the world.
And it certainly wasn’t reason enough to act stupid.
She wanted to talk it all out with one of her friends, but they’d both been really busy for the last
couple of months. Anne had Jake now, and Raney was going through a rough time after moving in with
her parents. Maybe that was why Meg felt confused and disoriented most of the time—because she
didn’t have her friends to talk things through with. They would have been able to bring sense and
perspective to this situation.
But, lately, it had felt like Meg was alone with it.
She made herself a sandwich and ate it with some grapes, standing up at the kitchen counter.
She kept looking at the pile of dirty dishes in the sink, and when she’d finished eating, she gave
up and started to wash them.
It was a ridiculous gesture anyway. East didn’t care at all about the dishes piling up, so her
waiting until he did them only served to frustrate and annoy her.
She might as well do them, so they were no longer a source of aggravation.
It wasn’t like anything she did would make him more responsible, more serious, more willing
to commit—even to something like cleaning up after himself.
She felt better after she’d washed and dried the dishes—the mindless activity distracting her
from her brooding—so she started wiping down the counter.
Then the stove needed cleaning. Then the microwave was really pretty gross. The toaster was
covered with grime, and the refrigerator needed to be cleaned inside and out.
Then the cabinets needed to be completely emptied, purged of the out-of-date food, and
reorganized.
It was dark when East made an appearance. Unexpectedly, from the stairs that led up to the roof
deck.
He must have been up there the whole time.
She was sitting on the kitchen floor, surrounded by pots and pans, trying to scrub the inside of
the awkward corner cabinet that twirled and was impossible to keep orderly.
“What are you doing?” East asked, standing over her and staring down in evident surprise.
“What does it look like? This whole kitchen was a mess.” She wore leggings and a long t-shirt,
and her hair was pulled back in a ponytail at the nape of her neck.
She felt a surge of attraction as she looked up at his strong, lean body and handsome face—but
she was obviously in no state to provoke a matching attraction in anyone at the moment.
The attraction was completely wrong, anyway.
“It wasn’t that bad.”
“Not that bad? Look under the sink.”
He leaned over to peer in the cabinet under the sink, which housed dozens of bottles of various
cleaners—some years old—random household supplies, and enough empty plastic grocery bags to
equip an army.
“Well, it might be a little cluttered,” he admitted, amusement tingeing his voice.
She felt strangely better at the warm laughter she heard suppressed in his words—since it felt
familiar, safer, more like the person she knew East to be.
“It’s more than cluttered. It’s a disgrace. Something has to be done.”
“So your plan is to clean the kitchen all evening?”
“Yes. Do you have a problem with that?”
“No. Just not the normal choice for a Friday night.”
Meg didn’t really have a very active social life, other than hanging out with Anne and Raney,
which she hadn’t done as much lately. She dated on and off, but it had been a full year since she’d
gone out with a guy more than three times.
Her Friday nights weren’t really that exciting.
“Well, no one is asking for your help,” she said coolly, giving him a narrow-eyed look. “You
can go out and have a good time, as you usually do.”
He grinned. “Nah. This looks like too much fun to miss.” He knelt down to the floor and started
to pull out the assortment of bottles from under the sink.
She stared at him. “You’re going to help?”
“Why not? You seem to be all wrapped up in it, so I figure I don’t want to miss out.”
She shook her head but had to hide a smile.
No matter how much East annoyed her. No matter how upset he made her. No matter how little
he could pull his life together. He always ended up making her smile.
They worked for thirty more minutes, filling up two garbage bags of stuff that was too old or
they would never use, and then cleaning the insides of the cabinets.
They had a few friendly arguments about how many bottles of glass cleaner they needed to keep
and where to keep the spare paper towels, and Meg was having a much better time than she would
have expected when the evening began.
Meg was wiping down the bottom of the final cabinet, on her hands and knees on the floor, with
half of her body inside the cupboard, when she felt a pinch on her ass.
It surprised her so much she jerked slightly and knocked her head on the wood.
“Damn it,” she complained, pulling herself out and glaring at East, “What are you doing?”
“Well, your ass was there,” he said, the corner of his mouth twitching irrepressibly. “Tight and
round and impossible to resist. What do you expect me to do?”
She ignored the flush of pleasure she felt at his description of her ass. Rubbing her head, she
grumbled, “I expect you to resist your lesser impulses.”
“I have nothing but lesser impulses. Don’t you know that by now?”
“What would your girlfriend say if she knew you pinched my butt like that?” She asked the
question mostly to remind herself that he did, in fact, have a girlfriend, and so his teasing flirtation
meant absolutely nothing.
For just a moment, a strange expression twisted on his face. Then he grinned again, leaning
back against the stove. “What would you say, if you were my girlfriend?”
“The moment you touched another woman’s ass, I would stop being your girlfriend.” She’d
intended the words to be teasing, but they didn’t come out that way. They sounded too sober. Too
bittersweet.
East’s expression changed as his eyes rested on her face. “Meg,” he began.
Her heart started to hammer, as if he was about to say something she desperately wanted to
hear. But before he could continue, a phone rang.
She blinked, reaching instinctively for the phone on the counter. She’d picked it up when she
realized the phone was East’s.
She handed it to him without comment, although she couldn’t help but notice that the name
flashing on the screen was “Angie.”
His girlfriend, probably. Her name must be Angie.
His grin faded as he looked at the screen and connected the call. “Hey,” he said.
Meg couldn’t hear what Angie said on the other side of the call, but whatever it was caused
East’s face to sober in a very uncharacteristic way.
Meg grew still as she tried to listen.
“Wait a minute,” East said, frowning, after Angie evidently stopped talking. “Wait a minute.
Slow down. Where are you?”
Meg watched something twist on his face. “What are you doing there?” he asked in a hoarse
whisper.
Something was evidently wrong. It was plainly visible on East’s face, in the stiff way he was
holding his body.
“Okay,” he said, after Angie had talked some more. “Okay. I’ll come get you. Go somewhere
where there are other people.” He sounded intense, urgent. “No, don’t argue. Go somewhere where
there are more people. Right now. Don’t you dare stay there. What’s close?”
After waiting for the answer, he said, “Okay. Good. Go there. Order a Coke, not a beer. I’ll be
there in about twenty minutes.”
When he hung up, Meg was already climbing to her feet. Anxiety throbbed in her veins at his
obvious urgency. “What’s the matter? Is your girlfriend okay?”
He was standing up too. “I don’t know. But she’s my sister, not my girlfriend.”
Meg knew he had a younger sister who was finishing up college, but she’d never known her
name. He never talked about her. She felt a weird swell of relief that was completely inappropriate,
given the circumstances.
“What can I do?” she asked, reaching over to put a hand on East’s arm, since he seemed
strangely paralyzed for a moment.
He shook himself off. “Nothing. I’ve got to go get her.”
“I’ll come with you.” She wasn’t sure why she offered, but she just didn’t want him to be alone.
He looked upset. More upset than she’d ever seen him.
“Okay,” he mumbled. “Thanks.”
She’d somehow expected him to object to her tagging along, but she was really glad he hadn’t.
***
Meg and East sat in silence for a few minutes after they pulled away from the house in his car.
She kept shooting him little looks, trying to read his expression.
She’d never seen him like this. So worried. So serious.
He obviously loved his sister a lot and was anxious for her.
He might act like he never took anything seriously, but at least he took his sister seriously.
“Where is she?” Meg asked, after a few minutes. Her voice sounded almost unnatural in the
dark car. It was after eleven now, and the sky was overcast.
“Down by the strip. I guess she got in a fight with her date, and he just took off, leaving her
stranded. She said she’d been drinking, but she sounded really out of it, so I don’t know if she’d taken
something else or not. She said she was wandering around, and she was just in an alley somewhere
by herself.”
“Shit.” Meg swallowed hard, realizing why he was so anxious. A drunk or high young woman
should definitely not be by herself in an alley. “How old is she?”
“Just twenty-one.”
“Shit,” Meg said again, almost under her breath. “You told her to go somewhere with people?”
“Yeah. There was a bar on the corner. I know it. She’s supposed to go there until I come.”
“I’m sure she’ll be okay.” She peered at his face in the dark, trying to read his expression.
“Yeah.”
He drove fast, and in less than ten minutes, he was pulling into a handicapped parking place
near the corner bar.
They both got out, and Meg had to jog to keep up with East’s long strides.
Angie was easy to spot once they entered. She was sitting alone at a small table, practically
slumped against the wall.
She had East’s brown hair and long, fit figure, and she was dressed in a tank-top and jeans.
She had a Coke that appeared to be undrunk in front of her, and she looked completely out of it.
At least she was safe.
East strode over and helped Angie to her feet. She immediately slumped against him, unable to
support herself.
“Did you take anything?” he murmured, wrapping his arm around her.
Meg instinctively came over to support the girl on the other side.
Angie mumbled something.
“Tell me,” East demanded. “Did you take anything?”
“He gave me something. Nothing bad.”
“What did he give you?”
“Something new. I didn’t think it would…” She trailed off, almost collapsing onto her brother.
Meg saw from East’s face that he was momentarily stumped, like he wasn’t sure what they
should do.
“Should we take her to the emergency room, do you think?” Meg asked quietly.
She didn’t have much experience with drugs. Her adventurousness extended to nothing but a
little marijuana in college. She had no idea if Angie’s behavior now was to be expected or a sign that
something was seriously wrong.
“I don’t know. I don’t know what she took. Or how much.”
“Then maybe we should—“
“Yeah.”
Meg was relieved when she saw that East made the decision to take his sister to the emergency
room. Maybe it wasn’t necessary, but she would sure as hell rather be safe than sorry. She assumed
East felt the same way.
They helped Angie to the car, practically carrying her between them. And they had to stop at the
curb for her to throw up.
They drove to the hospital and helped a practically unconscious Angie into the emergency room
entrance. After that, it was easier, since they weren’t the only ones responsible for the girl’s well-
being. Things happened quickly, as Angie was stabilized and treated. It became clear that the doctor
was glad they had brought her in, so Meg was reassured that they’d made the right decision.
It took a few hours, but Angie was finally given a room, since the doctor wanted to keep her
under observation for at least the rest of the night.
Angie was conscious again, as they stood over her in the hospital room. “I’m sorry,” she said,
looking at her brother. “I’m really sorry.”
East just shook his head. “You’re all right. That’s what matters.”
“I should have done better. I thought I was doing…better.” Angie closed her eyes, and Meg
thought for a moment she’d fallen asleep.
“You were doing better,” East said, evidently recognizing she was still awake. “You are doing
better. One bad night doesn’t mean all the work you’ve done is worthless. We’ll get you any help you
need.”
Angie’s eyes looked a bit teary when she opened them. “Thanks.”
“I’ll stay with you tonight,” East said, pulling up the chair closer to the bed. “Meg can take my
car home, and I’ll stay here.”
“I can stay—” Meg began, immediately resisting the idea of leaving him. He seemed to need
her to tonight, in some unspoken way.
At the same time, Angie objected too. “No. I don’t want you hovering over me all night. I’m just
going to sleep. You’ll annoy me, if you stay here. Just come back tomorrow, if you don’t mind.”
East appeared to briefly object, but then his expression relaxed. “Okay. I’ll go for now and
come back tomorrow morning. Call me if you need anything. Anything.”
“I will. Now, you’re tired. Go away.”
“Okay. Get some sleep, and I’ll be back tomorrow.”
Angie nodded and looked up again. “Bring Meg too. I’m glad you have a girlfriend at last.” She
shifted her eyes over to Meg. “It’s nice to meet you.”
“Oh, I’m not—“ Meg broke off the words, since it seemed silly right now to try to explain her
real relationship to East.
“I’ll talk to you tomorrow, West,” Angie said, closing her eyes again. “I’m going to sleep
now.”
“West?” Meg asked, turning surprised eyes to East.
Angie gave a soft huff of amusement, although she didn’t open her eyes again. “His real name is
Weston. We always called him West. Once, Mom was angry and said he was so contrary in every
way that he should be East instead. So he’s made everyone call him East ever since. It’s a stupid
name, but he’s like that.”
East looked uncomfortably between Meg and his sister. Then he said “Good night,” and led
Meg out of the room.
“Weston?” Meg asked, giving him a curious look.
“Pretend you never heard that.”
She took his arm, partly because she felt closer to him, knowing the real story of his name, and
partly because he looked so tired. “Let’s go home.”
Four
East was strangely silent as they got back into his car, even more so than he’d been on the way to the
bar earlier.
Meg kept looking at him, worried in a way she couldn’t articulate.
She had been worried about Angie earlier, but the girl seemed like she’d be okay now. She’d
had a really bad night, but she didn’t appear to be in a downward spiral. So the worst of the crisis
seemed to be over.
But it didn’t seem to be over for East.
“I think she’ll be all right,” Meg murmured softly, as he pulled his car out onto the street.
East took a strange breath. “Yeah.”
“It happens. I mean, I bet you’ve taken something you shouldn’t have taken before.” She tried to
make her voice light, but East didn’t smile.
“Yeah.”
“So what’s wrong?”
East turned his head to meet her eyes. “She’s my little sister.”
Meg let out her breath in a rush and leaned back against the seat. “I know. It’s different.”
“Our parents are pretty much…”
Meg lifted her head in interest, since he’d never talked much about his parents. “Your parents
are what?”
“Pretty much absent. They have been most of our lives. They’re always traveling or working.
It’s always just been me and her.”
Meg swallowed. “It’s good you have each other, then.”
“Yeah. I guess. Although she could probably do better than me.”
“Don’t talk that way. You were great with her tonight. She’s twenty-one, so she makes her own
decisions. You can’t keep her out of trouble completely.”
“I know.”
“So don’t beat yourself up about it. She’s not a kid anymore.” She reached over to poke his
arm, since he still looked tense.
He gave her a ghost of a half-smile.
“All you can do is your best,” she murmured, trying desperately to encourage him.
“I guess. But I’m not sure if I’ve even done that.” His eyes were back on the road, and she
could see the tension in his shoulders, even in the dark.
Meg realized it could very well be true. East hadn’t necessarily done the best he could. She
didn’t know any details about his relationship with his sister, but she knew very well how he
approached life. Lazy. Casual. Often indifferent.
He hadn’t done his best on much of anything—at least, as far as she knew.
“Well,” she said, a crack in her voice. “You did good tonight. All you can control is what you
do from now on, and you did good tonight. And I know you’ll do good tomorrow too.”
East turned back to meet her eyes, and they shared another of those moments of complete
understanding.
Then the gaze broke, and they fell into silence again.
Things felt different than normal, though, and her brain couldn’t talk her heart into falling back
into established patterns. She felt closer to East than she had since that one night they’d talked all
night—when she’d really believed something serious might happen between them.
She wanted to be close to him, to help him, to make him feel better, but she couldn’t think of
anything else to say.
When they got back home, Meg felt tired and confused and strangely aching. East seemed to feel
even more that way than she did.
They walked into the house, and Meg went into the very clean kitchen to get something to drink.
He followed her.
He didn’t do anything. Just stood there in the middle of the room.
“It’s late,” she said at last. “You should go to bed.” Then she belatedly remembered something.
“Unless you want to go see your girlfriend.”
He gave a strange sort of twitch, and she wondered if he’d just remembered her existence. But
then he relaxed and murmured, “I want to stay here.”
“Okay.” Meg tried very hard—and not very successfully—not to feel pleased by this decision.
“Well, at least go to bed. You don’t look…good.”
He gave a huff of amusement. “Thanks a lot.”
“I just mean you look tired.” She reached up and pressed her palm against his rough jaw. “You
look tired.”
“I am tired.” He leaned his face into her hand.
“Do you have a headache?” she asked, trying to make sense of the pained tension she saw on
his face.
“Yeah.”
“So go to bed.” She felt deep and tender and protective, as if he were hers to take care of.
“I want you to come to bed with me.” His voice was slightly hoarse, and his eyes suddenly
blazed with something that looked like need, like hunger, something far deeper than lust.
It thrilled her and terrified her both. She dropped her hand. “East, I can’t—“
He reached up and took her face in both of his hands. “I want you tonight.”
God help her, she wanted him too. So much. So deeply. So desperately. The emotions ran
through her so powerfully she swayed on her feet.
But she’d been smart for too many years, and she couldn’t throw it all away now. She took a
step back with a hitch in her breath. “I can’t.”
East’s shoulders slumped slightly. “Yeah,” he murmured, turning away and opening the
refrigerator to pull out a beer. “That’s probably right.”
He popped the cap and then took his beer to sit on the couch. He kind of collapsed there,
sprawled out over all three cushions. He looked so weary—almost wounded—that Meg simply
couldn’t leave him alone.
She might wish that he didn’t come onto her at inappropriate times—in inappropriate ways—
but she couldn’t seem to resent him.
Her brain told her that she should, but in this her brain had to be ignored.
She walked over and sat down on the couch too, forcing him to move his head so she wouldn’t
sit on top of it.
“I would have moved if you’d asked,” he grumbled.
She ignored him, adjusting his body so his head was in her lap.
He started to sit up, but she held him down.
“What are you doing?” he asked, sounding uncharacteristically grouchy.
“I was going to give you a scalp massage to help your headache.”
“My headache isn’t that had.”
“I don’t care how bad it is. I have nothing else to do, and I can’t go to sleep yet. So lay down
and shut the hell up.” She sounded snippier than she felt, since what she really wanted to do was
stroke him, hug him, comfort him some way.
Make him feel better.
With a low chuckle, he relented, stretching out on the couch with his head in her lap. “I feel like
an idiot,” he muttered, as he propped his feet up on the arm of the sofa since it wasn’t long enough to
accommodate the length of his body.
“Tough.” She combed her fingers through his thick hair and started to massage his scalp with
her fingers, keeping her touch firm and careful at the same time.
He let out a long breath and closed his eyes, relaxing the hand he was resting on the back
cushion.
She worked over him as skillfully as she could—wanting to help him in any way she could,
wanting him to realize that it was okay for someone to comfort him.
“Fuck,” he said after a minute, his voice hoarse and textured. “That does feel good.”
“Told you.” She kept her tone no-nonsense so nothing weird or intense would rise up in the
mood between them. But she felt fond, tender, almost maternal as she massaged his scalp and gazed
down at his large form.
She felt better than she had since his sister had called. Hours ago now.
His head on her lap was heavy and substantial, and it looked incongruously masculine
juxtaposed to her thin leggings.
After a few minutes, she couldn’t resist the chiseled lines of his face and stubbled texture of his
skin. She moved one of her hands forward until she was stroking the side of his face and kept rubbing
his scalp with the fingers of her other hand.
The roughness of his day’s growth of beard grated deliciously against her fingertips. It
stimulated her nerve endings until she recognized the tingling of arousal developing faintly at her
center. And it only intensified as she felt his body loosening, relaxing, softening as she caressed him.
And as she heard his thick, husky exhales.
She ignored her physical reaction, overcome with something much stronger in her belly and
chest. She’d never experienced East like this—letting her take care of him, almost vulnerable, without
the defense of his characteristic attitude and irony.
Meg traced her fingers along his high cheekbones, down the plane of his cheek, across the
strong line of his jaw while she sustained the massage of his scalp, his hair slipping between her
fingers.
Noticing the dark shadows under his closed eyes, beneath the dark fringe of his lashes, she
murmured, “Have you been getting enough sleep this week?”
“No.” The word was half exhale and half moan. His defenses were clearly down or he
wouldn’t have answered her so openly.
She started to ask him about his girlfriend but then bit off the question. She was tempted to take
advantage of his rare vulnerability, but she resisted the urge. She wanted to make him feel better. Not
just find out answers to things she didn’t know. And she didn’t want him to let something slip when he
consciously didn’t want to.
Instead of pursuing her questions, she moved her hand down his throat so she could stroke his
neck and shoulders.
East’s breathing was slow and deep, broken by an occasional groan that sent shivers down
between her legs. Her touch wasn’t sexual, but it felt so visceral and sensual that her body couldn’t
help but respond.
Her arousal just pulsed in the background, however. East meant a lot more to her than that.
He opened his eyes and must have read something in her expression, because his face softened
into a faint smile. “Is this what they call a pity massage?”
“No,” she said sharply. “Don’t be like that. You look…I don’t know…stretched too far. I
thought it might help.”
He let out a sigh and closed his eyes. “It does. Thank you.”
Her hand had moved down to the open neck of his wrinkled shirt. She wasn’t even pretending
to massage him anymore. She was blatantly caressing him, dipping her hand down under the edge of
his shirt and feeling the rough texture of his chest hair beneath her fingers.
Finally she couldn’t hold back a question, so she asked it softly, gently, as if testing the water.
“So why was tonight so hard for you?”
He gave a soft groan and a half-shrug that pushed his shoulder into her belly. “I don’t know. It
used to happen all the time.”
“What did?”
“The same thing. Angie calling me up in the middle of the night, in trouble.”
“Really? She got in trouble a lot?”
“Yeah. Drugs. The worst sort of guys. It started when she was fourteen.”
He sounded so matter-of-fact—so defeated—that Meg wanted to cry. “Oh, no,” she breathed,
her hand moving up to cup his cheek.
“Don’t make it into more than it was,” he said gruffly, turning his head away from her palm. “I
just tried to help her when I could.”
“And your parents weren’t around?”
“Sometimes they were. But she always called me.”
“And you always helped her.” She swallowed over the emotion and the rising tenderness she
felt—not wanting to make him self-conscious.
“I did what I could, but I don’t think I did enough. I tried to get her some help when it was clear
she was on a destructive path, but what the hell could I do? I was nineteen.”
“She seems to have gotten off that path. She’s doing well in college and everything?”
“Yeah. But the first trouble she runs into, she falls back into her old habits. I didn’t do enough.”
“Well, you can’t take all the responsibility on yourself. You can only do so much for her. Some
things she has to do herself.”
“I know.” He slanted her a suspicious look. “You’re not feeling sorry for me or anything, are
you?”
Meg felt a wave of affection she funneled into a teasing smile. Then she gave an exaggerated
sniff. “Of course not. I just think you’re my hero.”
East groaned in disgust, although there was a brief spark of responding humor in his eyes.
“Some hero,” he muttered, “Sprawled out here like a . . . like a . . .” His brow furrowed as he tried to
think of an appropriate simile.
“Like a gallant, wounded soldier,” Meg offered, hoping to earn another groan.
She got a sneer instead. “Like a sloppy drunk.”
Shaking her head, Meg combed her fingers through his hair and started to massage his scalp
again—realizing he might get up soon if all she did was pet him.
“I’m sure your sister appreciates all you’re doing to help her,” she said at last.
“Yeah. I think so.”
“And your parents?”
“I guess they might.”
A stab of pain shot through her heart as she took in the implications. “They don’t act like they
appreciate you?”
East pressed his lips together and looked away.
She couldn’t stand the tension she saw in his face so she brought her hand down again to stroke
his rough cheek. Then she brushed her fingertips along his tight lips until they softened.
“They’ve always been too busy for us. They’ve got a lot of money, if you hadn’t figured that out
before. I think Angie and I were supposed to be pretty accessories to their lives, but we weren’t
pretty enough. Now that we’re adults, they’re just not interested.”
Meg thought about her parents back in Iowa. They called every few days to see how she was
doing, and they flew all the way out here at least twice a year. She couldn’t imagine having parents
who just didn’t care.
“Did they give you this house?” she asked.
“Yeah. My dad had a bunch of rental properties in the area, so he gave me this house and a
couple of others ones. I think he was trying to prove how irresponsible I was, thinking I’d never be
able to take care of them.”
“You have other houses you rent out?”
“Two others.”
That must be how he supported himself. She’d always wondered. “So your dad was wrong.
You have been responsible with them after all.”
“I guess.”
“I had no idea.”
“I know. I didn’t tell you. I…”
“You what?”
“I feel like I’ve spent my life proving that my parents are right about me.”
“Oh, East.”
“It’s no big deal,” he said at last. “Old news.” There was something final in his voice, and she
understood it as a sign that he’d spilled all he was going to spill for the time being.
She also understood something else. She knew why he avoided responsibility, why he acted
like he didn’t care about anything. He’d had the responsibility of his sister for way too long and
parents who thought he was a loser.
So she didn’t press him any further. She massaged his scalp a little more until the lines of his
face drew her back to stroking his cheeks, his jaw, his mouth.
She felt almost mesmerized by the simple act of touching him like this. She wanted to soothe
him, caress him, somehow make the world better for him.
There just wasn’t anything she could do.
She felt like she would strangle on the emotion in her throat. “I’m glad you told me about all of
this. I wish I’d known before.”
Biting her lip, she tried to hide her expression. She wished she hadn’t said that. She didn’t want
to reproach him—not when he’d finally opened up to her.
His lips parted as if he would say something, maybe give some sort of explanation. But he
closed them again and let out a long breath.
She didn’t object to his reticence. He didn’t really owe her any sort of confession.
They were roommates. She might feel closer to him than anyone else in the world, but there
were no obligations between them.
Her fingers were brushing idly against his rough cheek, her skin grating audibly against his
stubble. As soon as she became conscious of the sensation, she started to react to it—recognizing that
pulsing of arousal she’d been distracted from before.
She gazed down at East, from his face to his broad chest to his slim hips to his long legs in his
jeans. He looked so big and masculine, and there was something utterly carnal about having him
sprawled out on the couch with his head in her lap.
She kneaded his shoulder with one hand and stroked his cheek with the other. Following an
irresistible compulsion, she caressed over to his mouth again, sliding her fingers along the line of his
lips.
He let out a long, lingering groan—so hoarse and thick and sensual it caused another jolt of
arousal to shoot down between her legs. His breathing had sped up and his cheeks weren’t as pallid
as they’d been before. In fact, they looked almost flushed.
Her thighs were hot from the weight and heat of his head, and she couldn’t stop touching his
lips.
East moaned again. Then he suddenly jerked up to a sitting position and rose awkwardly to his
feet. Rubbing a hand over his face, he muttered, “I should go to bed.”
Meg let out a sound of distress and stood up too. “Don’t go.” Realizing how pathetic she’d
sounded, she tried again, “You don’t have to go.”
East’s face looked a little strained, after being so relaxed before. “I’d better.”
She recognized a particular smolder in his eyes. Then took in his flushed cheeks, tense belly,
and the line of the bulge at the front of his jeans.
With a wave of recognition, she realized why he was so intent on leaving right now. “Oh.”
She didn’t know what else to say. Her body was just as turned-on as his was, and her heart was
nearly flying in excitement over the palpable connection between them.
But her brain—her always sensible brain—simply wasn’t all in.
“I know you said no,” East said, very low, very thick. His eyes were caressing her face now,
seeing even deeper inside her. “But I can’t talk myself out of it. If you don’t want this, then I’ll have to
leave.”
“But…” Her voice cracked, so she paused to clear her throat. “Your girlfriend.”
He gave a strange, loud groan and jerked his head away, as if on a silent curse.
His reaction was so strange that a question crossed her mind. Then her lips. “You…you do
have a girlfriend, don’t you?”
She couldn’t breathe as she waited for the answer.
He came over and knelt on the floor next to the couch, where she was still seated. He was tense
and flushed and practically shuddering with feeling. “There is no girlfriend,” he murmured. “Meg,
there’s no one but you.”
Her brain wasn’t sure whether she could believe it, but her heart was so ecstatic that nothing
else mattered. Without that one remaining barricade, nothing could hold back her feelings any longer.
She reached out and flattened her hands on his chest, sliding them down toward his belly. She
let one of them drop even lower, until she was palming his arousal through his jeans. Gazing up at his
searching face, she said huskily, “In that case, maybe I changed my mind.”
It was true. She wanted him desperately, more than anything, more intensely than she’d felt
anything before. And this time her brain couldn’t talk her heart out of what she so deeply wanted.
Not when her body wanted it too.
He stared at her for a moment. Then breathed, “Are you sure?”
“Oh yeah.” She leaned forward to press a kiss on the side of his jaw and let her lips slide
across his rough skin deliciously.
He wrapped his arms around her, gathering her into a tight embrace as his mouth found hers
again. Her head was spinning, and not just from the sensations. It felt like he wanted her desperately,
needed her desperately—and it answered a need of her own.
His hands started moving over her with a delicious entitlement, and he was still kissing her
when his hand slid between her thighs, rubbing her over her leggings. Her whole body tightened at the
caress, and she gasped into his mouth.
She couldn’t sustain the kiss when the sensations built up even more. She clung to his shoulder,
panting against his shirt as the tense coil of feeling broke into rippling pleasure.
He kept massaging her through the climax, until she collapsed against his chest, her body
softened in the aftermath.
He pressed little kisses against her hair until she tilted her head up to meet his eyes, smiling
almost sheepishly.
“I should have known you were a quiet comer,” he murmured.
She stiffened. “Why would you think that?”
“Well, you are, aren’t you?”
“Some of the time.” She frowned. “I’ve been known to be loud on occasion. Maybe you’re just
not as good as you think.”
He laughed softly and tightened his arm around her. “Was that some sort of a challenge?
Because you know that I’m not going to let a challenge go unanswered.”
She wanted to laugh too, her chest full of affection and something warmer, fuller. But she
managed to hold her frown. “That’s your ego talking again.”
Then he was standing up, pulling her to her feet, kissing her hard, passionate. “My ego has a lot
to say for itself,” he said against her lips.
“Well, unless it’s planning to do something, tell your ego to shut up.”
Without warning, he scooped her up into his arms.
She squealed, her arms automatically wrapping around his neck. “What are you doing?” she
asked, although she had a pretty clear idea about the answer.
His eyes were both hot and tender as he turned toward the bedroom, holding her cradled in his
arms. “My ego and I are taking you to bed.”
***
He did take her to bed. Then they rid each other of their clothes as they kissed with hungry urgency.
Meg pulled the covers up over them as she pushed East down onto his back.
She covered his body with hers and wound her arms around his neck. “We don’t have to do
this,” she murmured against his mouth. “If you and your ego are too tired.”
That earned her a dirty look before he made a growling sound and kissed her again. His hands
were stroking the back her of thighs and her bottom, and he helped her adjust her legs around his so
that their groins rubbed against each other.
His erection was trapped between them, folded up toward his belly. She rubbed her intimate
folds along the length of it, moaning at the stimulation.
East groaned too, arching up beneath her in a way that pressed her breasts against his chest. She
imagined he was probably a really good lover—it had certainly sounded that way when he used to
bring women back home with him—but she could feel that he didn’t have much control tonight, and
she didn’t want him to have to hold back.
So she reluctantly released him from her tight embrace and raised herself up so she could roll a
condom on over him and then align herself on his erection.
Breathing urgently, East held himself in place and helped her as she lowered herself over him,
sheathing his hard flesh with her body.
It felt so good, so perfectly right that Meg let out a silly mew of satisfaction as he penetrated
her. It almost felt familiar, although they’d never done this before. She leaned down again so she
could kiss him some more, and the shift in angle made him grunt and squeeze the soft flesh of her ass.
She was overwhelmed with delicious sensations—the full substance of him inside her, the hard
lines and coarse hair of his chest beneath her breasts, the skin of his thighs pressing against hers, the
urgency of his mouth beneath her lips, the texture of his hair in her fingers. It was all so good she
couldn’t stop moaning, even as their kiss grew deeper and wetter.
She pumped her hips over him as they kissed, getting delicious stimulation as his substance slid
inside her and her clit rubbed against his pubic bone. It had been several months since she’d had sex,
and she’d never wanted anyone this much. She felt desperate, needy, like she wanted to devour him.
And she knew it wasn’t going to take her long to come.
East seemed to recognize it too. His grip on her bottom guided her motion, and his urging sped
up as her orgasm built inside her.
“Oh, baby,” he said, when she’d lost her concentration on the kiss and just rubbed her cheek
against his instead. “Can you come? Can you come for me?”
“Yeah,” she huffed, rocking over him in her need to find release. “Yeah!”
She spasmed around him as her orgasm sliced through her, and she jerked her pelvis a few
more times to sustain the contractions as long as she could.
East had talked her through it, muttering encouragement and endearments so thick and mumbled
they were mostly incoherent.
She tightened her arms around his neck, pulling him as close to her as she could.
She wasn’t sure what she wanted to say. Just knew she needed to say something. “East,” was
what she ended up with.
“Good?” he asked, stroking her hair as he squeezed her bottom with the other hand.
The climax had been good, but that wasn’t what was swelling up inside her. “So, so good.”
He was tense beneath her, still hard inside her. And she realized he was still holding himself
back, even though he was buried deep inside her.
“Your turn,” she said against his ear. “Take me anyway you want.”
She wasn’t sure he’d respond immediately but he must be more far gone than she realized. With
a guttural sound, he held her secure and flipped them over so that she was on her back.
“Yeah,” she gasped, with a delighted smile. “Yeah.”
He responded to her encouragement by bending her legs up toward her shoulders so that he sunk
deeper inside her.
“Take me,” she urged him, arching her neck back with pleasure at the sight of his hungry,
animalistic face above her. “I want you to.”
He thrust into her with hard, fast strokes, shaking her body and shaking the bed. “Fuck, baby,”
he gritted out, “You feel so good.”
“Yeah,” she huffed. It was a raw, urgent feeling, and it gathered into another deep pressure
below her belly. “Yeah, hard. Harder.”
He reared up on straightened arms, his nostrils flaring as he stared down at her. He grunted
with his primitive rhythm, and his skin was glazed with perspiration.
Meg clawed at his back and his butt, feeling the clenching and unclenching of his tight muscles
there. This was supposed to be for him, but she was going to come again. She could feel the pressure
surging forward.
Her whole body jiggled with the force of his motion. “Gonna come. Again.”
“Yes,” he rasped, devouring her folded body beneath him. “Yes, Meg. Let me see you come.”
The pleasure was so intense she nearly screamed, the sound uninhibited and uncontrollable.
Her whole body shook and convulsed as her climax overwhelmed her, and her channel clamped
down ruthlessly around him.
“Now you,” she gasped, as she started to come down. “Now you. East, let it go!”
He made a rough sound in his throat and fell out of rhythm. His motion became hardy and jerky
as he pushed inside her with rough grunts. He gritted out words on each grunt, choppy sounds in time
with his uneven thrusts. “Yes. Meg. Need. You. So. Much.”
There were tears of pleasure and relief in Meg’s eyes as she clung to him, watching him give up
his control and take what he needed for once. When he came, a broken shout of pleasure was ripped
out of his throat, and his face transformed in absolute release.
He collapsed over her afterwards, nearly crushing her folded body.
She didn’t care. She felt whole—even as part of the sweaty, exhausted tangle of bodies they
made.
It was the first time in her life that her heart and her mind and her body were all perfectly in
tune, all pulsing with the exact same thing.
He was hers.
Five
Except, of course, he wasn’t hers.
The realization hit her as she was starting to wake up. She had no idea what time it was, but it
was light outside, and East was sound asleep beside her.
His body was warm and relaxed, and his breathing was slow and even. One of his arms was
holding her body against his, even in his sleep.
And she wanted nothing more than to snuggle up against him and ease back into sleep, feeling
safe, protected, treasured, known.
Loved.
But her brain had caught up to her heart and body at last, and it was screaming at her about how
wrong this whole thing was.
He’d said he didn’t have a girlfriend, and she desperately wanted to believe it was true. But
he’d acted like he’d had one for the last few months—which meant he’d either lied last night or he’d
let her believe a lie for a really long time.
Neither of those options were good. And it reminded her of something she knew very well.
Despite all of his good qualities—and he had more than most—he would never take things seriously,
commit to real responsibilities. When she’d hoped something would happen between them before,
she’d been nothing but disappointed.
He was who he was. He’d made certain choices against responsibility, commitment, binds that
would hold him down. She might understand now why he had made those choices, but knowing it
didn’t change anything.
He liked her, wanted her, maybe even needed her in certain ways. But love always involved
choices, and he wasn’t going to choose to be with her in the way she needed.
The way he’d lived his life for the last ten years only proved it.
So all of the sweet and hot memories from the night came crashing down to smother her. She
almost choked on them, pulling away from East’s body as quickly and carefully as she could.
She didn’t want to wake him up. She didn’t want to talk to him. But she needed to get away.
Right now.
She made it out of the bed, causing East to grumble in his sleep and roll over. When it was
clear he wasn’t waking up, she grabbed her clothes from the floor and ran into her bedroom.
She closed the door, locked it, then checked to make sure it was locked.
Then she stood staring around at her little room—twin bed, old dresser, card table for a
nightstand, overflowing closet, overflowing bookcase.
She’d only lived here for less than seven months, but it felt like home. She’d been happy here—
with East, despite his aggravating qualities. And now she was going to have to move.
She couldn’t keep living here with him—not after what had just happened. She’d never be able
to move on. She’d always be reliving what she could have had with him, if everything had been
different.
The thought strangled in her throat, but she fought against tears. She’d given into her feelings too
much already, and it had only served to ruin everything.
Trembling with the attempt to suppress sobs, she grabbed some clothes and went into the
bathroom.
She needed a shower. The world wasn’t coming apart at the seams the way it felt. She’d just
slept with the wrong man.
It happened. It happened to a lot of women. You dealt with it and moved on.
Meg took a long shower. She might have cried a little under the spray, but it wasn’t much. She
prided herself on being so reasonable about this whole ordeal.
She needed some time. Then she could get over it.
Her heart wasn’t going to overtake her brain again.
She was drying off when her phone chirped with a text. It was Raney.
Please tell me I don’t have to go to spin class this morning!
It was kind of early for a Saturday morning, but obviously Raney was awake, so Meg called her
friend right away. She desperately needed to talk to someone, and it couldn’t be East.
When Meg had briefly explained what happened, Raney was silent for a minute. Then she said,
“I get why you’re so upset, but I don’t think it’s as bad as you think.”
Meg tried not to roll her eyes. She loved Raney and she appreciated her friend’s vibrant,
spontaneous personality, but her endless romanticism was just not what she needed right now.
“I can hear you making a face, even through the phone.” Raney said. “I’m not being silly. I’m
looking at this more clearly than you are.”
“I don’t think so. I just slept with a guy who might already have a girlfriend. That’s just bad—
no matter how you look at it.”
“He said he doesn’t, and last night you believed him. It’s only your fear making you second-
guess it this morning. Plus, Anne says he doesn’t really have a girlfriend. It’s just a thing he’s got
going for some reason.”
Meg frowned. “I don’t care what he calls her. If he has a thing with another woman, then he
shouldn’t be sleeping with me. And I shouldn’t be sleeping with him.”
“That’s not what I mean. I mean, Anne says she doesn’t exist.”
“Well, what the hell does Anne know?”
“Jake said—“
“I know what Jake said, but East confirmed it at lunch yesterday. So he’s lying at one point or
another. I don’t want to be with a liar any more than I want to be with a cheater.”
“You don’t really think he’s either one of those things. You’re just upset. Still, I don’t think it’s
as bad as you think. So you slept with him. People fuck all the time. It doesn’t have to mean anything.”
Meg slumped to the floor of the bathroom, feeling heavy and exhausted. Her towel was
wrapped around her because she’d been too distracted to put on her clothes.
Raney continued, “I know you’re not into casual sex, but still…can’t you just talk to him so
you’re on the same page and then go back to being friends or whatever you all were?”
Meg swallowed hard and didn’t answer.
“Well?” Raney demanded. She was tiny, but could be quite forceful.
“I don’t think I can be friends or whatever we were again,” Meg admitted. “I…want more.”
“I knew it! I knew you were in love with him!”
“Don’t you understand? It’s not good. It’s not good news at all.” She felt herself shaking with
something like grief. “He doesn’t love me back.”
“Of course, he does. Anyone can see that.”
Meg groaned.
“Don’t act like I’m an idiot. I knew Jake loved Anne the whole time. You were always telling
her to be sensible, but who was right then? It was me, wasn’t it? And I’m right about this too. You’re
using your sensibleness to hide behind right now, when, if you could just take a step back, you would
see the truth like I do. East has been insanely in love with you for at least three months.”
“Then why did he keep pretending to have a girlfriend?”
“I don’t think he—”
There was a knock on the bathroom door, and it startled Meg so much she let out a squeak.
“Is it him?” Raney asked, either hearing the knock or the squeak or both.
“Yeah,” Meg whispered, staring at the closed door.
“So answer it.”
“I don’t want to answer it.”
“You have to talk to him.”
“Why do I have to talk to him?”
“Because it’s what you do after you screw your roommate.”
“Meg, are you okay?” East asked from outside the bathroom door.
“Yes,” she called out. “I’m fine.”
“Call me back,” Raney whispered, as if she might be overheard through the door too. “I might
even skip spin class for this.” Then she hung up.
East knocked again, louder this time. “Let me in, Meg.”
She just stared at the door, starting to shake in confusion and excitement.
He started to jiggle the handle, but she’d locked it so the door didn’t open. “Meg, talk to me.”
“Can’t I get some privacy, even in the bathroom?” she asked at last.
“No. I can feel you angsting, even through the door. And you’re going to talk yourself into doing
something stupid. Let me in.”
Meg was breathing in short gasps, and she managed to get to her feet. Her hand shook as she
raised it to the doorknob. She wasn’t rationally sure why she was so anxious. It just felt like her
world was starting to wobble.
She opened the door.
East looked tired and frustrated and confused and strangely urgent. He wore nothing but the
jeans he’d been wearing the day before.
“What do you want?” Meg asked, suddenly wishing she had something more on than the towel.
“What are you doing in here?” East stepped into the small bathroom with her.
“What do people normally do in the bathroom?”
“You’re hiding from me.”
Meg saw something on his face that astonished her.
He looked hurt, betrayed. Like she’d betrayed him.
Her face twisted at the irony and pain both. “Damn it, East,” she muttered. “What did you
expect me to do?”
“I expected you to talk to me this morning.” He stepped closer to her, looming over her with his
height and breadth. “Don’t you dare pretend something didn’t happen between us last night. We both
know it did.”
She was shaking helplessly now, her hands fisted at her sides. She turned away from him,
sucking in a long, hoarse breath. “It doesn’t matter what happened between us.”
He made a choked sound and reached out to spin her back around with a hand on her shoulder.
“What the fuck does that mean? Of course, it matters. Why wouldn’t it matter?”
“You have a girlfriend!” The words were forced out of her, loudly and uncontrolled. “Or you
kept pretending to for months now. And if she’s real, maybe you should think more about how this
affects her, instead of nagging me about something that can’t possibly have a future.”
He froze for a moment, looking vaguely stunned.
It was so confusing that Meg had to fight another sob. With great effort, she managed to control
herself. “I’m serious,” she repeated, in almost a whisper.
He released all his breath in a rough sigh, raising a hand to rub at his face. “Oh, Meg, damn it
all. I don’t have a girlfriend. There’s no one but you. I told you that last night. Did you think I lied to
you?”
The words weren’t spoken with his normal sexy charisma. They were naked. Open. Completely
vulnerable.
This time, she froze, staring at him blindly. “Then you lied all those other times.”
“I didn’t lie. I just didn’t correct your wrong assumption.”
She hugged her arms to her stomach, trying to hold herself together. She slumped to the
bathroom floor again. “I don’t understand.”
He seemed to sense her helplessness, and he lowered himself to the floor beside her. “I’m sorry
about everything, Meg. It turned into this whole thing, and I didn’t know how to change it once it
started. But I don’t have a girlfriend. I never had a girlfriend.”
“But you said—“
“I never said I had one. You just kept saying I did. And I didn’t correct you.”
“But why not? You knew that’s what I thought. Why would you let me keep thinking it?”
He glanced away for a moment before he looked back. “It seemed safer. I was feeling way too
much for you, so it was a safety net. For both of us. I could feel like I wasn’t risking everything, and
you wouldn’t keep feeling threatened as you started having feelings for me too.”
“What makes you think I had feelings for you?” she asked weakly.
He gave a soft chuckle and reached out for her hand. “I’m not as clueless as you seem to think. I
knew exactly what was going on with you. Your heart started to want me. Not to mention your body.
But your brain kept telling you, No.”
Her confusion was starting to dissipate, leaving something small and new and thrilled in its
place. “Well, my brain had good reason to say no.”
“I know it did. I’m pretty much a loser, and I’d be a terrible choice for you.”
“You’re not a loser.”
He gave a faint smile. “That’s nice of you to say, but it’s not true. I was….I’m trying not to be
such a loser. But I can’t change the habits of a lifetime overnight. Your brain knew what it was doing.
And I guess the girlfriend thing kept holding things off until you…your brain started to change its
mind.”
“If you don’t have a girlfriend, where do you go at night? And who keeps calling you where you
walk away to talk in private?”
“I got a job, if you can believe it,” he said ruefully. “It’s my boss who calls. I told you I was
trying to do better. Playing piano in an upscale bar. I’ve been doing it for ten weeks now.” He shook
his head. “It’s not exactly a dream job, but it’s something.”
She raised a hand to her mouth. “You got a job?”
“Yeah. Don’t look so surprised.”
“And that’s where you go at night? Not to a woman’s house?”
“Meg, there’s not been any other woman in my life for the last three months. There’s no one but
you.”
This time, she couldn’t hold back a little sob. Her body shook with it for a minute.
“Please don’t cry,” East said, looking briefly scared. “It’s not that big a deal. I was just trying
to get myself together.”
She repressed the emotion enough to lower her hand. “I hope you don’t think you had to get a
job in order to deserve me or something. It’s not the job that matters, really. I just want you to be you.
And be all in. Commit to things.”
“I know. I know why you were always nagging me about it. You were right. I’m working on my
music. You know that song I was working on yesterday? It’s all about you. I’m never likely to be rich
or successful or even very ambitious, but I want to be me. For you. That’s what I’ve been trying to
be.”
This time, a tear leaked out, and Meg swiped it away quickly. “Why didn’t you tell me all this
before?”
“I don’t know. Maybe I should have. I wanted to. But then I was afraid you’d get scared and run
away, and I couldn’t stand to lose you.”
Meg sniffed.
East reached up with both hands and cupped her face. “Last night was all of my dreams come to
life, Meg. If you tell me it’s just the one time, that there’s nothing more for us here, then I don’t know
what I’ll do.”
“I want there to be more,” she admitted, leaning toward him unconsciously. “I’ve wanted it for
a long time. I just didn’t think it was possible.”
“I think it is possible. And I want you to think so too. I want you to want me with all of you—
your heart, your body, and your mind too.” He leaned even closer, his mouth a breath away from hers.
“Do you think your mind could ever want a guy like me?”
“I think…maybe it already does.”
He groaned low in his throat and pulled her into a hungry kiss. She kissed him back—all of her,
every part of her, wanting him, needing him, loving him.
The kiss got intense quickly, but Meg managed to stop him before he began to take her towel
off. She just didn’t feel right making love on the floor of the bathroom, and they needed to go visit his
sister in the hospital soon anyway.
After she’d gotten dressed, she did remember to call back Raney. There was a brief pause
before Raney exclaimed, “I was right! I knew I was right! Wait until I tell Anne!”
When Meg went into the kitchen to get some coffee and something to eat, she stood and stared at
East, who was doing something unaccountable.
He was standing in front of the sink, rinsing a plate.
When he realized she was behind him, he glanced over her shoulder. “What?”
“What are you doing?”
“What does it look like?”
She walked over to him, grabbing him in a hug, overwhelmed, since the small gesture spoke
more loudly than anything else she’d heard this morning.
He returned her hug, but he murmured against her ear, “Don’t expect it to last. I hate doing
dishes.”
She giggled, feeling so much more than lust. Feeling it with all of who she was.
Then East asked, “So does this mean we’re together for real?”
Meg practically hugged herself with excitement, telling herself not to get used to the feeling
since it would likely lessen eventually as real life caught up to them. But maybe it would only lessen
a little. “I don’t know,” she said, hiding a smile, “It depends on whether you plan to ask me out.”
Epilogue
East did ask her out. And he kept asking her out for the next two months.
“East? East? Are you here?” Meg called out as she entered their house one evening.
He didn’t respond, but she noticed music spread out on the piano—sheets written in his own
hand. He must have been working on his music earlier.
Her belly knotted in excitement at this evidence of his presence, and she called out again,
“East?”
There were a few dishes in the sink—just what he’d used that day. He’d done all the dishes last
night after dinner, making sure his great act of duty was noticed and appropriately rewarded.
Still no answer. His car had been parked outside, so she went upstairs to check the roof deck.
He was there, stretched out on an old lounge chair, sunglasses masking his eyes, so she couldn’t
tell if he was awake or not. As she peered, he turned his head and took off the sunglasses, as if he’d
just recognized her presence.
He looked so adorable—rumpled hair, long, tanned limbs, sleepy eyes, and five-o’clock
shadow—that Meg couldn’t resist the urge to launch herself at him in half-hug, half-tackle.
He grunted as she jumped on him, but his arms came around her possessively and his eyes were
soft as he complained, “Ouch!”
“Why are you up here taking a nap?” She tried to get her arms around him, nudging up his
shoulders as much as she could.
“I didn’t get any sleep this morning, so I was tired.” He helped her adjust her body as it
sprawled over his, shifting her legs until they were positioned on either side of his thighs and
centering her body over his so her hipbone didn’t poke him in the groin. Her skirt had gotten hiked up
until it barely covered her bottom, but he didn’t bother to take care of that little detail. “And I suppose
I’ll recover from the broken ribs you just gave me.”
She giggled at his dry tone and leaned down to give him a kiss. He tasted like beer. He often
had a beer at this time of day.
East’s hands slid from her back to her ass, where he squeezed the soft curves before sliding
down to the hem of her skirt. When he found her bare skin, he stroked back up, settling his hands on
the flesh at the back of her thighs just below her bottom. “I tried to call you earlier, but you didn’t
answer.”
“I’d silence my phone during a meeting and forgot to turn the volume back on,” she explained,
feeling a flutter of excitement as his proximity the look in his eyes. “What did you want?”
“Nothing important.” His hands played possessively with her body as he spoke.
She nuzzled him, rubbing her cheek against his bristly jaw and sighing in pleasure at the feel of
it. “Don’t forget we have dinner with your sister and her boyfriend tomorrow night. She called this
morning to make sure we were still on.”
“I know. She sounds excited about this one, so maybe she’s serious. We’ll see.”
Rubbing her cheek against his, she murmured against his ear, “You’re a really good brother.”
“That’s not the only thing I’m good at.”
“You’re a really good roommate, too.”
With a guttural sound, East flipped them over so they were both on their sides, Meg trapped
between his solid body and the armrest of the lounge chair. “I’m the best roommate you’ll ever have,”
he murmured, leaning closer.
She opened her mouth to his demanding kiss, rubbing herself against him hungrily as her body
responded to his embrace and his mood.
When he’d pulled his mouth away from hers, he didn’t pull his face away. His lips against her
cheek, he asked, “So what are you brimming with excitement about?”
Meg knew immediately what he was referring to and felt an ache of tenderness at this sign of
how well he knew her. But she just said, “Maybe it’s because I have a very hot hunk of a man
between my legs.”
He wasn’t exactly between her legs, but she’d draped one of her legs over his thigh, causing her
skirt to bunch up disgracefully around her hips again.
He gave his pelvis a little thrust, letting her feel that he was starting to get aroused. But cupping
the back of her head in one hand, he tilted her head up to meet his gaze. “So you aren’t going to tell
me?”
“Of course I’m going to tell you. Anne, Raney, and I are going on a trip next month, before the
wedding. We’re trying to figure out where to go, but it’s going to be good.”
“Just the girls?” East’s arms had tightened around her, his eyes smoldering with both heat and
affection.
“Yep. No men allowed.”
She knew he would understand why she was happy about this, even if no one else did.
He kissed her again, this time softly, gently, stroking her mouth with his tongue. “So not
everything has to change,” he murmured, when he released her lips.
“Yeah.” She swallowed hard. “Or, even if it changes, maybe it’s not all bad.”
East chuckled, causing his breath to blow against her skin and his body to shake deliciously
against hers. “Well, I think the recent changes aren’t bad at all.”
“Yeah,” she breathed, smiling at his fond, amused expression. “I have to agree with that.”
“Speaking of changes.” East cleared his throat, all of sudden looking slightly uncertain.
Meg stared at him, having absolutely no idea what to expect. “Yes?”
Clearing his throat again, East went on, “I was thinking…we both know I’m the best roommate
a girl could hope for, but I was wondering if you were interested in a different sort of living
arrangement.”
She frowned, momentarily confused. “What kind of living arrangement?”
“One where we’re not just roommates.” He cleared his throat. “We’re more.”
“Well, we’re kind of more now, given how often we have sex.”
“Yeah, but I mean really more.”
She knew exactly what he was talking about now and felt a wave of joy at the knowledge.
“East? Are you asking me to live with you?”
“Yeah. Sounds pretty good, doesn’t it?”
She hid a smile—finding this uncertainty in such a confident, masculine man the sweetest thing
imaginable. “That’s a pretty big commitment.”
East chuckled warmly, nuzzling her hair. “I know.” His body had palpably relaxed as he
realized she wasn’t opposed to the idea. “But my plan is to keep you around for as long as I possibly
can, so I figured it might be smart for you to move out of the little room.”
“Is that right?” Her arousal had plateaued for a few minutes, but now it was building back up
again as her breasts and groin rubbed against him.
“Oh yeah.”
She tried to keep up their playful banter, but she had a feeling she was beaming like a fool.
“Why?”
He gave a grunt of inquiry as he mouthed the pulse at her throat.
“Tell me why,” she demanded, pulling back so she could look in his eyes. “It’s not just because
you feel bad about me being in the little room, is it?”
“No,” he admitted, his voice thick and tender. “It’s because I’m crazy in love with you, and I
can’t stand the thought of you being even one room away.”
“Oh.” She couldn’t suppress a silly giggle. “Same here. That’s a good enough reason, I guess.
So I say yes. And, if you don’t mind my mentioning it, it feels like South might be going north.”
She reached down to rub his erection through his shorts.
She was about to add another teasing comment, but East didn’t give her a chance. He claimed
her mouth in another kiss, and this one was deep, urgent, and passionate.
The need for conversation over, they kissed and caressed each other to a hot, needy arousal.
“Turn around,” he murmured into her ear, the command in his gravelly tone making her whole body
clench in excitement.
She turned around so that he was spooning her from behind, which was one of the more
comfortable positions on this lounge. And, after some shuffling of clothes, he sank inside her from
behind.
Meg moaned as he started to thrust, developing an even, satisfying rhythm. Then she began to
whimper when he brought one of his hands around to massage her clit as they moved urgently
together. And she finally made soft sobbing sounds as her orgasm swelled into a luscious peak.
East’s was big, hot, and strong behind her—his large, rough hands against her skin delicious,
the coarse texture of his jaw, chest, and legs irresistible. He was grunting next to her ear, sometimes
forming words and sometimes just guttural sounds of effort and pleasure.
Just on the cusp of her climax, Meg looked back at him over her shoulder.
He leaned forward and kissed her clumsily, and they held the kiss as she began to shake with
her orgasm. Her body was washed with waves of satisfaction, and her heart felt like it would burst
open in her chest as East’s pelvis jerked against her as he let himself go as well.
His body began to soften, relax, after his spasms subsided as well. His fingers continued gently
rubbing her, providing lovely, lingering stimulation.
“Meg,” he rasped, pushing aside her hair so he could press kisses against her neck. “I love
you.”
She thought—for one ridiculous moment—she might cry with pure contentment. Fortunately, she
didn’t collapse into such sentiment. She just released a happy sigh and said, “I love you too.”
“And I’m all in with you. You know that right? No avoiding commitment or responsibility or
anything.”
She wanted to dissolve into happy tears, but her brain firmly told her that would be silly.
Instead, she just gave a sappy smile. “I know. It makes me so happy. I want all of that from you.”
“All of you wants it? Because I want your body and heart and brain to all want me equally, just
as much.”
He knew her far too well, but she could tell him the absolute truth. “All of me wants you, and I
don’t think that’s going to change.”
It was true, and she could see he recognized it as such. She saw the response on his face, and it
filled her with a joy close to awe.
She wasn’t sure how it had happened, but East had won the mental battle always waged
between her brain and the rest of her.
And it had happened in only one night.
***
If you enjoyed this book, please check out the other
. An excerpt for One Night
with her Boss can be found on the following pages.
Excerpt from One Night with her Boss
Jake had left his office a half-hour ago, when she’d been on the phone. She’d thought he was
just heading for the restroom, but he must have gone somewhere else.
She didn’t like not knowing where he was, so she got up and started to look.
She knew he hadn’t left the suite, since her desk had a view of the main door. Max, his financial
guy, said Jake wasn’t in the men’s room, so she checked out the conference room and the lounge area,
where he sometimes moved to stretch out his legs if his knee was bothering him.
He wasn’t there either.
He also wasn’t in Janice’s or Melanie’s office, which left only one place in the suite.
Anne was shaking her head as she opened the door of the file room.
He wasn’t supposed to be in here.
But there he was, kneeling down to search through the bottom drawer of the file cabinet on the
back wall.
“What are you doing?” she asked, feeling a familiar wave of annoyance. Had he been in here
looking for something in a file for the whole thirty minutes?
He jerked in obvious surprise and looked at her over his shoulder. “I need the sales receipts
from last February.”
She let out a breath and walked over toward him. “Well, you’re in the wrong cabinet.”
“I am not.” He looked frustrated, rumpled, and absolutely gorgeous, kneeling on the floor in
front of her in his suit and red tie. “This drawer is for February 2013.”
“I know that, but the sale receipts aren’t there.” When he looked like he was about to argue,
Anne went on, “Would you please stand up? You’re going to hurt your knee like that.”
His shoulders stiffened, and his square jaw clenched. “My knee is fine.”
“No, it’s not. You were limping yesterday because you were at your desk for sixteen hours on
Tuesday. How long have you been kneeling here looking in that drawer? You can’t do that to your
knee.”
She knew her tone was too tense and urgent, so she tried to dial it back. There was no reason to
react this way, anyway. She just got so upset when Jake refused to make the most obvious steps to
take care of himself, as if he thought work was more important than his health or his needs.
“I told you my knee is fine.” His voice was guttural, almost a growl, and his eyes looked like
steel in the florescent light.
She reached down for his arm. “I’ll get the file for you. Would you please get up off your
knee?”
With an exaggerated sigh of impatience, he hauled himself up to his feet, not quite managing to
hide the wince as he straightened his bad leg. Now he was looming over Anne, even in her four-inch
heels. “Fine. Happy?”
She wasn’t happy. Sometimes he was so stubborn he made her want to scream. “Why didn’t you
ask me to get the receipts for you?”
“You were on the phone. Am I not allowed to search through my own files?”
“No, you’re not. I’ve told you over and over again. You end up putting things in the wrong
place, and it takes me hours to find them again.” She grabbed the file from his hand, glanced at it, and
then leaned over to slide it back into place and then push the drawer closed.
“I still need the—”
“They aren’t in that drawer. They’re over here.” She walked over to the opposite wall, her
heels clicking on the floor. She smoothed down her skirt, since it felt like it had gotten twisted
slightly. She vaguely hoped her ass didn’t look as big as she’d thought it did this morning. She leaned
down to open the correct drawer and rifled through files quickly until she found the right one.
Jake had followed her over, and she could feel him bristling behind her as she turned around to
hand him the file.
He stared down at it. “Why aren’t the receipts in the February drawer?”
“Because the receipts are all over here. If you would let me keep the records electronically, we
wouldn’t have this argument every other week.”
“Do you really think I’m going to trust the last ten years of my life to a computer? You’ve got to
be crazy. I could lose everything with a key stroke.”
He’d always been kind of a Luddite. A lot of the time she found it adorable.
Not today.
It bothered her unreasonably that he evidently thought the last ten years of his life were only
about building this company. As if he was nothing but his work.
She cleared her throat. “Keeping paper records means you could lose everything to a fire.”
“The cabinets are fire proof.”
She shook her head. “Fine. It’s your business. Your files. You can keep ancient paper records if
you want. But you aren’t allowed in here. If you want something, ask me.”
He stepped a little closer and braced his arm on the cabinet next to her shoulder. “Who’s the
boss here anyway?”
She could tell his mood had changed. He wasn’t angry. He was still bristling, but also almost
dryly amused. The transformation of his expression left her breathless, as did his proximity.
Her eyes were right at his chin level, so she had to tilt her head up to meet his eyes. “I’m not
trying to be the boss.”
His mouth twitched almost imperceptibly. “You’re pretty bossy, to not be trying to be the boss.”
She swallowed hard, clenching her fists to keep herself from putting her hands on his chest.
When he was like this—clever, dry, focused on her—she always seemed to want him the most.
“Well, I’m the boss of this room. You’re the boss of everything else.”
“Is that how it works?” He braced his other hand on the cabinet, trapping her between his arms.
“Yes.” She was flushed all over and suddenly conscious of the ache of arousal between her
thighs. She had no idea when that had happened. “That’s how it works.”
She could see that he was breathing quickly too, and he looked as hot as she felt. Something
new had blazed up in his eyes, and for a moment she was sure he would kiss her.
But he didn’t.
Of course, he didn’t.
She was his assistant. Not his girlfriend.
“Okay then,” he muttered, dropping his arms and stepping back.
“Okay.” She was almost shaking, her body primed and ready for something to happen. When
clearly nothing was going to happen.
Not at nine o’clock in the morning in the file room of the office, when all Jake would ever be to
About Noelle Adams
Noelle handwrote her first romance novel in a spiral-bound notebook when she was twelve, and she
hasn’t stopped writing since. She has lived in eight different states and currently resides in Virginia,
where she teaches English, reads any book she can get her hands on, and offers tribute to a very
spoiled cocker spaniel.
She loves travel, art, history, and ice cream. After spending far too many years of her life in
graduate school, she has decided to reorient her priorities and focus on writing contemporary
romances. For more information, please check out her website:
Other Books by Noelle Adams
One Hot Night: Three Contemporary Romance Novellas
A Negotiated Marriage
Listed
Bittersweet
Missing
Revival
Seducing the Enemy
Playing the Playboy
Holiday Heat
Married for Christmas
Salvation
Engaging the Boss
Excavated
A Baby for Easter
Duty Bound
Overexposed
Honor Bound
Road Tripping
One Night with her Boss
Stripping the Billionaire
Forever Bound
A Family for Christmas
Document Outline
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Epilogue
- Excerpt from One Night with her Boss
- About Noelle Adams
- Other Books by Noelle Adams
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