Opposites Attract (15 page)

An
expression of relief crossed his face as he nodded.

As
good as he was slow and gentle, Troy was even better rough and fast.
They came together with an intensity that rocked Amy to the core.

She
must have fallen into the exhausted sleep of utter satisfaction
because Amy awoke sometime during the night, cold on top of the
covers with the lights still on. As much as she tried not to wake
Troy, they were so intertwined it was impossible. When she moved he
woke too, kissing her sleepily on the forehead before stumbling into
the bathroom. She took the opportunity to ditch the boots and
lingerie she still wore and snuggled naked under the comforter as he
returned to bed and switched off the light.

Troy
spooned in close behind her and she discovered that just lying close
to her was enough to get him hard again. She definitely wasn’t
sleepy now. Thankfully Troy didn’t seem to have sleep on his
mind anymore either. Leaning back against him with a small sound of
invitation, she felt him reach for the nightstand in the dark and
heard the foil wrapper tear.

He
pressed in close behind her and held her in his arms while he kissed
her from neck to shoulder. He entered her from behind while one hand
covered her breast and his other hand slid between her legs. He
brought her quickly to orgasm again and followed soon after himself.
She’d be happy to let this man do this to her for the rest of
her life.

Afterward
as Amy began to drift off to sleep while still held in Troy’s
arms, she decided she might have just found a new favorite position.

~

Troy
woke early. He watched Amy sleep as the first light shone through the
windows. It struck him that in all the years he lived in this
apartment he never once had a girl over. Any sex always took place at
their place, never his. His home was his sanctuary and he hadn’t
been serious enough with anyone to invite them into it. Until now.
Amy sleeping here, in his bed, in his arms, seemed like the most
natural thing in the world.

His
warm and fuzzy feeling was rudely interrupted when her eyes flew
open. She sat upright. “Oh, no.”

He
thought she might have feelings of regret the morning after, but his
heart still felt like a ten-pound lead weight in the middle of his
chest at this reaction.

She
blinked. “What time is it?”

With
regret, he removed the arm that was still around her and glanced at
the clock. “Just after six.”

“
Oh,
thank God. I have an important meeting at eight o’clock. I was
afraid I’d overslept.” She smiled down at him and placed
one hand on each side of his head on the pillow. “Mmm. I don’t
want to leave you. If I didn’t have this meeting, I’d be
very tempted to play hooky. Oh, well. But hey, maybe you could meet
me at work and we could get lunch?”

The
relief nearly overwhelmed him. “Sure, just leave the address of
your office before you leave.”

She
glanced at the clock. “Hmm. An hour to shower and dress, half
an hour to get into work and to the meeting. How fast is your
quickest quickie?” She raised her eyebrows suggestively.

He
laughed. “No man is going to answer that question. But, ah, how
much time have you got?”

“
Fifteen
minutes, twenty tops.”

He
hooked a hand around the back of her head and brought her mouth close
to his. “I can work with that.”

Chapter 7

Troy
walked into Amy’s building just after noon and looked around
him. The slick publishing offices were the exact opposite of the
firehouse where he spent half his life. It just reinforced exactly
how different they were, in so many ways.

When
Amy was with him and in his arms, he didn’t have any doubts he
couldn’t handle. But the moment she left that morning, the
voice in his head started to chant,
What the hell are you
thinking?

He
glanced down at his jeans and sweatshirt. He probably should have
dressed up for lunch. As he was, he looked like a janitor among all
the suits around him. Did he even own anything to dress up in? That
was one more reason why he didn’t belong with Amy—she was
cashmere while he was denim. As if he needed another reason besides
the obvious one that he’d managed to ignore last night while
they were having mind-blowing sex, the fact that she normally slept
with women.

“
Well
if it isn’t Mr. Hunky Fireman.” Henri’s head popped
up from behind the walls of a cubicle. “I have to thank you.
Amy hasn’t been in such a good mood in a very, very long time.
She’s actually bearable to be around. You must be some
hunka-hunka burning love.”

He
felt his face color. “She told you?”

“
Honey,
she didn’t have to. I know these things.” Henri rolled
his eyes at him. “Oh please, stop being shy. If it makes you
feel any better, she tried to deny it.”

Troy
wasn’t sure if that made him feel better or not. He glanced at
his watch. He was a few minutes early to meet Amy so he decided to
take the opportunity to pick Henri’s brain. “Hey, can I
ask you something?”

“
Please,
I’m all ears. Well, not quite all…”

He
shook that off and continued. “Do you think that a person can
choose to change their sexual preference? Or are you just gay or not
and that’s it?”

“
Why,
sweetie? Are you planning on changing for me? Because if you are, I
have to warn you that at the moment, I’m taken.”

“
Forget
it. It was a stupid question.” Troy was about to drop the whole
subject when Henri sobered.

“
No,
it’s not stupid. All I know is it would have been a hell of a
lot easier growing up if I could have chosen to be straight. I even
tried having sex with a few girls back in the day, but you can see
how that turned out. Why are you so interested?”

So
even if Amy wanted to change for him, chances were she couldn’t.

“
No
reason.” Troy shrugged and tried not to let Henri see the
disappointment on his face. He took a deep breath and suddenly felt
like the walls were too close, particularly the wall with the sign
that read Amy Gerald on it just past Henri’s desk. “Can
you give Amy a message for me? Just tell her something came up and I
had to cancel.”

“
Sure.”
Henri’s face showed his contempt. He pursed his lips then
turned and didn’t look back.

In
the elevator Troy ran his hand over his face. “Shit.”

He
got into his car not knowing where he was going, just that he had to
get away from there. He drove until he found himself in front of the
firehouse even though he had no recollection of how he got there.
Actually, as he looked up at the place that was his second home, he
wasn’t that surprised he’d ended up there after all. He
didn’t want to go back to his apartment, too many memories of
Amy there. The smell of her was still on his sheets. His heart
clenched just thinking about her.

Walking
around the back, he found Antonio shooting hoops.

He
glanced over at Troy, then took a shot that sailed through the hoop
easily. “Hey. What are you doing here? You swapped shifts and
worked another double, silly. You’re off today. Did you
forget?”

“
I
didn’t forget.” Troy hesitated. “Can we talk?”

Antonio
stopped dribbling the ball and took a closer look at Troy’s
face. “What happened?”

Troy
told Antonio everything then waited for his reaction.

“
So
you just left her an impersonal message and left? That was a pretty
shitty thing to do.” Antonio shook his head.

“
She
and I can’t possibly work, Antonio. It’s better to end it
sooner rather than later. And if I had seen her, I wouldn’t
have been able to break it off.”

“
Why
can’t it work?”

“
You
know why.”

Antonio
let out a short laugh. “How can you still think she’s a
lesbian after having a night of kick-ass sex? I think this has
nothing to do with Amy. It’s you. You’re afraid of
falling in love and losing control.”

Troy
rolled his eyes. “Here we go with the psycho-babble again.”

“
Call
it whatever you want, but I’m right. One day you’ll admit
that.” Antonio passed the ball to Troy. “So what are you
going to do? She’s still living across the hall, right?”

Troy
bounced the ball a few times, took a shot and missed. He laughed
bitterly. “Hide out here until tomorrow when Maria gets home
and Amy moves back to her own place, I guess.”

Antonio
retrieved the loose ball and made the next shot before glancing at
Troy. “Coward.”

Inwardly,
Troy couldn’t agree more.

~

Across
town, Amy finally ended an eternally long conference call and emerged
from her office feeling like she was on the top of the world. It was
a perfect day. Her boss had loved her idea and her book proposal. And
she was totally falling for Troy. For once, both her work life and
love life stars had aligned. She glanced at her watch. Hmm, speaking
of her love life, Troy was late.

She
walked to Henri’s desk. “Henri, did Troy call for me
while I was on the conference call?”

Henri
stood and hugged her. “Oh, sweetie.”

Amy’s
eyes flew open. “Why are you being nice to me? Oh, my god, did
someone die? Is Troy hurt?”

Henri
held her by each shoulder. “I hate to be the one to tell you
this but Troy’s come and gone. He told me to tell you that
something came up.”

She
breathed a sigh of relief. “Jeez. Why did you scare me like
that? So something came up, I understand that. He probably got called
back into the firehouse or something.”

Henri
shook his head. “I don’t think that was it, sweetie. It
didn’t seem like that to me.”

She
frowned. What did Henri know about straight men anyway? “I’ll
just call him.”

With
shaking hands she picked up her phone back in her office, dialed the
operator and asked for the number for Ladder Company #3. It took
about five minutes, which seemed more like an hour, to finally get
Troy on the phone. Just the fact that he was there at the firehouse
made her feel better. Of course she had to be right about his getting
called back into work. What else could it be?

“
Amy.
Did you get my message?” Her relief was short lived. His voice
sounded weird. Why did he seem so serious?

“
Yeah.
I’m sorry you had to go back into work. Is it for long? Do you
know when you’ll be off again?” She stood and started to
pace as far as the cord would let her as a feeling of dread began to
grow.

He
hesitated for a long time. Finally when he spoke she knew, he was
dumping her. “Amy, look. I think it’s better if we just
don’t see each other right now.”

Her
heart pounded. “Right now? Or never.”

He
released a long breath. “I don’t know.”

She
laughed bitterly. “Well when you do, why don’t you let me
know?” She waited for his response, practically kicking
herself.

If
she were a stronger person, she would have slammed the phone down
right then. It would have been the perfect dramatic ending to this
shitty phone call. But instead, here she was hanging on and hoping
against hope that the next words he spoke would be to tell her he had
made a mistake and he’d be right over.

“
Take
care of yourself, Amy.” Then she heard a click. It was the
worst sound she had ever heard.

She
shouldn’t cry at work. It wasn’t professional. But at the
moment she didn’t care. Amy slid down the wall. Sitting on the
floor, she hugged her knees and sobbed.

Chapter 8

Late
Friday morning Troy figured it was safe to go back to his apartment.
Amy should be at work and Maria would be returning that day. But the
minute he unlocked the door and entered, he realized he wasn’t
safe at all. He stood in the living room where he had first thrown
away all of his doubts. He remembered how he had pressed Amy up
against the door and kissed her breathless.

If
he felt this bad in the living room, he couldn’t even imagine
how bad the bedroom was going to make him feel. A glutton for
punishment, he walked in anyway. He hadn’t made the bed and he
could still see the imprint of two heads on the pillows. He reached
down and smoothed the pillowcase to erase the image of her there with
him. That didn’t work because the memory was seared into his
brain. He had a feeling it would never go away.