The Lovely Garden (11 page)

The sigh he released was heavy and tired with a hint of relief. “Yes.”

I gave him a reassuring smile. “Good.” The smell of the alcohol permeated my nose, bringing it to the forefront of my thoughts. “Do you want to take a shower?” I indicated the stain on his shirt.

His eyes turned to his and his face fell. “Yeah. I guess I’m going to have to.” He stood and I got out of the way. My bathroom wasn’t the roomiest around, and both of us standing together put us nearly chest-to-chest. I wanted to touch him. To wrap my arms around his waist and melt into him. But it wasn’t the right time for that. I did, however, get a kiss. It was short and filled my body with warmth. “Thank you,” he said, resting his forehead on mine.

“For what?”

“Not prying.”

It was my turn to kiss him, a reassuring smile on my face. “I do expect you to tell me though. When you feel it’s right.” He didn’t need me being pushy right then, and I could wait.

There was a hint of a smile until his face fell, and he leaned heavily into me with a sigh. “I don’t have any extra clothes,” he muttered to himself more than me.

“Yes, you do.” There were the clothes we had left here after eating breakfast at my dad’s diner. I had washed them, meaning to return them, but hadn’t seen him since Monday.

Charles worked up a smile this time, his eyes glowing. “Never thought I would be so happy to see a pair of sweatpants and a shirt.”

A light laugh came out of me. “Towels and washcloths are under the sink. I only have girly soap and shampoo, so you’ll have to deal with that.” Some guys have a problem with it, some guys don’t. Charles was the latter, just giving me a shrug and said “Beggars can’t be choosers.”

I gave him one last peck on the cheek before heading back into the living room, closing the door behind me. I headed to the kitchen and uncorked the bottle of wine. Grabbing it and the wine glasses, I took them into the living room, giving the bottle some time to breathe.

By the time I reached the living room and settled into my chair, the shower had turned on. I didn’t know what to do, so I turned on the TV and started to flip through the channels. There was nothing that caught my interest. My mind kept wandering to Charles and what had happened to him. And when it wasn’t reeling about that, it was imaging what he was doing in the shower. The water rolling off of his muscular back. Soap suds sliding down his front forming pools at his feet. The rag running up and down his body.

My panties started to get soaked, and I needed something to distract me. Sex wasn’t currently on the menu, considering the state Charles had been in. He was almost catatonic. What he needed was some comfort, which I could provide for him.

The shower turned off and soon he joined me in the living room, looking very refreshed. “Better?” I asked as he spread himself out on my ugly, yet comfy, couch. He gave me a small smile and nodded. “Good.” I got off my chair and moved to him, placing myself between his legs. My hands wound around his waist and I rested my head on his chest. His fingers found my hair and started to play with it. “Charles?” I called to him softly.

“Hmm?” He answered, winding a strand of hair around his finger.

I squeezed him tighter. “I don’t ever want to see you like that again.” My eyes met his. “I know we’ve only been together for a
really
short time, but I care about you. Seeing you like that scared me.” I gave him a mock grimace. “I thought I was going to have to fight someone. I’m terrible at fighting.”

He chuckled and my chest warmed. That was what I wanted to hear. I couldn’t stand to see him in that state, and I truly didn’t ever want to see it again. “Sweet, Amy. Always caring for others.” More than he knew. “I’m sorry I scared you.” He traced my cheekbone with a gentle finger.

I shook my head as much as his chest would allow. “It’s not your fault. It’s whoever did that to you’s fault. And I can say, I don’t like them very much.” There was no doubt in my mind that it was his sister that had attacked him. With the tidbit of information Rebecca had given me and his reaction at seeing Ava in the garden were enough clues to tell me that. The question was why? Why did she hurt Charles and how could she? He was her brother! You’re supposed to protect your siblings, not hurt them.

“If I have my way you’ll never meet them.” I didn’t think I wanted to meet her anyways. It wasn’t going to go well.

A silence fell between us. Listening to his heart and him playing with my hair nearly lulled me to sleep, and so I needed to break it. “Why didn’t you ask me out sooner?” It had been bothering me since Monday. He had said that he had been waiting a while for us to get together, but he never made an attempt before to ask me out. Not that I recalled, at least.

“Mostly because every time I saw you after we first met, you were drunk.” That would explain a lot. “Also, out of respect for William and Jennifer. Your Jennifer’s best friend and I’m William’s boss. I didn’t know how well they would have taken it. And you didn’t show up to any parties for a while.” His hand stilled and he rested it on my shoulder blades. “It took a while to convince Jennifer to set us up as well.”

“Of course, it did. You actually wanted to date me.” That should have stayed a thought. My bitterness is something that I try to keep a cap on. I love Jennifer. She’s like a sister to me, but this trying to find me a husband thing just irritated me. She thought she knew what was best for me, and never asked my opinion. In the end, she hooked me up with men who have no interest me and are usually dicks because they expected someone that looked like her, not me.

“That sounded bitter.”

“That’s because it was.” I sighed, resting my chin on his chest to look him in the face. “If I tell you something, will you promise never to tell anyone else?” He nodded, squeezing me closer to him. “Before Billy and Jenny were dating, me and Billy were.” Charles tensed at that, but kept his mouth shut. I silently thanked him for that. “He dumped me for her. That’s really not my dark secret though. Pretty much everyone knows that.” I turned away from him, couldn’t face him for this one. “I was in love with him. It tore me to pieces when he left me for Jenny. I apparently have a really good poker face, or they both pretended they didn’t notice. I don’t know which is worse.”

“Do you still love him?” His voice was terribly neutral, which made his worry obvious.

I smiled and shook his head. “Not in that way. He’s like a brother to me, now. So, you have nothing to worry about.” I had to give him shit. But I still wasn’t finished with my story. “My bitterness is mostly due to her trying to find me a husband.” Even Charles cringed. “She thinks she knows what’s best for me and ends up hooking me up with douches. You have been the only exception so far, but you actually were interested in me beforehand. I had started to give up, really. Getting less interested.”

“Sounds like I’m lucky you gave me a shot.”

“You kind of are, honestly. I was looking for any excuse to walk out on our first date, and I mean any.” And then I decided that I was going to have a one-night stand with him, and the rest is history. I smiled at him. “I’m glad that you were wonderful. I haven’t been this happy in a while.”

His fingers slid through my hair. It was a little rougher than before and my heart sped up and my panties moistened. Oh god, what this man did to me. “You make me happy, as well. I didn’t expect our date to go as well as it did either. Like you, I don’t have the best of luck with dates.”

I grinned at him. “Now, you have to tell me, do you have any exes I should be worried about?”

Hesitation. Hesitation was never good. Please tell me I wasn’t going to have to worry about some psycho killing me in my sleep or him leaving me for an ex he never got fully over. “There is one, but you don’t have to worry about her.” Okay, then why the hesitation? “Ava, my sister, likes her.” Oh. So, I had to worry about his sister, still. That’s just lovely.

He sighed. “Rose will act like she’s better than you, but she’s really kind. My sister just manipulates her into believing she’s the only one for me.” A grim smile darkened his face. “Rose hangs onto her every word. It’s sickening, but nothing I ever say or do changes anything. I think it’s part Rose still being in love with me and not wanting to let go, and the other part, my sister being the terrible human being she is.”

“Tell me how you really feel, Mr. Bonner.” It was a Jones’ natural instinct to lighten the mood.

“Amy,” he chided, attempting to hide his smile, “this is serious.”

I adjusted myself so I could hold his face in my hands, and my chest was flush against his. “I know. You were just getting upset.” His heart had started to race and his hand grew heavier on my back, as if he were stopping himself from gripping my shirt. “I don’t like seeing you upset.”

His lips brushed against my palm. “I’m sorry. Talking about my sister is not easy for me, especially to someone else. Generally, I try to act as if she doesn’t exist. It’s a lot easier than explaining that my sister should be in a mental hospital, but my parents influence and now her husband’s keeps her out of it.”

“Yet, you told me.”

“That I did.” His arms wrapped around me, pulling me into him more, and kissed the tip of my nose. My arms instinctively wrapped around his neck. “I trust you.” And I trusted him, too, even though we had no reason to. We have only been dating for a week. We’ve pretty much have only known each other for a week. Yet, there was something about him that made me want to trust him. If I hadn’t, I wouldn’t have told him about Billy and my heartbreak, something only my parents knew about; I never told them, they just knew, because, well, parents.

I ran a finger down the scratch on his neck. He flinched, from pain both physical and mental. “Why did your sister do this to you?”

“I refused to stop seeing you.” Well, not the answer I was expecting, but it made my chest swell with pride. Not that he got injured because of me, but because he wanted to be with me. Ava hurting him pissed me off. I would punch her, if I didn’t think she would kick my ass. “She wants me to be miserable for the rest of my life. It’s the only thing that would make her happy, or so she says.”

Holy shit, his sister was a fucking bitch! Hearing that made me happy my parents never had a second kid. I didn’t think I would survive to adulthood if I had had a sibling like that. “Well, there’s not much I can do about her, but I can try my best to make you happy to spite her.” There was an enigmatic smile on his face. “Now, Mr. Bonner, kiss me.”

CHAPTER EIGHT

“Remind me what we’re supposed to be doing tonight?” Charles asked for the fifth time. We stood in my small bedroom getting ready for Jenny and Billy’s party, and he was hogging the mirror on top of my dresser. He was tying his tie and getting on my nerves at the same time.

“You know exactly what we’re doing.” If he said it one more goddamn time, I was going to kick him in the shin. As hard as I could, which was pretty damn hard. Though he would probably use it as an excuse to not go to the party, and he was going to go. This had been the plan for two weeks now, and I wasn’t going to break it, especially since it was Jenny’s announcement party though not with her family- yeah, I didn’t get it either. Not that Charles knew that. I hadn’t told anyone that she was pregnant.

With his tie finally straight, he moved away from the mirror so I could put on my make-up. “I know, I know. The party. I was just hoping they would cancel so we could stay the night inside. I hate social events.” He came behind me, wrapped his arms around my waist and rested his chin on top of my head.

“I know you do. I hate them, too, but we already said we would go, and we can’t back out now. Jenny would kill me.” I grabbed my foundation and gave it a good shake.

“Don’t wear makeup,” he pleaded. “You look fine without it.”

“You just don’t want all the other men hanging on me all night.” I tease, grinning at him through the mirror.

“It’s true, and I’ll use any underhanded method to make sure you stay mine.” He buried his face into my neck, nipping at crook. Despite my best efforts, a moan still left me. His hands moved down and he started to play with the hem of my dress. “This is the same dress you wore to our first date.” I nodded, biting my lip when his fingers brushed my thighs. “Do you know how hard it was, not to crawl under the table and get a taste of you?”

I groaned. “You really know how to make a girl wet, don’t you?”

“Seems so,” he said, brushing his fingers across my moist panties. I could feel the smirk on his face when I gasped. He started to rub my clit through my panties, nibbling on my earlobe, and free hand squeezing a breast.

“We don’t have time for this,” I panted when his fingers became more insistent. Why had he started this now? We had only been together a month, but he knew I didn’t like to be late.

His hand slid under my dress and bra, teasing a nipple. “I just want a taste, Amy. Please?” I found myself nodding my head, all sense having been thrown out the window. He removed both hands from under my dress. “Turn around.” The gruffness in his voice made me shiver in anticipation.

I turned around and met his eyes. There was a look in those light brown orbs that I wasn’t used to seeing. Desire. More specifically, desire for me. Men wanted to sleep with me and would, but no man had ever wanted all of me as Charles did. It was enough to a woman start to fall in love, which I was. And hard.